The White Lotus finale is proof you don’t have to kill queer women to make good TV
The White Lotus season 2: Simona Tabasco as Lucia and Beatrice Grannò as Mia. (HBO/Sky)
Season two of The White Lotus came to a suitably chaotic ending last night, with enough treachery, infidelity and murder to sink a very expensive private yacht – or at least shoot everyone onboard it.
*Spoilers below – obviously*
Predictably, not everyone made it out of Sicily alive, with Jennifer Coolidge’s (iconic) Tanya having stayed at her last White Lotus resort after quite literally going overboard, taking the total body count to a staggering four – the other three being Quentin (Tom Hollander), Didier (Bruno Gouery) and Niccolo (Stefano Gianino).
The only characters to really receive a happy ending after their holiday romance are Mia and Lucia – Beatrice Grannò’s aspiring singer and Simona Tabascos’ sex worker.
After a long history of queer female characters either dying or having their series cancelled, it’s remarkable that Lucia, who had a brief tryst with hotel manager Valentina, and Mia, who is self-professedly “a little bit gay” too, are seen strolling through Sicily with their arms around each other as the various heterosexual marriages dissolve into feigned happiness covering dark secrets.
Fans have highlighted the two characters as the real winners of the finale, saying: “I know it wasn’t a competition, but they won”, after Mia was hired as the new singer of The White Lotus.
It’s unclear whether the two are just ‘good friends’, or whether they’ll be romantically involved, but by the end of the episode Mia is paid the money that Cameron owed her and received a lovely 50k in her bank account from Albie. Win.
The meme of the episode (and arguably series) has, unsurprisingly, involved Jennifer Coolidge. While trying to escape a boat full of murderous gays – which one fan pointed out is incredibly unrealistic within itself – Coolidge’s character, Tanya tells a member of staff: “These gays, they’re trying to murder me.”
This is actually true. The show’s finale revealed that Tanya’s husband had targeted her for murder in order to gain her money, which he wouldn’t receive if the two divorced (pesky prenups!).
The line is perfect meme material, and Twitter has done their worst – or best.
Viewers/ fans/ gays have also loved Tanya’s impromptu ‘James Bond’ moment in the finale, as well as her suitably “derp-y” death, which involved her successfully escaping a gaggle of murderous gays, only to bonk her head on the side of a yacht and drown.
At the airport, the ‘less dead’ characters return to whence they came, though viewers have had some thoughts on their endings, too.
White Lotus is already in talks for a third series, and creator Mike White has just teased that the next gaggle of guests could be jetting off to Asia to explore “death and Eastern religion and spirituality”. Consider us intrigued…
