On The White Lotus, Harper goes on an all-out passive-aggressive campaign
“That’s Amore” also treats us to a deep talk about life and beauty
TV Reviews Harper
Have you picked up your jaw from the floor? That’s where mine was when Mike White finally revealed the twist we all should’ve seen coming. After all, for a “naughty nephew,” Jack (Leo Woodall) was, perhaps, too odd of a guest in Quentin’s (Tom Hollander) gay-filled yacht and palazzo. And if the impact of that final scene gets to be blunted by the way we get to refer to it as “this season’s rimming reveal,” there’s no denying writer-director Mike White made sure to make it as operatic (and eye-searing) as he could be. Almost as if he’d heard complaints about the way that season one Armond moment was (how shall we put it?) a tad too demure for the sex position it was depicting. Because boy did he deliver on this front (or, back, I guess) this time around.
I was almost tempted to write “Poor Portia” (Haley Lu Richardson) but for someone who’s so online and who’s clearly been reveling on how few fucks Jack gives, she’s probably primed to be endlessly more understanding about this, ahem, arrangement than anyone else on the show. That’s definitely not the case for Tanya (Jennifer Coolidge), who truly felt like she’d seen a ghost. Or something even more terrifying. But we’ll see. Might this be a condom wrapper moment where Tanya keeps the news to herself? Or will she try to steer Portia away from Quentin’s “beauty”? As with most other things this episode, whatever Tanya and Portia and Jack and Quentin decide to do will rest on how much importance they place on things like “propriety” and “tradition.” And, also, how much they value, say, open communication over lurid secrecy. How much does Jack owe, after all, a pretty girl he’s just met? Not all of us can be open books eager to be read like Tanya.
I will say, this was probably the jolt I needed to finally be back on the Tanya train. Coolidge made this Puccini opera protagonist the reason to watch The White Lotus season one. And it made sense to thread this second season around another of her adventures. But there’s no denying the other Sicily guests have become the real scene-stealers this season (Aubrey Plaza’s Harper being right up there at the top of the list). All while Tanya’s heartbreak and kooky ideas about tarot readers, spas for poor women, finger foods, and her current husband have been hilarious, yes, but a tad footnote-y to the main thrust of the show. That is, of course, until these various thrusts she just witnessed after having arguably one of the most entrancing conversation about life and beauty with Quentin (Tom Hollander) we’ve seen yet.
Meanwhile, across town, Harper, Ethan (Will Sharpe), Cameron (Theo James), and Daphne (Meghann Fahy) went out for the most awkward wine tasting adventure you can imagine. Throwing caution to the wind and having learned her husband had lied to her the night before (though he insists he actually didn’t do anything with those “hookers” he and Cam had brought back to their room, he promises!), Harper went on an all out passive aggressive campaign. Watching Plaza navigate the way Harper is enjoying holding Ethan and Cameron in her thrall (the latter even eyeing her and touching her legs under the table!) all while trying to be indignant about their behavior was a masterclass.
Then again, I don’t think anyone expected us to see Ethan turn out to be such a natural when dropping scathing reads on his friends. To call out Cameron for suffering from “mimetic desire” (“I was smarter. Maybe you thought sleeping with women I had a connection with would make you smarter.” Ouch) is an A-plus move—especially when Cameron has been less than shy in showing how much he’s into Harper to begin with. But the exchange was a reminder that, perhaps, the single most important theme of this season is the way these characters can never escape the fact that they only grasp sex as a transaction.
Sure, that’s clearer to observe in Lucia (Simona Tabasco), who’s playing Albie like a fiddle, and Mia (Beatrice Grannò), who offered herself to Valentina in exchange for two nights at the piano. But it’s everywhere in the way these Americans in Sicily understand how they can relate to one another in bed; and that was all before we knew Jack and Quentin’s uncle/naughty nephew dynamic was decidedly more R-rated than at first glance.
It explains why Quentin leaves us with Gore Vidal’s line: “I can understand companionship. I can understand bored sex in the afternoon. But I cannot understand the love affair.” Love, after all, necessarily requires doing away with any kind of transactional dynamic. It’s what Bert (F. Murray Abraham) thought he had with his wife (and why she stayed with him, he argues, despite knowing of his affairs). And why Dominic so regrets how he let his relationship with his wife (voiced by Laura Dern, no less) sour so and why he’s now so sensitive about letting escorts like Lucia and Mia into his (and now Albie’s) life. What does love look like in 2022 in Sicily? Well, we’re seeing how such a question is harder to answer—even when the song Mia sings at the restaurant (“That’s Amore”) makes it feels so self-evident. Even if we all know it’s anything but.
Stray observations
- Is Daphne’s entire bubbly persona just an act? And if it is an act, is it an act of desperation? Of self-preservation? Of survival? The moment she shows Harper a photo of her kids on her phone (while claiming to be looking to show off “her trainer”) felt particularly calculated in its ditziness, almost as if she knew what she was doing, telling Harper in no uncertain terms why she stayed with Cameron. White’s been getting fabulous performances from all his ensemble but it’s been Fahy who’s been sneaking in with one of the most revelatory portrayals on the show.
- Who can hook me up with some “healthy wine” from Mount Etna?
- Oh Albie. I now worry he’s not only going to get his heart broken but his entire savings stolen…
- I could write an entire piece on White’s decision to turn crashing waves into the visual leitmotif of the season (series?); here is nature at its most violent yet also its most beautiful. There’s a forcefulness that feels weighted yet also ethereal. One that speaks to an inevitability; waves will crash and crash and crash…you can’t escape from them, can only learn to avoid them, or ride them, or maybe just get washed over by them. Oh, that’s before you begin to see how he’s often used them as stand-ins for orgiastic pleasures…. See? So many meanings! So little time to unpack them all!
- Speaking of overdetermined meanings: What should we make of White having Tanya sit through Puccini’s Madama Butterfly? Is this yet another clue for who’s gonna bite it by the end of the week? Tanya did say she sort of understood where Cio-Cio-San was coming from when she decided to kill herself….
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Daphne definitely knew what she was doing, and those kids are definitely not Cameron’s.
Anybody else think Greg might be the cowboy Quentin was referring to? And Quentin was on the other end of Greg’s phone calls? We’ve been thinking Daphne and Cameron were the grifters, but maybe that’s a misdirect. Just a thought …
Maybe but Jon Gries seems a little too squirrly and neurotic to be described as anyone’s “cowboy”.
Jon Gries was a good looking cowboy in his day! I mean the Greg we see in the show was sick in S1 and miserable in S2 so it’s not out of the question he was a different person a few decades ago.
Greg is *ABSOLUTELY* the cowboy. I’m now convinced either Greg or Quentin is the floater.
i dont think there is a cowboy. Notice how Mike White wants you to notice he Malboro cigaretts? You never see branding accidently, and NEVER cigarette branding. Malboro = Malboro Man (cowboy) = story he was making up on the spot.
Exactly. And if there WAS a cowboy, it sure wasn’t goofy Greg. And I can’t even believe awkward Colorado bureaucrat parks employee Greg would find a team of gay European grifters to go after Tanya’s money. Way too many easier ways for him to cash in than splitting it with all of them if he could even find them. Plus, I still think Greg has been dead the whole time and exists as a delusion in Tanya’s addled mind, evidenced in this episode by Portia’s confused look to Tanya wanting an annulment, and someone asking her if she had a dead body in her luggage. (His ashes, like Taya’s season 1 storyline, not his body).
To support this… there is a lot that could add up. Greg works for the BLM which is mostly in the western USA (and Alaska). For example Wyoming Has tons of land managed by the BLM. They often also recruit and promote from within (he would not manage 200+ folks out of nowhere). So they meet 30 years ago sure. Those details make a connection more plausible.However, I’m not on board with all the conspiracy theories.
My thoughts are scrambled after that final scene, so here they are in no particular order:- I was so sure Quentin’s storyline was headed toward Greg, with his undertone-laden story about the heterosexual cowboy he met in the American West, his one true love that he’d do anything for… And then asking Tanya whether she’d die for beauty! And then when Jack had to “do something for his uncle” real quick… well it all would have made Quentin’s efforts to get close to Tanya make a lot of sense. The first time we saw Greg whispering on the phone, it felt like ‘affair misdirection’ to me. I immediately wondered if he took a hit out on her, and this sure felt like it was heading that way, until…- Ethan handled that ‘apology’ (after finding the condom wrapper) like an absolute idiot. Downplaying, insincere, misdirecting, almost gaslighting. Casually mentioning to Cam at the winery that he, Ethan, is smarter almost made up for it tho- Cam touching Harper’s leg at the dinner table had my skin literally crawling. He is gross- But! Daphne’s trainer reveal was incredible. She revealed so much, without appearing to reveal anything at all!!- I agree with the reviewer, Lucia sure seems like she might be playing Albie pretty hard here. She says she genuinely likes him and I want to believe it (and he wants to believe it), but I’m wondering if the angry man / pimp she refers to, Alessio, isn’t a story to play on Albie’s niavete. When she saw the real Alessio, did she just see a friend and then tell him in Italian to pretend to rough her up? The real question is what’s her goal with this move though. Just extra cash? Or a one way ticket to LA via Albie’s need to fix what he might be perceiving as a wounded bird?- Albie, take your f’ing socks off man
Agree with you re: the interaction with Alessio – esp as it was one of the only times there was no translation of the conversation via subtitles, so we (the viewers) were as much in the dark as Albie was as to what was really said.
