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“Hide and Seek” felt like half an episode — or, more generously, like the opening salvo to a wild two-parter. We boarded Gary’s superyacht but didn’t make it to the full-moon party. The girls found a club with a vibe but no one’s made any bad decisions. After breakfast, Rick and Amrita bid each other fond adieu, but that man is still kicking around Samui. Piper’s parents are sitting at the dinner table, but she hasn’t dropped the bomb. More menacingly, Timothy Ratliff has stolen Gaitok’s handgun from the hotel security booth, but he hasn’t pulled the trigger … as he must.
It’s not that I think that Tim or anyone who loves him should die. It’s just a little white-collar crime, dude — take a deep breath and remember Martha Stewart. But when a character commits an act that’s so desperately uncharacteristic, something needs to happen. We’ve been conditioned to think murder is a bookend to The White Lotus experience, and, of course, we’ve already glimpsed a preview of shots being fired while Zion — a character who’s not even made it to the resort at this point — meditates. But what’s to stop Chekhov’s gun from going off twice?
Showrunner Mike White nearly teases the idea himself when he sends Jaclyn, Kate, and Laurie on the run from a ragtag gang of kids armed with Super Soakers — a blissfully chaotic local Thai New Year tradition. I was momentarily starting to like Jaclyn this episode. Sure, she’s the most high maintenance (who thinks she’s low maintenance) of the trio, but she’s also the one to finally cancel the yogathon in favor of actual fun, admirably pushing through Kate’s draining “I’m too old for this” routine. And when Valentin steers the girls in the direction of an all-inclusive resort catering to fleshy, sun-charred seniors, Jaclyn immediately calls it. Every group needs a night-chaser like her. Someone willing to bulldoze the “Well, we just got drinks, let’s see if it picks up” inertia and corral everyone back into the Uber.
Or, in this case, a disco rickshaw. The girls swing by the hotel to kidnap Val and demand that he — and buddies Vlad and Aleksei — take them out to a real party to make up for sending them to Club Almost Dead. “You’re our butler,” Jackie reminds him when Val lightly protests that he can’t skip work to rip shots at noon. It’s a morsel of perfect writing. Health mentor, life coach, bodyguard, waiter, whatever. To the obscenely wealthy, there are only two types of people: people and their butlers.
It all feels like it’s careening toward loose debauchery until they get to town. In town, these ladies let themselves down, because an extreme aversion to splashing is one of the few legit red flags a person can wave. Get a life. You’ll dry eventually and most people look better damp. I hooted when the girls sought refuge from the water-gun army in a mini-mart, and I’ll never get over my disappointment that they didn’t arm themselves from inside the store to fight their way back into the Songkran mêlée. Some people just aren’t joiners. Some people need to control the preconditions for fun.
I suppose the same story unfolds at the episode’s other “party” — Gary and Chloe’s boat “party,” which isn’t really a rager but more of a stand-and-chat. If you’ve ever wondered how rich Tanya McQuoid was, I think we have our answer. Greg’s sitting on ten bajillion square feet of floating real estate, plus his glass-walled mansion on the hill. He must make intriguing company for Tim Ratliff, who is so stoned off pilfered benzos that he’s letting it all hang out, from his junk to his anxious musings. Thank God his parents are too dead to see their son’s ignominious end; too bad everyone at the country club isn’t dead. What kind of life could Tim buy for himself and Victoria if they never went back home? His lawyer warns that his assets are likely already frozen, but what about the cash Tim has stashed in other places? Offshore accounts. Trusts for his kids. Could Victoria be a boat person if Tim really needed her to be?
Probably not. She’s allergic to the white men who make themselves at home in Thailand, marrying — or just stringing along — gorgeous Thai girls less than half their age. Hot, loud, and louche, Gary and Chloe’s yacht is her personal hell. Victoria prefers things prim and respectable. All smooching should happen behind closed doors, and all drug abuse should happen under the guise of a doctor’s prescription. Piper lingers invisibly at the periphery of the party, though Victoria is right to call her the most judgmental member of the family. The difference between Piper and Victoria isn’t a matter of open-mindedness; it’s a matter of comportment.
The Ratliff who’s really coming into his own at this party is Lochlan. The kid is holding court. He’s crushing beers. He’s doing magic. These women don’t care that he’s protecting himself with his feminine side when he sits down; it’s all about the prestige, baby. I cringed to hear Saxon tell his brother that the girls on this boat were thirsty for “young come,” but I think that horndog might be kinda right. They’re attracted to Lochlan’s vitality, to his eagerness for their fun.
