‘The White Lotus’ Episode 6: Brotherly Love

This post contains spoilers for the latest episode of The White Lotus, “Denials,” which is now streaming on Max. 

First comes the rush, then the regret. Last week’s episode was easily the season’s wildest, full of sex, drugs, and Walton Goggins delivering a master class in demonstrating that all acting is reacting. “Denials” is set the day after most of the guests partied too hard, and now they have to reckon with the choices they made that night — some of which they barely remember. 

Let’s again take it group by group, starting with the people who had a relatively mellow evening last time compared to, say, the Ratliff brothers. 

Belinda 

This should be a wonderful day for Belinda, right? Her son Zion (whom we met in the season’s flash-forward opening scene) finally arrives at the resort, and is mostly just amused to realize that his mom just slept with Pornchai. And Pornchai suggests that he and Belinda could team up to make her dream of running her own spa come true. Family, sex, potential professional advancement, gorgeous scenery… the world is her oyster, no? 

But there remains the spectre of Greg, who approaches Belinda and invites her to a party at his house. Earlier in the episode, we see him tell Chloe that he needs her help to “deal with something.” We know from the second season how far he will go to deal with problems, and Chloe could be a useful alibi for him depending on his plans. That said, it feels almost too obvious for him to try to kill Belinda, given that we already saw him take out a hit on Tanya, so perhaps he is going to try for the carrot, rather than the stick? 

Pornchai’s offer, meanwhile, is more complicated than he thinks. It’s not just that they’ve only known each other for a few days, only had sex once, and that mixing business with pleasure has a high potential for messiness. It’s that Belinda has already had this particular football snatched away from her, Lucy Van Pelt-style, once before with Tanya. This isn’t quite the same thing, because Pornchai isn’t the heir to a family fortune and intends for a more straightforward partnership. But Belinda understandably has her guard up, not wanting to have her heart broken a second time on this subject. 

But just as Greg trying to kill her would risk feeling like a rehash of Season Two, Belinda going all in on the spa idea and having it fall apart could risk doing the same with Season One. Things ended well for several members of the Sicilian staff; maybe Belinda will be similarly rewarded this time? 

Tim, Victoria, and Piper

The episode begins with an obnoxious fake-out where Tim imagines killing himself, before sending most of the Ratliffs, save Saxon, off to the monastery so Tim and Victoria can have a look around this place where their daughter intends to live for at least a year. Victoria naturally is disgusted by everything about it, and still can’t fathom why Piper would subject herself to this lifestyle — and, for that matter, subject her family to the public humiliation of knowing that she has stayed here. But Tim’s whole world is collapsing, with suicide feeling like the best possible outcome. So he’s more open to the experience than he would have been at any other moment in his lifetime. He has a genuine conversation with the head monk, whose discussion of why Westerners like Piper show interest in coming here — ”Spiritual malaise. Lost connection with nature, with the family. Lost connection with the spirit. What is left? The self, identity. Chasing money, pleasure, yeah?” — resonates with everything Tim is feeling at the moment. He has spent his life chasing money and pleasure, and encouraged his children to do the same, and where has it gotten him, and them? Everything Tim believed has brought him to the brink of ruin, so why shouldn’t Piper try the opposite of that?   

The monk’s description of death as “a happy return,” meanwhile, only strengthens his resolve in the idea of killing himself — and then Victoria inadvertently puts herself in danger by telling him that she doesn’t know if she’d want to live if they lost all their money. Because Gaitok has retrieved the stolen gun, Tim at the moment doesn’t have an easy means of pulling off the murder-suicide about which he is fantasizing. But there are still guns on the premises, and perhaps we are heading to a point where the active shooter will be him trying to annihilate his entire family, with other guests and staff catching strays along the way. That feels incredibly dark for this series, though.  