Basically this was said:Lucia: What’s up?Alessio: Are you having fun?Lucia: Yes I’m having fun.Alessio: Why didn’t you respond to my messages?Lucia: I’m taking a walk.Alessio: (angrily, grabbing her)Why didn’t you respond to my messages?Lucia: What the f* are you doing?So if it’s fake it was set up beforehand rather than Lucia asking him on the spot to fake an argument.
Weird. I keep my subtitles on all the time as I’m an American living in Sweden and it translated the conversation she and alessio had.
Taking a hit out on her would also explain a couple of things:
– Greg’s wanting to give her one perfect day in Italy before leaving the scene of the crime.
– Quentin almost relishing in Tanya’s “queen of Sicily” line as if she has confirmed everything he has been told about her. If this lifestyle of decades of decadence in Sicily has led to Quentin’s cash running, or almost running dry, the plot to kill Tanya makes total sense. Will Portia be able to save the day? Will they stage this as if Tanya has killed herself, a la, Madame Butterfly?
Clearly Tanya is not going to die, White has said before that he could see White Lotus continuing on with her as the only holdover character – which would also make sense if she is a charter member of their loyalty club! But consistent with the “poor people are the only ones who truly suffer” ethos, I could see someone trying to kill Tanya and Portia biting it instead. At least she’s gotten to enjoy her vacation now too!
Yes, I think killing of Tanya would definitely be too cruel. She is the innocence and one true heart that runs through this show. Yes, she is a bit dramatic but she seems to have the best grasp on reality than anyone else on this show who has smugly looked down on her. I could still see Greg as being one of the people who is dead by the end of the show getting caught in his own plot. Long live Tanya!
I’d love it if they killed off Tanya, but I bet the producers are wrapping all future seasons around her globe-trotting vacationing adventures.
But with all the talk of Greg signing a prenup would Tanya have set him up to get her fortune if she dies?
If Greg and Quentin were really in cahoots to kill Tanya — which I think is far fetched — than I believe White would have dropped some hints that despite the prenup, Greg would inherit a sizable chunk of her fortune. Given that Tanya inherited her wealth from her father, it seems likely that most of the money sits in some kind of trust, and when she dies, it goes into a family foundation dedicated to naming things in Tanya’s honor.
about when Lucia ran into Alessio, to me she’s dated him in the past, and it was a random run in. Translation from Reddit: He asked her if she was having fun and she said she was. Alessio asks why Lucia hasn’t written to him. She says because she went out to take a walk. Alessio asks why Lucia hasn’t responded to him and he grabs her. She says, “What the hell are you doing?” Then she walks away.
Ethan demonstrates and proves more and more every episode that he is actually the worst. As bad as Albie and Cam if not moreso because of how he treats Harper, who up to this point was trying her best to be a good, loving wife as he continues to be terribly passive aggressive to her at best gaslight her at worst because of the bro code and his own inability to be a mature grown up. The real odd thing is that since he doesn’t actually want to cheat on her, then why does he treat her that way? There is no good reason why.
I did not like him from the first scene where he had on the ball cap and sport coat. Baseball caps are not dress clothes even if they are plain.
What I`ve been saying since episode one. In his only defense, I think he couldn`t be honest with Harper if he wanted to, because he`s not being honest with himself. I think he’s with her because she picked him. He might also think that’s she the sort of woman someone like Cameron couldn’t steal, because she’s bound to despise him, so she probably felt like a safe choice. Not cheating is just as much, if not more, about being better than Cameron, as it is about staying faithful to Harper. Succumbing to Cameron’s corrupting influence would mean Cameron wins, and that makes it easy enough to resist the temptation. But at the end of the day, Ethan is just not that into Harper, and where do you go from there? He doesn’t want her, but he doesn’t want to lose her either. It’s the sort of dilemma that honesty won’t solve.
Your points are great and correct except for Harper picking him. I actually think that once back when they were broke and fresh out of college, they were mutually in love and had things in common and why they got married, but as time went on, she grew up and matured, while he didn’t, as he got more successful and started working with and being around guys like Cameron and started to succumb to Cameron’s corrupting influence. Ethan is in the same boat as Albie and Portia, as far as they’re all being a bunch of immature, insecure, awkward, cowards. They lack the emotional intelligence to be honest with themselves and to others, as they choose instead to be passive aggressive/gaslighting to everyone: Portia to Tanya and Albie to his family, while being attracted to more arrogant, self-assured people like Cam, Lucia, Jack. Ethan is not into Harper, but he’s too scared, weak, and immature to straight up break up with her too/cheat/or even decide where he wants to go with her.
for what it’s worth I don’t think Portia owes all that much emotional honesty to Tanya, but she certainly tried to string along Albie for a while. I think there is indeed a similarity to Ethan’s dilemma, where she thought Albie’s the type of guy she’s supposed to want, and made herself go along with it for a while, not being honest that she just wasn’t feeling it. He just seemed liked too good an opportunity to pass up. So that’s the mortal sin here, opportunism, complacency, lack of self awareness, lack of honesty.
She does owe emotional honesty to Tanya. She hates working for Tanya and the way she treats her, but doesn’t say anything, or quit, or at least even take Tanya’s original advice as far as going away and doing something else there in order to not be seen by her husband. She always has to be in range and close by to be the mindless serf at her beck and call because losing her job would mean she’d have to get a real job and actually figure out what she really wants to do with her life and she’s not about to do that for the reasons I mention earlier. Lucia and Mia would try to fleece Tanya dry if they were in the same position which is something Portia doesn’t even think about doing. She wouldn’t know how even if she wanted to. That’s that awkward insecurity and immaturity and lack of agency.
On principle, I think, it’s perfectly fine to keep doing a job you hate for the money while all the time complaining. You don’t have to love it or leave it. I think that Portia problably could quit, if she wanted to, because I don’t think she’s particularly poor – her parents would probably have her back. But I also get why she might not want to play that card. Keeping a job you hate as long as you don’t have another one lined up just makes pragmatic sense.
You do have a point that Portia is probably not doing a lot to line up another job though (although give her a break; she’s clearly mentally checked out and on vaction mode right now – who knows, maybe she plans to quit and hustle hard once she’s back in the States, but wants to wring at least a bit of fun out of this ultimately disappointing experience for now), and her sticking with Tanya (or even taking that sort of job in the first place) is indicative of a certain aimlessness.
“at least even take Tanya’s original advice as far as going away and
doing something else there in order to not be seen by her husband.”
But her advice was that she should stay shut up in her hotel room so she would always be available just in case–unless she is truly getting paid royally, that’s not the kind of request any sane person should take. It wasn’t the much more reasonable “Keep your phone on but go out and explore the city” or anything similar.
“Lucia and Mia would try to fleece Tanya dry if they were in the same position which is something Portia doesn’t even think about doing. She wouldn’t know how even if she wanted to. That’s that awkward insecurity and immaturity and lack of agency.”
Wait – you’re saying that if she was confident and mature, she would be stealing from her boss? WTF
“where she thought Albie’s the type of guy she’s supposed to want, and made herself go along with it for a while, not being honest that she just wasn’t feeling it. He just seemed liked too good an opportunity to pass up. So that’s the mortal sin here, opportunism, complacency, lack of self awareness, lack of honesty.”
You guys are putting way too much weight on their interactions. They are both single people on vacation looking to get laid. When it looked like the other was checking out, they hooked up with other people (both were were prostitutes, but still). You don’t owe it to someone you’ve merely been flirting that you’ve decided to stop flirting with them.
Do you also think Ethan had gay sex with Cam in university?
Maybe, maybe not. For now it seems more likely to me that it’s really mostly just about dominance games. Cameron is using sexual aggression to push boundaries, but the sexual aspect is just a means to an end. I think he accomplishes his aim if the other person is unsettled, and will mostly stop short of actually going there. I wouldn’t, for instance, believe for a second that he’s actually into Harper just because he’s blatantly hitting on her.
I actually know someone like Cam, so I’m interested in seeing how this goes. I’m just surprised evolving Harper didn’t just blurt out “Keep your hands away from me!” in front of everyone else.
I think right now, Harper herself is interested in pushing boundaries. She wants to get a reaction from Ethan and Cameron proves to be the most powerful tool in that regard. Ethan so far has been very hard to read, he usually keeps his cards close to the vest. But he sure does seem to have some feelings about Cameron. Have we ever seen as much emotion from Ethan as when he calls out Cam about his “mimetic desire”? I don’t remember, and maybe Harper doesn’t either.