Greg largely doesn’t participate in the gathering he’s co-hosting, but he does superintend it. He observes from the top deck of his super cat as his girl low-key flirts with Saxon, who thinks sawatdee kha is pronounced “swastikhaaa.” When Chloe asks Greg for permission to take the boat to a neighboring island without him for a big party, he briefly hesitates. Does he actually want Chloe to go to this party without him? Does he want her to think that he doesn’t want her to go to this party? He tells Chloe he’s too busy to join, but doing what? We catch him asking Fabian some questions in the hotel lobby, presumably about Belinda — a five-minute task that definitely could have waited until tomorrow. With a little light internet stalking, Greg learns that Belinda has a son, which strikes me as good news for all. Visit her at the hotel, threaten the kid, and solve the problem. Bada-bing, bada-boom.
Because really, why should Belinda care enough to risk herself in any way? She finally Googles Tanya McQuoid and learns that the heiress drowned suspiciously off the coast of Italy. Not to be harsh, but … good riddance. Tanya is no one to Belinda — a barnacle of a past life that never materialized. I remember being confused by Belinda’s character in season one, surprised that she would hang so much on the promises of a hotel guest. It occurs to me now that the Maui season must have taken place soon after Zion left home for college. Belinda was reconstituting a life that used to revolve around raising a son. But here she is in her new life. Her beautiful son is about to boomerang to her side. Maybe a little room service, a little romance. Why does it matter if Greg and Tanya are out there living the good life on Tanya’s money or if it’s just Greg? If I was Belinda, I would mind my business. I genuinely don’t care that much about individual instances of justice for the rich.
But you know what appeals to me? Vengeance. Thank God Rick got off that yacht and, seemingly, onto the puddle-jumper. I’d love to see Jim Hollinger suffer at the hands of the man he wronged or, as Chelsea puts it, find himself in a “You killed my father. Prepare to die” scenario. Truthfully, the more times Rick tells this sob story — and I am glad he finally unburdened himself to Chelsea, if only for Chelsea’s sake — the less plausible it sounds. Jim Hollinger murdered Rick’s dad in a land dispute between Jim and the local Thai population at some point between Rick’s conception and Rick’s birth? And also the body was never found? What if Rick’s dad was just a deadbeat who didn’t feel like leaving the boat party? What if he’s still alive, another LBH waiting to die in paradise?
“Anyone who moves to Thailand is either looking for something or hiding from something,” Tim suggests to Greg early in the episode. Greg and Tim are both hiding. Piper is seeking; she’s about to tell her parents that she wants to return to Samui for a yearlong Buddhism camp for white kids. What to make of Rick? Early in this episode, Amrita tells him that he doesn’t have to be stuck: “You can let go of your story.” It’s an intriguing complication for a plotline that, on its face, appears to be one of seeking. But you can lose yourself in the looking, too. You can be consumed by it.
Of course, Tim’s dichotomy only applies to the characters who flew here. The good news for Gaitok is that he has not lost his job at the White Lotus; the bad news is that management has decided to complicate the matter of his incompetence by issuing him a gun. My immediate worry was that he would hurt himself, but before Gaitok even fires the weapon, he loses it. I’ll give you three guesses whose fault it is. Fine, it’s Gatiok’s fault for not locking it away in the drawer. And I suppose Tim Ratliff’s, though having just learned from his lawyer that Kenny is cooperating with the Feds, he was basically obliged to take it.
Still, I think we can all agree that Mook isn’t entirely innocent here. In fact, her relentless “Who? Me! I’m entirely innocent” schtick is wearing thin. Stop being such a hoe, Mook. If she doesn’t like-like Gaitok, then she needs to quit giggling at him and visiting him in her cute dance costume. If she does like him, then they would have been on a proper date by now. I, too, was seduced by Mook’s girl next door routine, but now I see she’s wearing just a little too much lip gloss. What is she up to? Who is she working for? If Mook was hunting for a ticket to Bangkok on the arm of Khun Sritala’s bodyguard, she could just fuck one of her existing bodyguards.
Perhaps it’s all much simpler, much darker. The people who work at the White Lotus Thailand exist in a world of make-believe, where guests request waiters “bring the sun” alongside their breakfasts, and they’re expected to play along. Maybe Mook has no motive at all when she flirts with Gaitok. Maybe it’s just another part of her day in a life spent in a bubble where grown men play hide-and-seek and nothing much is real.
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