[imagesource: Fabio Lovino / HBO]

The second season of The White Lotus has unequivocally proven that Mike White owns television.

That last scene of all three generations of men looking back at a pretty girl walking past sets that fact in stone. See the hound dogs doing what they do best up top.

The sweetest redemption here is that Lucia (Simona Tabasco) successfully scammed two generations of these sexist Di Grasso men out of $50 000 (that’s almost R1 million by the way).

Spoiler, I know, but I assume you’ve seen all seven episodes of White’s latest sumptuous satire (the final episode aired on Sunday/Monday local time) and have come here to relish in memes to bide the time until the next season comes out.

The series is now known to keep us all magically on the edge of our seats with a hint of death in the very first episode.

This time, in the season premiere, Daphne (breakout star Meghann Fahy) got our hearts racing with her ironic comment about how nice the hotel is, saying “Oh, you’re gonna die. They’re going to have to drag you out of here,” only to go swimming and actually find a dead body in the water.

Then, the deceptively addictive opening score (which amazingly combines the first season’s Hawaiian score ‘Aloha!’ into a new song with Italian sounds called ‘Renaissance’) keeps the tension going with the metaphor-laden title sequence.

I don’t think any of us skipped the into, because, hot damn, it is powerful.

Anyway, most of us spend our watching time trying to figure out who will end up dead in the last episode, which is already an iconic plot device:

At this point I wonder if I’m the one who dies in the season finale of The White Lotus.

— Bess Kalb (@bessbell) December 11, 2022

Based on season one, where the hotel’s staff workers were treated as disposable and irrelevant much of the time (as commentary on class), it made sense to think that Mia (Beatrice Grannò) and Lucia, the two local sex workers, would be offed.

But it turns out they were the only two characters who ended the series truly happy and content. While the mess between Cameron (Theo James), Daphne, Harper (Aubrey Plaza), and Ethan (Will Sharpe), seemed to have found some calm at the end, you can still recognise the pent-up tension in their lies about all their shared cheating escapades.

Eventually, we find out that Tanya (Emmy winner Jennifer Coolidge) dies after shooting a yacht’s worth of her new gay friends when she realises that they were conspiring with her husband, Greg (Jon Gries), to exploit a clause in their prenup that meant Greg would inherit her fortune if she died.

The way she fell into the ocean trying to get off the yacht is an oddly fitting ending considering how in season one she was spreading her mother’s ashes from a boat, notes BuzzFeed.

It is sad that Coolidge is gone because she ultimately held the two seasons together. She also birthed most of the memes, starting from this hilarious scene:

this scene is so much funnier knowing it’s improvised im crying #whitelotus pic.twitter.com/351D3Om0Xy

— Cris ✨ (@lionesspike) December 6, 2022

Alright, you came here for the memes:

white lotus finale pic.twitter.com/CdVLp07GDB

— Fabian Igiraneza (@fabianigiraneza) December 12, 2022

house of dragon 🤝 the white lotus #thewhitelotus pic.twitter.com/Fo84zW9ZRo

— tsto (@tsto_loff) December 12, 2022

what’s the French word for seeing an image you know will become a meme that you’ll be seeing across social media platforms for the next 3-5 years https://t.co/jNAoN95kqA

— Paul McCallion (@OrangePaulp) December 12, 2022

tanya in the white lotus finale pic.twitter.com/96qGPRyDeT

— kie (@criminalplaza) December 12, 2022

Surely the moment she asked the Italian-speaking captain whether he knitted his own cap, or the moment she told the coked-up mafia pimp that she likes his “giant pupils” are in here as memes, too.

Ah yes, there’s it, the willful ignorance:

It was Daphne that was the queen of using positivity as an absolute weapon though:

harper, ethan, and cameron: *absolutely losing their minds*

daphne: #TheWhiteLotus #WhiteLotus pic.twitter.com/cMJq59YZgQ

— Rayah (@champagnepisces) December 12, 2022

She’s TRUE lobotomy goals pic.twitter.com/Gyqm67dldd

— julia hava (@binchcity) December 12, 2022

Daphne is group texting her friends “just had the most random weekend”

— Michael Benjamin (@mfbenji) December 12, 2022

Give that girl an Emmy.

Mia, too:

Mia singing in The White Lotus lounge while all the other guests cheat, lie, and murder each other pic.twitter.com/M2wV3oFPu5

— Sam Stryker (@sbstryker) December 12, 2022

A round of applause for girls using men successfully, yes:

mia and lucia leaving the white lotus pic.twitter.com/WCuuMDCXsR

— katherine pickhardt (@katpickhardt) December 12, 2022

HOW IM FEELING NOW THAT LUCIA AND MIA SUCCESSFULLY USED MEN TO ACHIEVE THEIR DREAMS #whitelotus #thewhitelotus pic.twitter.com/nzBNKwAyt9

— Cris ✨ (@lionesspike) December 12, 2022

Pity about this win though:

greg after getting the call that $500m is on the way to his bank and everyone he had to split it with is dead: #WhiteLotus pic.twitter.com/Zl5DesAU3X

— Ro (NFT era) (@Real_LindaLing) December 12, 2022

Moving on from the good times to the weirder times:

albie: “they found a guest who drowned. they also found a bunch of dead people on a yacht”

portia, who definitely knows that may have been tanya:#WhiteLotus #TheWhiteLotus pic.twitter.com/YIy4NqxHfi

— kathleen (@kathleen_hanley) December 12, 2022

portia and albie leaving sicily together #thewhitelotus pic.twitter.com/kl8JQENsWk

— ashley (@revofash) December 12, 2022

Wonderful, they found a way to keep Coolidge in season three!

when jennifer coolidge plays tanya’s twin sister in #WhiteLotus season 3 and she travels to the maldives to spread tanya’s ashes the ocean… pic.twitter.com/xxGJ2I221l

— Jake Kaplan (@JakeKaplanNY) December 12, 2022

Anyway, HBO has already booked another excursion at a luxury hotel somewhere on a whole new continent, which means a season renewal is definitely happening.

I’ve heard rumours it could be in Japan and be a “funny look at death and Eastern religion and spirituality”.

[source:buzzfeednews]