I think neither of them are into each other but also totally expect them to f*** for “f*** you Ethan” reasons
After this latest episode I’m not actually convinced that Albie is that bad. Yes, it was painful watching him misread Portia, yes he revealed some questionable attitudes towards women (“wounded bird”), and yes I got schadenfreude from watching him get punk’d by Jack. BUT! He was surprisingly chill about finding out Lucia was a prostitute. And he didn’t seem all that bitter or mean-spirited when he saw Portia the next morning. Maybe he was a bit disappointed, but overall he seemed to have a pretty laid-back attitude about it all (although his night with Lucia probably helped). When you take all that into account, I’m inclined to give him a pass on the “wounded bird” comment and write that off as a product of adolescent naïveté and solipsism. Cringey as it was, it really wasn’t that bad in the grand scheme of things, especially when you consider who his male role models are. I could still see him making a heel-turn, but he also seems like a relatively innocent/redeemable character. Same with Portia.
“he continues to be terribly passive aggressive to her at best gaslight her at worst because of the bro code and his own inability to be a mature grown up”
There’s no gaslighting going on. “Doing drugs with hookers” is not – even for people who found them in a situation in which SOMEONE ELSE initiated the whole thing – something that rolls off the tongue naturally. It is absolutely lying by omission. As soon as she knew something was up, he told her. No gaslighting. He was fucked and legitimately can’t answer how cam ended up having sex on the couch. They even showed him in the bathroom, coming out to see them on the couch.
I like your theory. No way Greg is having an affair. He’s up to something but that would be too dull.
Socks sex is weird.
Lucia is trying to take Albie for all that she can. First of all, she charges him 2000 euros, whereas the night with Ethan and Cam was 1200? Then that guy (Alessio) clearly seemed happy to see her, and she said something to convince him to grab her. She already charged tons of clothing and food to Dom’s room. When he cut her off, she is looking for another cash cow and believes she found it in Albie.
The night with Ethan and Cam was actually 3000. Cam had 1800 on him and promised the extra 1200 after he went to the bank. I am not 100% sure she is cut off from Dom although she might be now because she is still with Albie.
Jesus christ… you people need a fucking hobby.
My husband and I were discussing the socks and my theory is that it makes Albie seem even more young and naive. A calculated costuming decision.
This season has less thematic depth than the first one, but I might say it’s more flat out entertaining. An Italian comedy of errors examining sex, lies, hypocrisy, and searching desperately for companionship or love. I don’t think Lucia will charge Albie. As she said she wouldn’t. I think she sees him as penance for the guilt she feels being a sex worker and corrupting Mia. She may like how innocent he is, though I must admit I found it a bit implausible that a a good-looking and hunky Stanford grad would be so naive about women. His story and Cameron’s almost collided, and I think Albie, in an effort to prove himself the aggressive, macho man, will confront him, with disastrous results.I read Daphne “accidentally” showing Harper her kids as tragic. Like she was saying, “Please, for the sake of our marriage and my children, don’t explicitly reveal out loud what I already know in my heart, because then I’d have to end the marriage and be alone.” Daphne’s like Bert’s wife, staying with Cameron and suffering. I don’t even think she even cheated on him despite what she tells Harper about her trainer. And I read Cameron’s grabbing Harper as a hateful power move, continuing the pattern in college with Ethan’s girlfriends as well as getting revenge on her for telling Ethan about him.
I was expecting Quentin to be the scammer with Tanya. He needs money (Jack didn’t just forget his wallet with Portia) and is playing her. But I also thought, “Are they serial killers?.” Tanya waking up in the night and wandering that house was like a horror movie.
Bert still seems more well-adjusted than anybody else, though we did see how he deluded himself that his marriage and wife were fine, and recognition of the pain it cost in his eyes. Damn good job, F. Murray Abraham.
I totally read the kids’ photo as implying they aren’t actually Cam’s…
WOAH!!! That’s quite a read…OMFG that makes the story 1000x more interesting.He thinks he’s getting away with something while she is getting the most blistering revenge imaginable. Holy smokes.
She showed the picture of her blond and blue eyed kid “accidentally” after telling Harper about the blonde blue eyed trainer she sees regularly to take her mind off her husband. Get it? I think the article author also missed this point.
That didn’t occur to me, but, yeah, could be. I read Daphne with some pathos. Meghann Fahy has done an excellent job in a couple of scenes showing how hurt and vulnerable Daphne is under this performative mask of a happy wife.
It’s certainly very different than last season. I find the characters and relationships to be more compelling and authentic this season. I’m loving the deconstruction of the self-proclaimed “nice guy” Albie, and how much depth White has given to the Daphne-character type. I was also starting to think that Quentin was a scammer and killer, but I think that’s just all a misdirection. I mean, I cannot believe that Tanya would be killed without first resolving whatever is going on with Greg. And if Quentin does intended to kill Tanya, it doesn’t make much sense to so publicly hangout with her — and he’s got to know that there will be an investigation with someone that rich. I thought that there was more signaling from White that Dominic might kill himself with that shot he held for a while of him looking into the ocean.
I do think Quentin needs money to support his lavish lifestyle and that’s why he asked Tanya to the villa. Foreshadowed by Tanya warning Portia about how people want her money. Jack also may be a sex worker himself and Quentin owe a very large tab he needs to pay off. He may also genuinely like her, but his response when she asked who the opera goer was was cruel.
There has been some commentary here that Albie will snap and kill everyone. I don’t think his character is an incel or repressing great anger. And such a bleak, violent thing wouldn’t fit the tone of the show. I think Albie is genuinely a nice guy who could use a lot more experience with relationships (the implausible thing that he doesn’t have it already, as mentioned above).
Everything with everyone on the show is transactional, so yeah, I agree that Quentin probably wants something, but I’m still not convinced that it’s as sinister as White wants us to think it could be at the moment. I think it’s more like this detour to Palermo provides Tanya with some kind of introspective clarity. Albie isn’t a “nice guy.” Butting in on Portia and Jack last episode and all but demanding that she take her seat with him at the beach was pretty gross. He has some major entitlement issues. And now hanging out with Lucia like they’re dating… Well that’s obviously not going to end well.
Everything with everyone on the show is transactional, so yeah, I agree that Quentin probably wants something, but I’m still not convinced that it’s as sinister as White wants us to think it could be at the moment.
Bingo. I’m convinced that’s the running theme here. Every relationship … EVERY relationship … the hooker and the john, the old college friend, the new gay friend, the young lovers, the newlyweds, the older couples, your relationship, my relationship … is transactional on some level. It is a series of gives and takes, compromises, sometimes mundane, sometimes easy, sometimes hugely sacrificial, sometimes demeaning and sometimes loving and compassionate, and sometimes all of those messy, complicated things at once.
Isn’t Greg setting her up to be killed? Isn’t Greg the cowboy he met? Isn’t he going to kill her for a cut of the fortune.
That would just be too convoluted, with too many witnesses. If you’re going to kill someone, you don’t hang out with them in public for a week.
I guess we’ll see what White does, but if he goes in that direction, I imagine there will be a lot of groaning.
On some other boards, I’ve seen people speculate that Greg is the “cowboy” Quentin said he’d do anything for and that Quentin will kill off Tanya so Greg can get her money. They added Greg being upset that Portia came along and being so focused on giving her “one nice day” as proof points. I’m not sure I agree – Greg did appear to be doing fine financially and have his own life before they met in S1, while he’s clearly tired of her I would think he could just leave her. And as you note, Quentin is really setting himself up to be the fall guy if that is the case.
Oh, I could see Dominic killing himself! He seems like he’s protesting a bit too much with all that talk about not getting love affairs. To me, that story about the cowboy mostly just suggests that he has a bad habit of falling for straight guys. I think it’s more likely to allude to the naughty nephew rather than Greg. I think Dominic is not satisfied by the transactional nature of the arrangement, and also, he knows it will end soon, because he’s running out of money. Soon he won’t be able to afford any of the beauty he lives for. I could see him not sticking it out to the bitter end and instead wanting to go out in style – killing himself in a final, dramatic, grand gesture. And he might want to use Tanya as a prop. She does add a certain flair to things.
(Worst case scenario: he’s been thinking about suicde for ages, but has always been too craven to go through with it, so he tries to talk Tanya into a double-suicide to fortify his resolve. “Would you die for beauty” does seem a bit sinister, a bit like testing the waters. But I’m sure Tanya is safe.)
I think you have confused Dominic, Albie’s father, for Quentin, Tanya’s ‘high value gay’
Yeah, I totally meant Quentin.
Surely “whatever’s going on with Gregg” is arranging to have her killed by Quentin’s men no?
Lucia is totally playing Albie. She’ll get him to get her money from Cameron and scam him into thinking her pimp is after her, too. She isn’t trying to atone for anything. And yes, it was totally hinted that the kids are Daphne’s trainer’s and not Cam’s.
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I can’t really see Albie as hunky. He’s too boyish.
Agreed, but we’re adults… he’s definitely hunky to people his age.
oo, I like the idea of confrontation between Albie and Cameron! Out of left field, but plausible! If there’s some violence, I bet it won’t be between the people we’ve seen building tension so far. I guess, Albie vs Cameron would seem random and senseless enough.
