Spoilers below for the season 3 finale of The White Lotus.
The White Lotus season 3 couldn’t end with just one murder. This time, show creator and writer Mike White killed off three characters, including tragic lovers Rick (Walton Goggins) and Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood).
The episode took a violent turn when Rick ended up shooting hotel owner Jim Hollinger (Scott Glenn), who he believed killed his father. He only found out seconds later that Jim actually was his father all along.
The murder set off a shootout between Rick and Jim’s guards, but Chelsea, who had followed her partner into the confrontation, was a casualty in the bloodbath. Rick was ultimately also shot by security guard Gaitok (Tayme Thapthimthong) while carrying Chelsea’s dead body. Chelsea spoke earlier in the episode about her and Rick’s fates being linked (“amor fati”) and wanting to be together with him forever.
White revealed after the finale that Chelsea’s devotion to Rick is why he felt he needed to kill off the fan-favorite character. “Chelsea has this kind of romantic fatalism about their relationship, and you want to buy into it,” he said. “She says to him, ‘Stop fixating on the love you didn’t get. Think about the love that you have. I’m right here.’”
“It’s a classic theme of Greek tragedy, of somebody killing the thing that they love [while] trying to get some revenge,” White said.
He expanded on the arc of Chelsea and Rick in the official White Lotus podcast’s bonus episode. He started by discussing how his own location scouting trip inspired him:
When I was in Thailand, I met a lot of these guys who have younger girlfriends. A lot of them were Thai, but some were from other parts of the world. And you could just tell, I got on an elevator, and there was this older guy, and the young girl was very hot, and boobs all pushed up. And she was like, had on her phone, and she was like, oh, she was showing him some runway photos of something. And you could just tell, he was just like, I could not give a shit...and she was just living in her reality, and I was like, it’d be fun to start off, and you have this kind of relationship where it feels like, he’s probably in it for the sex, but...at this point, it’s almost not worth it.
But then that ends up being the romance of the show. And I haven’t written a lot of that kind of relationship in the show at all. So I was just like, it’d be interesting to do kind of a stealth move where ultimately, you actually suddenly find yourself really rooting for this couple, and you love them.
Chelsea’s characterization added a layer of spirituality to them too, he added, and perhaps took some of the edge off of her death.
[Having] her be this kind of woo-woo into astrology, but...because of that, there’s this idea that maybe in their tragic ending, there’s something that feels a little like some kind of hint to a life beyond, that love transcends this life. Like even as they’re wheeled out to the plane together in their symmetrical coffins, that their love transcends this in some bittersweet [way].
[She has the stance of] I’ll follow you in the next life and the next life....So I like the idea of giving her a lot of kind of prattle that seems like nonsense, but that ultimately you're like, oh, maybe. At the end, she talks about the groups working to this divine goal. So whether I believe all that, it's nice to have a voice of that, because she has this deep sense of belief and amor fati, and like things happen for a reason that maybe somehow that takes off the edge of the sadness of her death in some way, because it feels like she has some kind of, I don't know, higher power to what happens next.
Watch White explain the choices he made in the finale below:
Wood and Goggins wrote tributes on Instagram reflecting on their characters’ fates. Wood wrote in her post, “I only went home once whilst filming White Lotus. This is what I saw on the first day back there. R and C forever 💘”
Goggins shared a longer reflection, writing:
Rick + Chelsea. With the heaviest of hearts… To me, ours was a love story. It was only ever a love story, hindered by unresolved, childhood trauma. We all have them… but can we move past them. In the depths of our despair there is always beauty around us. If we can sit with our pain, just sit with it… not react… not be defined by it…It’s there… the love the world is constantly giving in any given moment is there. Always waiting for us to see it… Trust me I know. Thank you Mike White for your imagination, your tender heart, for the privilege of giving us the opportunity to tell it. Thank you Aimee Lou for being my partner… a journey I will never forget. Sammy Rock for being the best wing man a fella could ask for. And every stellar fucking actor in this cast…. You’re just incredible to watch. Bernad, John, Ben, Kamine… and this whole crew. I love you. We’ll always have Thailand. And to all of you…thank you for going on this journey with us. WG Those first 5 are photos, some taken on those fateful days, are by our incredible stills photographer @fabio_lovino_ Gifts. Thank you friend.
“Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.” Aeschylus.”