Gaitok

Another White Lotus staffer seemingly enjoying a great day that never actually feels that great. While the Ratliffs are at the monastery, Gaitok searches their villa and eventually finds the pistol, and he is so beneath the notice of the wealthy guests that Tim and Victoria don’t even clock him as they pass each other on the way back inside. And when his boss takes him to the shooting range, Gaitok proves a very good shot. But the boss’ question about whether Gaitok has the “killer instinct” portends trouble. Because this is not a guy with a killer instinct, nor is he someone who seems like he should ever be trusted with a loaded weapon — especially since his primary goal remains trying to impress a woman who seems to have friend-zoned him. 

Rick and Frank

There’s no follow-up to Frank’s monologue about his former fascination with Thai ladyboys. Instead, our brief glimpse of the old friends is just setting us up for whatever’s coming in next week’s episode, when Rick will finally get a chance to confront Jim Hollinger. We do at least finally hear Scott Glenn’s voice at the very end of the episode. And before that, Rick insists to Frank that he doesn’t actually want to kill Jim, but, “I need him to know how bad he fucked me up.” We still don’t know if that’s what he really wants, nor do we yet know if Jim is his father’s killer or just his father, though I’d place my wager on the latter. (And if I’m wrong, then Glenn and Goggins need to play father and son in some other project, ASAP.)  

Jaclyn, Kate, and Laurie

And here’s where the denials and recriminations really come in, as the old pals go from passive-aggressive sniping to full-on hostility. Kate assumes that Laurie will be amused to learn that Jaclyn had sex with Valentin, because earlier in the trip they both mocked their famous pal’s hyperbolic descriptions of her new marriage. Laurie, though, is just hurt. She may never have actually believed that Valentin would sleep with her — may not have even wanted it, at least not in the sober light of day — but she let herself believe that Jaclyn was being sincere in her attempts to help her have a vacation fling with a hot younger guy. Instead, as has been the case with them at least since the 10th grade, Jaclyn takes the biggest prize for herself as her birthright, leaving Laurie once again feeling like the loser Jaclyn only keeps around so she can feel better about herself in comparison. Jaclyn is caught between guilt over cheating on Harrison — who finally returns her many calls and acts as hopelessly in love with her as she claimed he was with the other women — and defensive indignation at being called out for her usual behavior by little Laurie. And Kate — who has always been the least comfortable of the trio of talking behind the others’ backs — finds herself catching strays, with Laurie calling her a fake, even as Kate insists, “One person’s fake is another person’s good manners.” The White Lotus as a whole is generally on the side of honesty over feigned politeness, but Laurie is going so nuclear, so quickly, that perhaps this will turn out to be an exception. Or maybe it will be Laurie snapping and shooting at everyone in her sight? 

Saxon and Lochlan

In terms of present-day action, the brothers don’t do a whole lot in this episode. Lochlan accompanies the rest of the family to the monastery, Saxon hangs out by the pool, and both of them nurse terrible hangovers from all the booze and drugs they ingested the night before with Chelsea(*) and Chloe.

(*) Rick’s side quest in Bangkok has left Chelsea a bit adrift as a character. She’s a fun foil for Saxon, given her complete disdain for a young man she dubs soulless and sad, but most of her conflict to this point has revolved around her love for an older man who is deliberately so unlovable.  

Yet their dawning realization of what they did together is easily the episode’s most memorable development. At first, it seems that Saxon was merely passed out near next to Lochlan and Chloe as they had sex. Then, the flashback evolves into Saxon masturbating right next to his brother having sex. And finally, each of them realizes that Lochlan was the one giving his brother a hand. It’s a natural extension of the creepy incest vibes established between the siblings in the season’s early chapters, with the drugs being the thing to finally break down the barrier between thought and action. On a series that has already featured Armond pooping on camera, Tanya shooting all the gays, and Tanya walking in on Leo having sex with his “uncle,” competition for the Most Shocking White Lotus Moment Ever is stiff, but this development is definitely up there. 

Will the nightmarish memory of being gratified by his kid brother be enough to make Saxon snap and start shooting everyone in sight? Probably not. But this is a show where a lot of strange things happen.