I read Daphne “accidentally” showing Harper her kids as tragic. Like she was saying, “Please, for the sake of our marriage and my children, don’t explicitly reveal out loud what I already know in my heart, because then I’d have to end the marriage and be alone.” Daphne’s like Bert’s wife, staying with Cameron and suffering. I don’t even think she even cheated on him despite what she tells Harper about her trainer.This all day. I’ll come back here and give you a virtual high-five when we are proven right and all of these others are proven wrong. Mike White is too smart for something as dumb as “these kids actually belong to the trainer because, look, blonde hair.” I am not even sure the trainer was real. She’s suggesting, although critically she never actually says it, that she copes by stepping out with her trainer, who is “so cute with blonde hair and blue eyes.” And then she shows Harper the pic of her kids. She was talking about her kids. She’s saying “look you stupid bitch don’t say these things out loud … THIS is obviously why I don’t leave.”
“these kids actually belong to the trainer because, look, blonde hair.” isn’t dumb at all. It was pretty subtle. I think Daphne is more devious than she seems, and it would fit into the theme of all these transactional relationships.
That’s not amore…That’s a moray.
The moment she shows Harper a photo of her kids on her phone (while claiming to be looking to show off “her trainer”) felt particularly calculated in its ditziness, almost as if she knew what she was doing, telling Harper in no uncertain terms why she stayed with CameronAm I the only one who saw her blond haired, blue-eyed kids and thought she was saying the kids aren’t actually Cameron’s? Wondering if I’m too cynical now.
Same here. Didn’t exactly require a Punnett square to do that calculation: dark-haired Cameron should have thrown at least one dark-haired progeny. Add a fair-haired trainer to the mix, and the odds of two Children of the Corn suddenly gets a lot higher.
Goddamn, a Punnett square reference! All the stars to you, sir!
dark-haired Cameron should have thrown at least one dark-haired progenyI know a couple who both have dark brown hair and both of their kids have flaming red hair.
I think that’s right, especially given that the whole reason for telling Harper about the trainer was to say that she cheats too!And what’s so delicious about it, is how oblivious Cameron is to it all.
Guys like Cameron are kind of like dogs. They have no concept of the world going about its’ business without them. They are such the star of their own story always, even if they are just a bystander to a car accident, they are the person most tragically impacting by the accident that didn’t involve them. The only things that happen and exist are things that happen and exist to, near, or about them.
There’s zero genetic reason why one—or even two—dark haired parents can’t have blonde children. They can and do.
Mine did as well, but like the characters mine also had a mix of eye color, and their 2 kids were blond/blue and black/brown. Hence the assumption.
My parents did. My mom is fair and my dad had black hair and olive skin. Me and my sis are both blondies with blue eyes. Genetics are cray. But, I did think she may have been referencing at least one of her kids were the trainer’s.
sure, but there’s definitely a reason why they chose to make her kids blonde. it’s saying something without saying it.
No I know. Just saying that we know because of how she did it: “oOpS, i sHoWed yoU mY KidS inStEaD oF tHe trAiNeR”. Not because of anyone sleuthing a Punnet square
I have 2 first cousins on opposite sides of my family like that. Both have blonde grandparents.
Wrong/right. They can, and they do. BUT statistically it isn’t as likely.
I think that was exactly the meaning of that conversation.
Dang, nice catch. I felt the move of showing her a picture of her kids was deliberate, but only thought the motivation was to show why she puts up with her douche of a husband. I didn’t even think about the fact that both kids are blondies.
Gurl, same. Also, it puts her previous conversation with Harper into a much richer context, when she said that she’s not a victim in the marriage. This would mean that while Cameron was wilding out, she built her entire life without him. Her kids, her relationship with the trainer, memories, plans, laughs, everything. Without him even knowing about it.Also, it was interesting to me to notice that Cameron is the second male character to define cheating as an addiction, after Dominic. Maybe there are more, I don’t know, but it does put into perspective how different genders reflect on the same issue. In my mind, at least.
What’s really strange is that, of all the couples in the show, Daphne and Cameron have what appears to be the most stable relationship. It’s like the lies and indiscretions are the common thread that keeps them together.
I agree, she’s far more devious than she puts on…except when she’s with Harper. “I think you need a trainer” means Harper needs a side piece because Ethan is rich but kind of a putz. Those kids are probably not Cameron’s!
The baby-daddy is totally the trainer. The opening sequence has a woman riding on a donkey, accompanied by a man, which is clearly an allusion to Mary and Josef, which is clearly an allusion to intransparent paternity.
The implication was 100% that the blonde, blue-eyed child was fathered by her “trainer.” That’s pretty obvious.Also, the reviewer fails to understand that the “nephew” (a sex worker) is there to distract Portia while Quentin works on flattering Tanya so he can fleece her of her fortune. Quentin’s in love with a straight American “cowboy” from Wyoming, which fits the description of Tanya’s husband, who is conspicuously absent during all of this (shouldn’t he be back by now?)—and who may be in cahoots with Quentin, Jack, and co. to (likely) kill his wife and split her fortune. There was nothing “deep” or beautiful about Tanya and Quentin’s conversation about beauty; it was a creepy justification for killing.
Interesting theory but would Tanya’s husband get her money if she was killed anyway? They talked so much about making him sign a prenup, which I know isn’t the same as what you might have in a will, but…
Even if that wasn’t the case (I agree with you that it is) it wasn’t an especially deep reflection on life and beauty 😅
Same here. Didn’t exactly require a Punnett square to do that calculation: dark-haired Cameron should have thrown at least one dark-haired progeny. Add a fair-haired trainer to the mix, and the odds of two Children of the Corn suddenly gets a lot higher. Situs judi online cellobet merupakan situs judi online yang menyediakan permainan slot online terpercaya dan memberikan layanan deposit pulsa tanpa potongan
That’s an interesting thought but it wasn’t my takeaway at all. I think Manuel’s more correct on this: she’s suggesting to Harper that she stays because she “copes” with his adultery by engaging in her own … and then she “accidentally” shows her a pic of their kids. It’s kinda like “you’ve heard what I said but now let me show you the most important reason why I stay.”
That’s exactly what she was doing. The reviewer completely missed it.
I had a whole conversation with my stylist about this. She very pointedly spoke of the “trainer’s” blonde hair and blue eyes, and then showed Harper Bl/bl children. Was she saying Get a “trainer”? Get a trainer and have his B/B babies because neither you or your husband are B/B? Or was she saying children and buckets of money will just make you feel better? There were more layers than an onion there.
It’s either that or “stay away from my husband get your own ‘trainer'” but there was no chance it wasn’t entirely calculated
Daphne was 1,000% implying that at least the blue-eyed blonde of her kids was the trainer’s, not her husband’s. I was like, “DAMN!”
“That’s Amore” is such a silly song!
I really don’t care for Mias’s singing style but that may be an unpopular opinion.
Mia is …not good. I’m not sure she’s supposed to be read as especially good
I recently learned that Este Haim was on set coaching “Mia” on hersinging, which may explain why it was so bad (I honestly don’t think that was the intent). Also that actress has worn some seriously questionable & downright ugly looks during awards season.
I’m a little sick of the waves, tbh.
I’m sorry, but if you’re staying at a gay man’s place and you hear men grunting in the middle of the night, you don’t invade their privacy. You wait for an invitation.
To go even simpler, you don’t invade anyone’s privacy in the middle of the night unannounced period. Was Tanya raised in a barn? Who wanders into someone else’s closed room like that?
Tonya and Kathy Hilton. …wait, is Tonya supposed to be Kathy Hilton?
An entitled, semi-oblivious person of great wealth and privilege?
i thought she was possibly drugged. drugged by the cigarettes
she’s high on the image of Monica Vitti
Who? Tanya that’s who.
i said this here earlier but Tanya was (all evidence suggests) raised to believe that her desires come first, so if her gays wake her up with sex noises, suggesting they’re having fun without her, she’s gonna go and find out who they’re having fun with
throughout the 2 seasons of this series, Tanya has been known for being the opposite of discrete on other’s behalf and for following social protocols when it inconveniences her desires. In this palazzo, Tanya is a queen and Quentin and the gays are her court jesters. she feeds off their fawning and attention and they give it to her (seemigly) unconditionally, So if she’s woken up by some sex noises, Tanya’s gonna tanya and find out which of her gays are having fun without her
“You don’t need to / shouldn’t have to pay” = love?Lucia loves Albie, or wants him to think so, so he doesn’t have to pay for the sex. And Jack would rather dine and dash than make Portia pay for the rice balls.
I don’t think that was a twist — last week a number of us thought that Jack was a sex worker. And I doubt think White was trying to be coy about that reveal.
Exactly, it seemed obvious something was up with him. Why would this young guy be on 2 month long vacation with his “uncle” and all of his middle-aged entourage grabbing his ass? Plus it parallels along with Albie’s misadventures. They both feel for sex workers.
“And if anything ever did happen, just do what you have to do to make yourself feel better about it.”Proceeds to “accidentally” show Harper a picture of her blond, blue eyed child — immediately after describing her personal trainer in the same terms.Good writeup, but author 100% missed the point! One of them kids ain’t Cameron’s.
