TV Review - The White Lotus

Looking back on this series after having seen all the episodes, I can't say that it possesses a single character that I liked, at least within the main cast. There were a couple of supporting or brief characters that were interesting, but the series focuses less on those people. The series bounces between three groups of people and I couldn't really find anything compelling or engaging about either group. The people on the periphery or the people surrounding those groups sparked my interest, but since those characters stayed on the periphery, it was hard for me to connect with this series.

Murray Bartlett (Tales of the City and Looking) stars as Armond, the manager of a hotel resort in Hawaii, known as the White Lotus. He's frustrated with his job, but he always does it with a smile on his face. He can be a little bitchy to his employees, but he seems to run the place fairly well. The only other things that we learn about Armond is that he's gay and he's a former addict either with drugs or alcohol or both. Arguably, Armond is a main character in this series, which could be described as an ensemble with no real protagonist. He's positioned as such, but this series doesn't delve into him as much as a protagonist would be. The series is limited to the confines of the resort, so it's not as if we ever go home with Armond and get a peek into his life beyond the walls of the White Lotus, which could be indicative of how consuming his job is and his lack of a life outside of it, or it could just be narrow vision of the writer and creator of this series, Mike White.

Steve Zahn (Rescue Dawn and Joy Ride) plays Mark Mossbacher, the husband to a woman who runs a huge tech company. Throughout the series, he feels emasculated in more ways than one. There is some tension between him and his wife, Nicole, played by Connie Britton (Nashville and Friday Night Lights). She's a bit of a control freak who arranges for this vacation but can't totally pry herself away from work. A lot of it probably stems from the issues that she has with her husband. However, what unites both Mark and Nicole are how they revel in their wealth and their privilege. Despite being liberal or most likely registered Democrats, they do seem insensitive to certain issues, especially to those that affect marginalized people like the Hawaiians who surround them at this resort.

I understand that exposing Mark and Nicole's insensitivity or ignorance in that regard is the point of this series. However, there are so many TV shows that center on wealthy white people that to have yet another isn't that insightful or unique. Focusing on wealthy white people and their marriage isn't something new that White is bringing to the table. A man who makes less money than his wife and him grappling with that is something that hasn't been that deeply explored in films or TV shows. That's a dynamic presented here, but White doesn't take the opportunity to really dig into that. It's something baked into the fabric but not really brought to the floor. Another such wrinkle is Mark learning that his father was gay posthumously. The series drops this revelation but then does nothing more with it, so I'm not sure what the point of it was. White drops this revelation like a turd only to then flush it away.

Alexandra Dadario (Baywatch and Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief) plays Rachel Patton, a newly wed who works as a journalist but she's now the wife to a wealthy man named Shane, played by Jake Lacy (High Fidelity and Fosse/Verdon) who seems to be only wealthy due to him being born to wealthy parents. He's a hunk but he's also a symbol of wealth and white privilege. He's a total jerk who feels entitled to everything and who fusses like a baby when he doesn't get what he wants. He forms a rivalry with Armond when he doesn't get the room that he wants, despite the honeymoon suite he has being perfectly fine. He's never satisfied. Somehow, Rachel didn't see this about him nor did she see the fact that she's basically his trophy wife. She doesn't want to be a trophy. She wants to have a meaningful career of her own. Her existential crisis really comes across as whiny and a reflection of her privilege as well, which I understand is what White is critiquing in her, but wallowing in it for six episodes isn't that entertaining or all that funny.

Jennifer Coolidge (Legally Blonde and American Pie) plays Tanya McQuoid, another wealthy white woman who is dealing with depression. She's come to Hawaii to spread the ashes of her deceased mother. She's single and is a woman of a certain age. She attaches herself to her massage therapist named Belinda, played by Natasha Rothwell (Insecure). Tanya suggests to Belinda that she start her own business and that Tanya could finance it. This excites Belinda and gets her hopes up, but it might not be something with which Tanya follows through. It's an example of how the rich often uses poor people, even befriending them building up their hopes only to dash them. Coolidge and Rothwell are both funny together and individually, which helps, but their story line favors Coolidge in a way that again tilts toward the privilege in a way that negates the ultimate point being made.

Sydney Sweeney (Euphoria and Sharp Objects) plays Olivia Mossbacher, the daughter to Mark and Nicole. She's a very progressive-minded teenage girl, but is also a walking reminder of white privilege. She's a hypocrite who doesn't know it or if she does, she doesn't truly care. She's friends with Paula, played by Brittany O'Grady (Star and The Messengers), a girl of mixed race but who is a person of color. She enjoys the privilege that comes with being friends with Olivia and her wealthy white family, even though she's literally sickened by it. The series does a better job of leaning into her point-of-view and her experiences, but she still feels a bit underdeveloped. Her character doesn't become interesting until the penultimate. Until then Paula just feels like a clone of Olivia and by that penultimate episode when she starts to become more distinguished, it almost feels like too little, too late.

What's sad is that I wanted more of one thing, but the show never delivers. Talk is made about the Hawaiian people who are exploited and used, as well as seemingly abused by the white people who have built the resort and who populate it. Yet, we don't really get much of an exploration of the lives of those Hawaiian people. The closest we get is a young man named Kai (pictured below), played by Kekoa Kekumano (Aquaman and Hawaii Five-0). Yet, the series dispatches with him and never revisits him or anything else in his life.

Brad Kalilimoku (Finding 'Ohana and Hawaii Five-0) plays an unnamed canoeist who is only seen from afar. White never even bothers to give him a close-up, so that we can see more of who he is. He's just a Hawaiian who is only viewed from a distance, from afar. This is emblematic of the way that the white people treat the Hawaiians in this story, but I feel like White should do better than ape what his characters are doing. He should bring us closer to these marginalized people. Kalilimoku deserved a close-up.

Rated TV-MA.
Running Time: 1 hr. / 6 eps.

Available on HBO.