Sunday evening’s finale of The White Lotus Season 2 was an motion packed, if underwhelming, conclusion to a season of lies, manipulation, and the facade of extravagant wealth. With an uncharacteristically long term time of an hour and 17 minutes, author/director Mike White needed to wrap up the storylines of an entire forged of characters, leaving it unclear which, if any, of them will seem within the following season. Tanya’s assistant Portia (Haley Lu Richardson), specifically, had probably the most harrowing journey, making it to the ultimate scene on the Catania Airport by the pores and skin of her enamel.
What Happened within the Season Finale of ‘The White Lotus?’
“Arrivederci” picks up the place the earlier episode left off, with Tanya (Jennifer Coolidge) waking up in Quentin’s (Tom Hollander) villa in Palermo after a cocaine fueled get together, and Portia waking up in Cefalù with Jack (Leo Woodall) after coping with his belligerent drunkenness the evening earlier than. Tanya and Portia initially traveled to Quentin’s villa collectively, however Jack whisks Portia away to discover Cefalù throughout the day, purposely preserving her from going to the get together by getting so intoxicated he’s unable to drive them again. The two are pressured to get a lodge room, and earlier than Jack passes out, he drunkenly reveals that Quentin and his buddies aren’t as rich as they appear, and that Quentin “rescued him” from his previous life. Confused and suspicious, the subsequent morning Portia wakes as much as her cellphone lacking from her nightstand, which Jack is fast to brush off, insisting they spend the day collectively earlier than going again to Taormina. When she later tries to prod Jack into admitting he took her cellphone, he reveals that Tanya, Quentin, and the remainder of the get together are already on the boat on their means again to Taormina, leaving Portia no different alternative however to drive again with him. At this level, concern is already beginning to settle in, and when Jack leaves his cellphone behind to make use of the toilet, Portia makes a frantic name to Tanya, her solely lifeline in Italy.
Portia’s Real Life Horror Movie
After her cellphone name with Tanya, the place they begin placing the items collectively to the bigger conspiracy to kill her and Tanya reveals that she caught Jack having intercourse together with his “uncle” Quentin, Portia enters a full state of panic. She tells Tanya, “I just have this really weird feeling that something bad is going to happen.” This cellphone name is a turning level within the episode for each Tanya and Portia. The unraveling of the homicide plot towards her, together with the truth that she is the one returning character from Season 1, make it comparatively clear that Tanya goes to be one of many our bodies Daphne discovers within the ocean. With this in thoughts, the viewers has recognized because the first episode that a number of our bodies are discovered, leaving the viewer to surprise if Portia will likely be one of many others.
From this level ahead, Portia is totally at midnight. Her cellphone continues to be lacking, and she or he’s not sure of Tanya’s whereabouts and of Jack’s true intentions. She resides a girl’s worst nightmare: trapped with a person she hardly is aware of in a rustic whose language she does not communicate, with no mobile phone to contact anybody for assist. When Jack’s true character begins coming to gentle, he grows more and more annoyed along with her, wanting her to cease questioning him and “let him do his job.” For the rest of the episode, we watch as Portia’s life devolves into the plot of a horror movie, full with the poor decision-making you’ll count on to see from a girl who’s about to get killed in a slasher film. She has a number of possibilities to get away from Jack—when he’s handed out drunk on the lodge, when he leaves his cellphone behind on the café, when he will get out of the automotive to smoke a cigarette — however she by no means does. She additionally makes the mind-boggling determination to attend to confront Jack about his lies, and even outright asks him if she’s being kidnapped – however not till she’s inside a locked automotive with him.
In Defense of Portia
These are the sort of selections that make viewers scratch their heads or yell at their screens for Portia to belief her intestine and get the hell out of there, however is that this conduct purposeful or just poor characterization? She and Jack have been concerned in a short fling, and he immediately begins exhibiting abusive behaviors when Portia begins to point out indicators of resistance. He steals her cellphone, and when he discovers her utilizing his cellphone to name Tanya, he snatches it out of her hand. When she confronts him within the automotive he immediately shouts to get her to close up. When she insists that she desires to return to Taormina he turns it round on her, attempting to make her really feel responsible for not desirous to spend their final day collectively, and refusing to drive her again.
Perhaps her questionable selections weren’t made out of sheer stupidity however out of self-preservation. Up till this level she might have been underneath the impression that the 2 of them had some form of connection, and that he cared about her not less than a bit of bit, as a fellow human being if nothing else. Maybe she was cognizant of all the probabilities she needed to escape however felt responsible leaving Jack with no cellphone or technique to get again. Portia does not reveal a lot about her previous romantic relationships, but it surely is not fully inconceivable that she might have handled this type of manipulative conduct earlier than. Considering Season 2’s commentary on masculinity and gender dynamics, it is unfair to put a lot blame on Portia in such a terrifying state of affairs, contemplating the ability imbalance at play of their relationship coupled along with her data of the bigger plot towards Tanya.
Portia’s complicated response in direction of this distressing state of affairs might be intentional, to point out her naïveté and spotlight her similarities to Tanya, or may merely be the product of shoddy writing. Every episode is written and directed by a person, and it may merely be that Mike White did not totally take into account how a girl would realistically act in such a harmful state of affairs. When Jack finally drops Portia off on the aspect of the street close to the airport, he reminds her that she’s good, a lot smarter than him. But not good sufficient to ditch a person she hardly is aware of on the first signal of hazard? Its unclear if Portia will return in Season 3, but when she does, hopefully extra gentle will likely be shed on her decision-making on this state of affairs, or if her character merely suffered from poor characterization within the last episode, through which so many different storylines needed to be wrapped up as nicely.