Agree with some of the other commentors here, Daphne is very clearly implying that she is having an affair with her trainer and at least two of her kids are genetically related to him, not Cameron (I think they have three – right?). Fahy is great BTW – she was great on The Bold Type too, by far the most talented actor of the main three characters.The other thing I’d note (for a second week) since I don’t see it in the review – Valentina is pretty clearly the one making Isabella uncomfortable. Isabella definitely looks unhappy at Rocco being assigned somewhere else. And then last thing, Greg has to come back right? Curious how he fits into the story still given Tanya is on a completely different tangent now.Really have no clue how this is going to play out and who is going to die. Albie seems like a prime suspect to be involved one way or the other as he now feels protective of Lucia while potentially being the target of a scam by her and others.
Maybe it’s just me, but I really do think Lucia actually likes Albie and isn’t trying to scam him. She probably the most honest character on the show.
Could be – Albie does come off as a pretty good dude in this episode as he doesn’t react negatively at Lucia’s profession or even her talking openly about having sex with Cameron and not getting paid in full. But I still think that is heading towards disaster as he doesn’t know she’s hooked up with his dad.
My thoughts as well, that’s the real conflict brewing with them. She banged his Dad! What exactly would she be scamming from him anyway? If she wanted to scam someone I’m sure there are bigger marks than Albie staying at the hotel.
Lucia’s “scamming” him in the sense that she’s going to use his affection for her to her benefit. Albie’s not paying her for sex but he’s certainly going to end up paying her. She’s convincing him that she has a pimp who is threatening her to continue to pay up. She doesn’t have a pimp. She wants Albie to give her the money that she “owes to her pimp” so that she’s safe. But, again, she doesn’t have a pimp. She’s getting a big payday from Albie.
Lucia having a pimp just came out of nowhere — so far, she has been defined as someone who is independent, in control, with a plan. Lucia picked the gelato place that they went to where they ran into her supposed pimp. That seems like a hint that it was staged. And I don’t think a pimp would bother one of their “employees” while they are with a client.
On Reddit someone translated what they were saying when he grabbed her arm. Is just seems to be a boyfriend or someone she’s dated. I think she was using that accidental exchange to further push her “woe is me” agenda with Albie.
Interesting. I think we’re also supposed to understand that €2k for the night was excessive, and that Lucia knows Albie will feel pressured to pay (I don’t have a clue what the going rate is for a sex worker, but if that’s really what Lucia is getting paid, then she wouldn’t need to bill her drinks to Dominic’s room).
It’s more than she said Cameron owed her.
that rate is pretty standard (it’s actually on the lower end of standard, by Vegas/NYC/Miami/LA standards, anyway) but also, when you’re booked by a client, you don’t pay for anything. you never reach into your own pocket for things like drinks, tips, cabs, etc. so Lucia charging drinks and food and shopping to Dom’s room is perfectly consistent with the situation imo. (sure, he didn’t technically hire her for his entire vacation, but the implication when he gave her his room key was very clearly, “enjoy yourself on my tab, just try and keep things discrete.”
Her potentially scamming Albie is also out of nowhere. If she was planning some big caper, don’t you think she would have mentioned it to her girl Mia?
I love Lucia, but at this point I definitely think she’s trying to play Albie. First I thought she wanted to become the girlfriend and be taken back to the States, but now I feel silly about that, because there is no reason whatsoever to believe she’d be naive enough to think that could work. She has clearly clocked Albie as someone wants to save the damsel, and now she’s inventing an ogre he can save her from. Let’s hope it will only cost him money.
I’ve been fairly sceptical about Albie so far, but this episode he has won back a lot of points with me, for the gracious goodbye with Portia. If they leave it at that, they’re both a bit redeemed in my eyes.
I’m still rooting for Lucia not to get punished for her hustle. My dream ending is that she can keep up the charade until the end, and he leaves, a bit poorer (but honestly, he can afford it, can’t he?), but feeling good about himself.
Eh, I can see Lucia being that naive and trying to manipulate Albie into a green card marriage and Albie being that naive into being that kind of white knight nice guy ironically echoing the comment about “the broken birds” he said to Portia earlier. Last episode she was openly having second thoughts about leaving the game until she bumped into Albie. My theory is that he or even shes the dead one after her pimp finds out and retaliates.
See, I don’t see how a green card marriage would be at all attractive to a sex worker in her prime, who’s able to charge up to 2000 euro a night. I don’t think the US is appealing as some US-ers think 😉
You haven’t met or known any twenty-something Scilians or Italians as a whole. Moving to the US or Western Europe for better paying jobs/better life is still very much a thing with them these days. The youth unemployment rate in Italy right now is almost at 30% as it’s even worse in Sicily, and the ones who do have jobs are very poorly paying. She also did also straight up say that her dream is to the come to the US which is accurate and partly explains why her English is so good. Also, the nice guy trying to turn the prostitute into the princess is one of the oldest tropes in the book.
I totally agree with you re: nice guy trope! I’m hoping that Lucia saying she dreams of moving to the US is just part of her scamming Albie 🙂
Maybe not but she repeatedly claimed to have always wanted to go to LA,could be a stock “line” she uses on clients or maybe not
I think the “pimp” is just an acquaintance she roped into her act to increase the sense of urgency for Albie. But I could see this ending very badly for either her or Albie – someone else mentionned that Albie might get into an altercation with Cameron, trying to get him to pay Lucia her money.
Yeah, but I don’t think Cameron would actually kill Albie for it. That’s why I think it could be her pimp who winds up killing either one of them. Especially if Albie goes after him as part of the white knight act. Or maybe Albie’s dad gets killed intervening. Though who knows what Cam is capable of. I guess we’ll see.
Sure, the pimp/jealous actual boyfriend could be involved. I wouldn’t count out Cameron though – of course he’s not going to murder someone in cold blood about settling an invoice, but who’s to say he’ll be in full possession of his better judgment when the situation escalates? Not all lethal violence is premediated murder – I’m thinking drunk barfight ending badly. You don’t need to want to murder someone to push them away rather forcefully, they might stumble and fall and hit their head in an unfortunate spot.
Albie’s Dad getting killed when intervening is also a good bet though – there was a bit of forshadowing for an “an uninvolved party as collateral damage”-bit when they discussed the car bomb killing the wife in Godfather. Maybe Dominic dies instead of Albie, or Mia dies instead of Lucia.
There IS NO PIMP! come on!
i think she may have scammed you too
The other thing I’d note (for a second week) since I don’t see it in the
review – Valentina is pretty clearly the one making Isabella
uncomfortable. Isabella definitely looks unhappy at Rocco being assigned
somewhere else. Agreed, hope Valentina gets a happy moment for herself. She seems to be the most genuine out of this whole bunch of the self obsessed.
My guess is that Valentina is either going to be turned down flat by Isabella or she is going to see Isabella on a date with Rocco. And then she is going to take Mia up on her offer from this episode and feel ashamed by it, hence why she’s already in a bad mood as she arrives on the crime scene in the first moments of the first episode this season.I do like Valentina but she’s definitely in the wrong for how she is treating her employees (both Rocco and Isabella) and I think she’ll get a smaller comeuppance for it.
I’m shocked the review didn’t mention Valentina’s grossly inappropriate behavior, too. Isabella is physically uncomfortable in her presence, and her motivation for Rocco’s reassignment (and replacement) was apparent to everyone involved. Given last week’s review’s obvious sympathy for Valentina, it’s interesting (and a bit annoying) that her increasingly uncomfortable behavior (including being bribed with sex) wasn’t mentioned at all.
I’m a little befuddled by it because now it feels like every White Lotus has a manager who is a queer person on the verge of a breakdown. I was hoping Valentina could maybe just be a demanding bitch who is good at her job and otherwise has a happy queer home life separate from the hotel.
Valentina is rigid because she exists in a very homophobic traditional society, my heart still goes out to her as miscalculated as she is.
“Valentina is rigid because she exists in a very homophobic traditional society, my heart still goes out to her as miscalculated as she is.”
I think that’s mostly fair. She doesn’t seem to be able to navigate the signs well—so she’s shocked when her coworker shows admiration for her, completely misreads it and now doesn’t seem to know how to handle it so is completely overcompensating by being too aggressive and making her uncomfortable. In fact I think I behaved similarly when I was dealing with my sexuality–except that woulda been at ages 18-20 (and not now–I hope.)
Tanya’s husband Greg never left Sicily; he is the hetero cowboy that Quentin was (and still is ) in love with. Greg and Quentin are plotting together to kill Tanya for her money.
Then Greg better get the prenup changed before he kills her. He stands to get nothing, as previously stated, so where’s his motive?
I don’t really know anything about prenups or estate law, but I can imagine a situation where Greg gets very little in a divorce but still stands to inherit if Tanya dies.
Given how thoughtful White is about laying groundwork for everything, if this is all a con to kill Tanya and take the money, then I think something would have been said how if Tanya dies, then he gets a big payday. But as I said in another post, given that her fortune was massive and inherited, the money is probably all in a family trust, and then slated to be moved into a foundation dedicated to naming things in Tanya’s honor; Greg’s inheritance is probably the same payout he’d get if they divorce.
Prenups are usually for divorces, not accidental death or suicide — which I think they’re pushing her towards
That’s just it. Quentin is going to lure Tanya to leave everything to him and then it won’t matter when Greg leaves her.
Life insurance?
Ohhhh shit!
I’m wondering if Portia’s name is any kind of tipoff – she’s been portrayed as kind of hopeless, a passive girl who has no power over her own life, but Shakespeare’s portia manages to subvert that by dressing as a guy and outwitting the situation (bc women always ultimately don’t have the power). The setup feels like Tanya is effed, but maybe Portia does turn out to be useful?
That’s too cynical for even this show. Someone upthread said Tanya will learn a lesson about life/introspection, and that sounds right to me.
I can’t for a minute believe that flamboyant Quentin would ever have any interest in bumbling Greg, let alone a lifetime of pining away for him. I think that’s just a Quentin story to help flesh out the overall grift to Tanya.
I think the cowboy is Greg? Yeah?
I mean it’s a little neat and tidy but like… it’s gotta be Greg right?
I was almost tempted to write “Poor Portia” (Haley Lu Richardson) but
for someone who’s so online and who’s clearly been reveling on how few
fucks Jack gives, she’s probably primed to be endlessly more
understanding about this, ahem, arrangement than anyone else on the
show.
“Listen, I ain’t gay, but an all expenses paid trip to Sicily is an all expenses paid trip to Sicily”
Or will she try to steer Portia away from Quentin’s “beauty”?
The preview for next week basically shows her doing this
Oh Albie. I now worry he’s not only going to get his heart broken but his entire savings stolen…
I thought this too, but when Lucia didn’t bring up how much money Cam owes to get her out of trouble with her (I’m assuming) pimp, my opinion changed. But it might also be the first time in awhile that a relationship has been non-transactional for her
Quentin says, “I can understand BOUGHT sex in the afternoon,” not “bored sex.”
So now Lucia’s pimp has seen Albie and we are reminded that Cam owes her money. We have been reminded that Sicily is a dangerous place via the Godfather locale connection and we can expect collateral damage. We have been shown that Jack has a gorgeous body and ass and we also have been shown that he has a devil-may-care attitude toward getting in trouble and pissing off the locals. Portia could have had the nice safe good guy but now she is going to be the one who dies for beauty. Dead woman walking. Hookers aren’t the only ones who get punished. And of Albie is going to get it – he is innocence personified. Hanging out w Lucia is dangerous 8d going to get him kolled.And we’ve crossed off Vespas vineyards, churches. artwork, sumptuous palazzos and now opera off the Italy stereotype list – anything else? – a fountain? Lucy Ricardo trying to sneak a salami disguised as a baby? No way the Mob doesn’t show up. It is Sicily and locals are starting to get rubbed the wrong way.
Thanks for this interpretation of “dying for beauty” I was trying to think of a situation that would describe and couldn’t think of a thing, just read as ‘faux deep’ to pretend at vulnerable bonding to me.
Not having watched the show, this article was unintelligible.
I have really been enjoying this season. Yes, these people are not great for the most part but unlike the first season, they are more compelling to me. I go back and forth on Lucia, I was really starting to like her but if she games Albie. Ugh. I adore Mia and her chutzpah and let’s hope Valentina gets some and Guiseppe gets a new job. I’m so glad it seems to be turning out that Albie is more naïve than incelic. The reveal with Jack and Quentin was the last surprising thing. I really hope they just scam Tanya and don’t hurt her physically. It’s amazing that she is so trusting. Daphne and her trainer have beautiful children. I still wonder about Cam and Daphne trying to scam E and Harper. Not sure how well that is going to go if Cam sleeps with Harper.
Albie at the end of the day just wants to get laid. He’s naive, but he’s not that different from his dad in what he wants from women. Lucia is playing him, but she’s just playing the system. Albie’s belief that the ideal woman are broken birds is gross, he deserves to be taught a lesson lol.
Right! Lucia sees right through Albie and his nice guy bullshit.
I can’t get over feeding the piano player an overdose of random pills, and then not caring at all when she thinks he’s dead beyond trying to figure out how she can take his job. Yeah, he (basically correctly) thought she was a prostitute and was willing to pay/compensate her for sex, but she’s got some kind of serious personality disorder stuff going on.
I think Lucia was right. She did become a monster.
I think Quentins first real love was Greg. Hes going to try to kill Tanya because he said he would do anything for his first true love.
I though she was insinuating the trainer fathered her kids…
Revealing, rather than insinuating. Harper hasn’t processed that yet.
I think Daphne and Cam are definitely running a scam on Ethan and Harper. Cam’s refusal to pay Lucia seems more like a “he cannot afford to pay her” situation rather than just forgetting or being busy.
Cam gets Ethan high and tries to get him to let Cam invest his money while Harper has been “kidnapped.” When that does not work, they start working on Harper, who is clearly the harder nut to crack. Planting a condom wrapper in the couch. Making up a story about a trainer that doesn’t exist to get revenge on her husband. If she leaves Ethan or falls prey to Cam/Daphne’s wrangling, she will have a divorce windfall that will also be available to Cam’s potential influence.
Did I totally misread Daphne showing Harper the picture of her kids? She says the trainer is blond with blue eyes, then shows Harper the picture where the kid in the center happens to be blonde with blue eyes. So I took this to mean Daphne was insinuating that the trainer was the real father of this kid
lol, as a gay man, i could tell that Jack was a toyboy for the old-gays, so i wasn’t shocked by the ending. I had forgotten about that awful rimming scene from last season (it wasn’t even actual rimming).
Jack’s line about “some of them (the gays) being so strong” was a huge hint for this in the last episode. I would bet Uncle Quentin isn’t the only one Jack’s bedding on the side.
I thought he kind of admitted that he’s OK with being a boy toy with his the friends of his ‘uncle’. So, it wasn’t a far leap to see that they are also boning each other (and I immediately assumed that meant this wasn’t a blood relative — although THAT bit of storyline isn’t forbidden on HBO shows!)
Same here. Also I heard a lot of older gays using the term ‘nephew’ or ‘cousin’ for toyboys, sometimes even lovers.I kinda appreciated the rimming scene last season, to be honest. It didn’t look like actual rimming, true, but I appreciated that they had one. People don’t usually represent the true life of the lgbt+ community, so it’s precious to me when I get to see it. I had the same experience with ‘Looking’. Which just goes to show how important it is to have queer storytellers out there.
I am not a gay man and it was also not a surprise but I think the real subterfuge is that his job is to distract Portia
It’s “bought” sex in the afternoon. Important detail, given that this season is about transactional sex (Quentin-Nephew; Lucia-everyone; Mia-Valentina)
Yes! Thank you! This was really bugging me.
Quentin and his entire posey are absolutely scamming Tanya…right? The lavish lifestyle and the line from Tanya about ‘the nice thing about being around people with money is you never have to worry that they are after it’ could be MW pulling a fast one on us and maybe it is all legit. There are too many issues piling up for me to see it as anything other than a large con at this point.Something about a group of individuals scamming rich isolated people from their money just feels right. The line about the only way to save the house and help with the costs is to open it up to the public. They are trying to get Tanya to drop money on them so they can lead their care free and are lifestyles.
I assume they are just going to be gone one morning leaving Tanya with the bill for the villa.
I’m with you (of course! lol). While MW at this point in the season might be suggesting there’s some big sinister plot, it’s probably something more pedestrian. I believe (and maybe I’m wrong) those aren’t the stories he’s interested in telling. He’s interested in the various contours of the relationships we have with others, and the transactions necessarily involved in engaging in and maintaining those relationships. So while they are “scamming” Tanya for sure (the “Queen of Sicily” thing was the big tell), these are just social gadflies out to have a good time on some rich tourist’s dime, and then it will be on to the next. It’s meaningful to Tanya, because Quentin knows exactly the buttons to push. He spotted her as someone who would overly value the idea of a “special” friendship with a “high end gay.” She’s a perfect mark. It’s the transaction for which he has engaged. Just as we see the various other transactions at play among the other relationships.
cameron (i think)had a line in an earlier episode where he said something along the lines of “they own these palazzos, but they have no money”
Wasn’t “mimetic desire” the exact same situation between the daughter and her friend in season 1?
Well Sydney Sweeney does have some spectacular mimetics…
I think that Greg is also who Quentin referenced as the heterosexual cowboy he fell in love with once 30 years ago and would still do anything for…perhaps even killing Tanya? Not sure if it goes that far, but I sense there is deceit there in that capacity in some form.
The “jaw dropping” surprise left me and my partner more confused than surprised. Were we not supposed to assume that Jack was a rent boy from the start? While I could see the discovery being surprising to the character of Tanya since she is fairly oblivious, I don’t think Mike White is attempting to surprise the audience with this show. That’s why the deaths are set up as a red herring for the show being a mystery when it is not. These characters are all very mundane and that is the point.
Yes — especially with Harper’s whole “it’s exactly what I thought all along” rants. It seems that’s the theme. These people want to be able to change, want to be able to be different, want to be complex. They can’t and they’re not. Everyone is exactly who they seem to be, grifter, sleaze, toxic nice guy, etc. Even Harper thought she wanted to expose Cameron and Daphne in order to make herself feel like she was better than them. But now she’s realized she should have just let it all alone and had the fun, superficial vacation.
Well he straightforwardly presented himself as the nephew of Quentin. So no, I didn’t assume they were banging.
I was the same, a very attractive young man just “hanging around” rich men in 50s and 60s and its a platonic nephew? Straight people seem naieve at times
Yes, it’s the same as escorts being called “nieces” on resorts. It’s just reversed and he’s the “nephew”. He’s a sex worker I assume.
My thoughts exactly – I didn’t find this shocking at all. Good point about the characters wanting to be special.
Exactly. So many reviews keep screaming about the jaw dropping “incest” cliffhanger, as if Jack is actually Quentin’s nephew. Every character is living a lie, why would that ever be the truth?
I feel like the whole setup was a grift, ala Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Rent a palazzo, get tickets to the opera to woo Tanya, the performative emotion at said opera, that whole speech about beauty. The “gays” are broke and are looking for their next grift, seemingly finding it in Tanya—indulging her vanity, etc. etc. To have her find it out before (and hopefully she does something to derail this) is quite satisfying. The whole time they were at the palazzo, I kept thinking–how is she going to get her and Portia out of there? Will uber take them back?
I felt he was a rent boy from the start as well. I also have been thinking they are planning on ripping her off somehow since they first met and it’s been a con the whole time. Especially more so when he was talking about how the palace they have was denied the government grant….dude needs cash fast and he has thankfully met a ditzy billionaire heiress just in time.
I don’t think it’s a hit man job on her via her husband, but more just Quentin is a lifelong criminal and his rent boy is his partner, and they stumbled upon this treasure chest so are working them now.
Didn’t the ‘nephew’ even say that he sometimes entertains the affections of the older gay guys? I feel like he tipped his hand that he isn’t totally straight. Also, I’m now thinking he’s not a ‘blood’ nephew. HAHA!
I really enjoyed Ethan’s lapse into aggression with his comment to Cameron about mimetic desire and his explicit insult to Cameron’s intelligence. It’s the exact same time of “dominating” behavior that Cameron’s been doing to him, but repackaged for tech bros instead of frat bros. Ethan and Cameron are not as different as either Ethan or Harper believe.Valentina’s behavior towards Isabella is gross. Take a hint, girl: Isabella’s not into you. I know this episode was jam-packed with good stuff, but Valentina’s reassignment of Rocco, and his replacement, was so transparently icky that I can’t believe it went without comment in the review.
And Cameron and Daphne are 100% angling Harper into a threesome, right?
So many thoughts…Greg is the Cowboy, and he and Quentin are clearly in cahoots. Quentin is the person Greg was on the phone with, and it’s extremely convenient that he disappeared as soon as Quentin showed up. Quentin is going to get Tanya to lower her guard and leave everything to him. Greg being the floater just became much more likely.Lucia is actively scamming Albie, but I don’t think it’s nefarious. I think she genuinely likes him and he’s her meal ticket out of sex work. And honestly, he’s such an entitled, spineless clown, he deserves what he’s getting. Also, very kind of the producers to give us those two scenes of the unfathomably gorgeous Lucia in preparation for that final shot.That’s if Dominic doesn’t blow shit up in a big way…Ethan… ain’t as smart as he thinks he is. He’s becoming more and more insufferable with every episode.The kids definitely aren’t Cameron’s.I’ve expected that Cameron and Harper were going to have a fling since the first episode, and that’s only cemented by the events at the dinner table. But now I wonder if that’s why Daphne is alone when she finds the floater, and why she didn’t seem too upset before going in the water.Or is she alone because Lucia’s pimp is going to get the money out of Cameron and Ethan.I’m still not certain who the floater is because I think they deliberately want you to believe it will be one of the “bad guys”, but I also think one of the underlying themes of this whole series is that the wealthy don’t pay for their misdeeds and that the working class always feels the consequences. Maybe I’m wrong.
“I could write an entire piece on White’s decision to turn crashing waves into the visual leitmotif of the season”I was a little more curious about the other transition scenes he use, which was basically a small triangle shape against a solid background- the tip of a pine tree against the sky, the alcove against the ocean… Maybe I was just seeing what I wanted to see, but seemed a little like a reference to the… lower female form?
There was another triangle formed by the curtains at the opera house that actually faded into the alcove against the ocean, and I thought the same thing.
lots of tunnels and arches – leading people to their fate?
DO YOU MEAN A VULVA?
What should we make of White having Tanya sit through Puccini’s Madama Butterfly?Madama Butterfly is about an arranged marriage between a Japanese teenager and a US naval officer. Cio-Cio-San earnestly believes it’s a legitimate marriage based on true love and let’s just say her husband….does not share that view. He abandons her and a few years later, in the aria we saw in last night’s episode, she’s singing about her belief that one beautiful day she will spot his ship arriving in the harbor and they will be reunited. And it comes true! Well, sort of. He does return that very day with his “real” wife, an American woman. Cio-Cio-San kills herself so that her husband will take their son and raise him.I’m not sure if Tanya will kill herself, and there’s definitely not a child involved in this equation, but I suppose we could see some potential similarities with her and Greg and how they view their marriage. In her mind she, too, has been abandoned. Or it could just be very dramatic misdirection. Or an opportunity for Quentin to emotionally manipulate Tanya. He did very pointedly tell her she reminded him of a Puccini heroine and things almost never end well for his heroines.
The Puccini opera does tie in very nicely with the local legend of the moor’s head – the stranger who seduced a local girl with promises of marriage, who already had a wife at home, and was killed for that. It’s about empty promises, crushed hope, seduction by false pretense. With the moor, it ends in murder, with Puccini, it ends in suicide. I think we might get both murder and suicide by the end of the series – suicide seems clearly tied to the Tanya plot – the forshadowing at the Tarot reading. Someone mentioned Dominic as a potential candidate.
However I don’t see any seduction by false pretense in this storyline. There’s a fair bit of pretense (the rentboy pretending to be the nephew), but it’s used for cover, not for seduction. I don’t think Portia is horribly deceived. She might be somewhat unsettled by the revelation, but I can’t see her being terribly crushed. She was having some fun, not planning to marry.
Seduction by false pretense might be at play between Albie and Lucia. But this time it’s the local girl who’s doing the pretending. I hope she won’t get killed!
(I had a theory, where Albie asks Lucia to be his girlfriend and promises to take her to America, and then gets cold feet and goes back to Portia, to more closely match the original tale. But it’s too convoluted, and there are not enough episodes left).
Something tells me that Mia will be the murder victim this season. She probably has more wide-eyed innocence than any other character, and generally good intentions, so she makes the perfect sacrificial lamb. In all likelihood, the murderer will be aiming to off someone else (Lucia?), but end up killing Mia by accident.
I also think this about Mia but didn’t the officer in the opening scene say there were actually several bodies? Am I misremembering?
The most confusing/fascinating thing this season, to me: Portia’s clothing/style. I honestly don’t know what she’s going for. This ep’s look appeared to be… Sporty Spice? And earlier in the ep it was like 80s secretary on her way to work in comfortable white shoes? But it’s completely different every episode, and they’re all exceptionally weird.
She dresses in “Gen Z Ugly Chic” which is basically a mashing of the worst styles we left in the late-80s into the mid-90s.
omg, I’ve been trying to suss out a defining term for their (gen Z) fashion choices, you nailed it.
Oooh, does that mean we’ll get to mock her in pastels? No one – no one – looks good in pastels.
I fucking love her style. It’s fun and young.
she’s dressed like a young person who doesn’t know how to dress. it’s pretty accurate.
haha someone’s never seen the teenagers in Brooklyn these days.
I think the “I don’t know what she’s going for” aspect is the entire idea. Portia’s well-meaning, but ultimately kind of an uncultured rube thrust into this high-class context she isn’t equipped to navigate. Her clothing is a weird, inconsistent mess because she has no real sense of style, echoing her lack of self-confidence and her seeming lack of a sense of self.It’s appropriate that she works for Tanya, because neither of them fit into the social strata they’re trying to occupy and it’s clear from first glance. Everyone tolerates Tanya because of her wealth, but it’s also very obvious that her wealth didn’t buy her taste or self-awareness. Just from their clothing, she and Portia are instantly clocked as oblivious Americans with no business forcing their way into the kind of European old money world they want to play in.But my guess is Quentin is actually house-poor, his estate bleeding money, so he needs to wine and dine Tanya as a grift to keep his lifestyle afloat. Which she and Portia are also too inexpert to see.
Really? She dresses like a lot of people her age. A lot of patterns, playful silhouettes, etc.
It’s clear Lucia is playing Albie. If her “pimp” was real, he already would have visited broke-ass Cameron. Also, during the “pimp” scene, Albie remarks that they walked far out of their way that evening, making it pretty clear that the rendezvous was preplanned.Anyone surprised by the “nephew” sex scene was really asleep at the wheel. They all but twirled their mustaches leading up to that moment. Also, Quentin is openly gay, so there’s no reveal there and … it just seems like a nothing burger. The actual big reveal: Quentin and his crew laughed at Tanya’s queen of Sicily question, confirming he is most certainly not her friend. As has been mentioned elsewhere, here, a Greg tie-in (hello, cowboy) and murder plotline seem plausible. line as if she has confirmed everything he has been told about her.Harper’s attraction to Cameron has led her to do just about as much (if not more) than Ethan at this point. Assuming we saw the full story, Ethan really didn’t “do” anything. The fact that Harper can’t accept his explanation shows that things were already severely broken well before this trip. Harper needs to own that she has an attraction to “bad boys.”
Really, at no point did I get the sense Harper was attracted to Cameron – she’s clearly doing this purely to punish Ethan and also, maybe mostly, herself. It’s full on drunken self-loathing trashing about self-destruction.
Of course there relationship was severly broken before the trip. The real problem is that Ethan has never been actually attracted to Harper, and getting continually rejected by him has completely erroded her self-esteem. All the bravado we saw in the first episode was obvious over-compensating.
This is all in the eye of the beholder, but I keep seeing quite a bit of “spark” between Cameron and Harper. He’s an awful person. She knows it. And she is certainly using Cameron and even her “spicy” table chatter to punish Ethan. But it can also be true that there is a part of her that feels an attraction to this loath-some douche. Sometimes people find themselves attracted to people they shouldn’t be, people they don’t even like. I think Mike White is playing both sides of the line.
Sure, people have ambivalent feelings about others all the time, loathing can be certainly sometimes mixed with desire. I’m not necessarily seeing it here – to me Harper seems more like the kid at the playground psyching herself up to eat that worm, to make a point. All that downright desperate drinking suggests to me a need to numb herself to what’s going on and what she’s about to do. I think she does eventually start to revel in her power to start shit and provoke reactions, but I’m not sure that’s about Cameron’s appeal specifically.
We will see how she reacts to Cameron when Ethan is not there to see it. I mean, you might be right, maybe she’s sees some intrinsic benefit in the flirtation beyond provoking Ethan. But that might just be the pure appeal of the transgression, restoring a sense of power. At least, that’s how Daphne is trying to sell the idea. In that case Cameron would be a fairly interchangeable aspect of the affair.
“Really, at no point did I get the sense Harper was attracted to Cameron – she’s clearly doing this purely to punish Ethan and also, maybe mostly, herself. It’s full on drunken self-loathing trashing about self-destruction.”
I would say that their interaction in the ocean showed at least a little spark/curiosity on her part.
Yep if there’s any attraction between the two it’s based in malice
I figure albie is going to stand up to a “pimp” or theo james and then get stabbed/shot
She isn’t attracted to Cameron. She’s just trying to make Ethan jealous.
Yeah, I don’t think you saw the full story as you’re seemingly forgetting how Ethan initially lied to Harper about the condom wrapper and why he ignored her calls. Or how he ignored her sexual advances to jerk off to porn which she caught him in the act of doing. Ethan did plenty during this trip to drive her over the edge.
Ethan is problematic as hell, truly. I just think Harper has now shut off completely from her husband. I don’t think the facts of the condom wrapper honestly even matter at this point. As you say, it’s about something bigger.
Gore Vidal’s line: “I can understand companionship. I can understand bored sex in the afternoon. But I cannot understand the love affair.I heard it as ‘paid sex’ in the afternoon. Either one works, I guess.In other news, can you get me out of the grays? Asking for a friend.
It’s a pretty famous quote (well if you read Vidal’s essays) and the line is “bought” sex not bored sex. Vidal didn’t find sex boring but he did prefer to buy it…
If it somehow turns out mumbling, bumbling Greg is the cowboy it would be one of the most ridiculous plotlines / reveals ever written – even if the love attraction part was just some BS told as part of the con the whole time. The idea that (Season 1) terminally ill, Coloradan parks bureaucrat Greg is part of gay European grift team is such a stretch. The idea that flamboyant Quentin would be madly in love with such a drab goof is beyond ridiculous – but there’s been dumber contrivances. And if Tanya just rebuffed Quentin, at least to leave the vacation resort – the whole scam is off. And my “Greg is a dead delusion of Tanya’s” is still hanging around this episode because 1) Portia reacted strangely (again) to Tanya’s comment about annulling her marriage to Greg, and 2) When carrying Tanya’s luggage someone pointedly asked, “You got a dead body in here?”. Frankly, either of those two storylines are SMH poorly realized at this point. I was under the impression Lucia was a freelancer and has no pimp (which would probably be a death sentence around actual Italian tourist / mafia influenced areas). The discussion with random guy was probably a misdirect with an acquaintance to get Albie to get her more cash to “buy” her safety or freedom, then rip him off, although Lucia hasn’t been written to be that cruel or hostile thus far. Makes me wonder if his dad kills her and Mia for fucking (around) with his son. The girls are treated like throwaways with no homes or stability, so they (and fake-pimp random town guy) would hardly be missed, and the boys could split for America before anyone suspects anything. I was afraid they’d go full Three’s Company ridiculous and have Ethan think the condom belonged to Harper. Not sure what to make of Harper suddenly going full-on rager like this, unless she’s really just setting up Cameron (and maybe artifice bastard-children mother Daphne too).
I don’t this Gregg is The Cowboy but I’d absolutely believe he was looking for a rich lady to target from the get go, that’s actually how I interpreted him in season one and was surprised nothing really came of it. Seeing them married this season made me think “oh I was wrong” but his odd/mean behaviour immediately switched me back to that theory
I thought Daphnie was fiddling with her phone a lot when she was talking to Harper like as if she was recording her or something? I think Greg is working with the guys to scam Tanya for sure, it was far too convenient that they appeared and made friends with Tanya as soon as he left and they also had an age appropriate lad for Portia to distract her.
This is hopefully a belated primer to American audiences for just how annoying Essex accents can be.
As if anyone cares!
I don’t think the Harper we know would have been ok with Cam trying to grope her at the dinner table.The Queen of Sicily? Another reason why Tanya is the least relevant character of this season. We finally get to see why bringing the Sicily gays into the story was important?2000 euros for a one-nighter? That is ridiculous. That’s 2000 US dollars. But she’s only charging Cam for 1300. Poor Albie. Don’t fucking fall in love with a hooker. No one feels sorry for the hooker.Valentina’s story is now so predictable. Just stop.
Yeah, 2000 Euros seems like the rate a very high-end escort service with very beautiful models would charge (not that I have any idea!) and not a freelance amateur as Lucia might be, casually doing it with her best mate. But then again, she is very attractive and has a very sexy body. I’m assuming she knew Dominic and Cameron—the dumb, rich, sex-addicted Americans–would pay whatever she asked, so she upsold herself. But inflation these days (not that kind) everything has gone up.
she’s charging for the whole night, I think she’s asking for a normal amount at a luxe resort.
actual Vegas SW here: $2k for an overnight is on the lower end of standard. (also, she’s “only” charging Cam $1300 because he already handed her some money on her way out of the room.) #themoreyouknow
She isn’t giving Cam a discount. He only paid her 700. He owes 1300.
Right. My mistake. Thanks.
Harper has decided that if no one else is going to follow the rules / morals, then she wont either – note how she didnt take a prosecco when they arrived vs her drinking / smoking now – shes choosing to act in a way thats bad for her.The queen of Sicily bit shows why they chose Tanya. I just watched the start of episode one (to confirm we have met Alessio before) and noticed a boat very much like quintens out at sea while the police remove the body from the ocean. They may be important to the story.I also don’t know what the going rate would be, but this is a white lotus hotel so it wouldnt suprise me . Also, isnt the $1300 just the remainder that Cameron owes them? OI though it paid them what he had at the time but came up short. I might be wrong though.I am still intrigued with where Valentina goes with her story. I don’t think she will take Mia up on the offer, but I think she appreciates the friendship.
Mm… it’s too bad that the couple that will stay together is the one already doing the whole transactional relationship one. Harper remains my favorite character of this season.
But she’s only charging Cam for 1300.Well he gave her some cash while rushing her out the door, right? Maybe $700?
HBO bingo card: incest.Am I the only one who keeps looking at Albie and being like “Todd? Todd!”Also: was that really where Theo James was fucking Lucia? We all dismissed the “I want you inside me” speak as stuff bros do to amusingly make one another uncomfortable…but maybe there was an extra condom wrapper? And Mike White does seem to think everybody is gay so.
There was no incest. Jack isn’t a nephew, he’s a boy toy. They’re pulling a Dirty Rotten Scoundrels grift on Tanya.
why those dirty!! rotten!!!what’s the word? dammit I just had it
If Ruprecht was one of Quentin’s posse, that would be something
They did show Cameron having sex with Lucia on the actual couch though–and no one else having sex on it…
I watched a repeat of this week’s episode last night, and I’m more convinced than ever that Greg is the cowboy, especially after Quentin mentions that he fell in love with this straight man 30 years ago, and he’s still amazed how he’d do anything to make this person happy. It all adds up.
There’s a definite Mike Leigh/Paolo Sorrentino flavour to this season. Also, those turbulent cliffs are demanding a sacrifice. The question is who’s it going to be? They could all easily find themselves contemplating suicide (except maybe Bert, unless the weight of how he treated his wife finally comes home to roost! It’s going to be fun seeing how this all plays out.