An email enters your inbox. The subject line reads “POV: UR AT THE WHITE LOTUS.” It’s from the clothing brand Cider—you know, the one all over TikTok that defines itself as an “Earth–Conscious Brand” while contributing to the erosive trend cycles of fast fashion. Scrolling through the email allows recipients to pick out boho–chic bikinis or cream, knit midi dresses listed under labels like “pretend like nothing’s going wrong in these tropic–ready pieces” or “just another retired millionaire, nothing to see here.” If none of these specifically curated looks tickle one’s fancy, there’s a whole page dedicated to playing dress–up for the “Lotus Escape.” For a little under $30 and the small price of potentially unethical labor, you too can look like the glamorously troubled vacationers of the White Lotus Hotel.
After a three–year hiatus, Season 3 of Mike White’s The White Lotus has finally started airing. Though the location has once again changed—this time, our characters find their way to Thailand—this season centers on yet another group of rich white people who only marginally veil their dark secrets and hidden resentments behind opulent exteriors. This formula is set in its ways, but the people still thirst for bourgeois drama; the first episode, “Same Spirits, New Forms,” premiered to 2.4 million viewers—57% and 155% higher than Season 2 and Season 1 respectively. The White Lotus has cemented itself in the cosmopolitan mainstream, and with its weekly releases on Sunday nights, it's become a you–just–have–to–be–there cultural moment. It seems everyone—co–workers, mutuals on Twitter, and even professors—has The White Lotus on the mind. It’s pop–cultural relevance harkens back a period of the classic “water–cooler” shows. And you’re in luck, because now you can emulate the very same characters you tune into every end of the week … just ignore the skeletons in their hotel closets.
If Cider’s unofficially inspired clothing line isn’t quite your vibe, you can check out the officially branded Abercombie & Fitch The White Lotus collection. Now you can live as a walking advertisement in this $90 crewneck sporting the The White Lotus logo and beach skyline or imitate the on–screen inhabitants’ aesthetic with one of their many linen sets, always described as “breezy.” With this latest season, The White Lotus has not only delivered a new cast and a whole new level of crazy, but a perfectly curated ad campaign. Take a quick scroll through HBO’s official The White Lotus website, and you’ll find all the brands the show has partnered with, from the likes of American Express to Kiehl’s. It appears that, with this most recent season, The White Lotus has lost the plot of its capital critique, commodifying itself to better sell to audiences.
When millions of viewers tune in to the latest salacious episode every Sunday night, they’re first met with a series of partnered advertisements curated to match the show’s aesthetic. This may seem like a small adjustment for viewers, who might not even realize the branded content. But it’s one huge step for advertising executives at Warner Bros. Discovery—HBO’s parent company. As Ryan Gould, the head of digital sales for the company, puts it, “By leveraging our premium portfolio of brands and platforms, we’ve created immersive, integrated campaigns that connect audiences to our advertisers in meaningful and innovative ways.” The inherent lavish branding of The White Lotus has created the perfect environment to partner with brands and sell specifically targeted products through curated ads.
Ketel One Vodka, for example, recently partnered with Patrick Schwarzenegger—the eldest brother of the fictional Ratliff family—to make him their first ever “spirit advisor.” In this 60–second ad, a suave Schwarzenegger shakes up a White Lotus Vesper Martini garnished with lychee, telling his beautiful co–star that he thought she “might want a taste of Thailand.” With one sip she is whisked away to the shoreline, pink sunsets, palm trees, and steamy massages. Julie Yufe, the senior vice president of Vodka, Rum, and Gin at Diageo North America, speaks about the collaboration: “The show’s exploration of timeless hospitality aligns perfectly with the craftsmanship behind Ketel One Vodka and Tanqueray Gin, both of which are synonymous with the highest standards of quality.” Because, of course, there’s no better way to sell your show–branded alcohol than with the face of the character who is speculatively headed down an incestuous path with his younger brother.
Schwarzenegger is marketable. He’s an attractive choice to be the Ketel One spokesperson. He is, of course, not his character, Saxon Ratliff, a nepo–baby douchebag who makes comments about his sister’s sex life and masturbates with the bathroom door open while his brother is in the room. When the ad plays before the opening credits, it's hard to separate the commodified, luxurious lifestyle from show which is meant to critique it.
There are conflicting values between The White Lotus the show, and The White Lotus the brand. The show is a humorous, biting satire on American social elites told through their frivolous vacationing habits with references to the colonial roots of the tourism industry. Hotel manager Armond (Murray Bartlett) put it perfectly in the opening of Season 1: “They wanna be the only child, the special baby child of the hotel.” The characters are used to getting what they want, when they want it. They utilize their money and connections for the pettiest of reasons, always assuming that they matter more than anyone else around them.
Much of the critique that Mike White offers is revealed through the everyday obscenities these rich characters commit alongside the darker, albeit classic, flaws of the upper class—the culmination of these moments is enough to make the average person’s skin crawl at their cringey, shockingly out–of–touch behavior. Season 3 is no different from its predecessors in this way. The southern Ratliff family features a father in some dubious money scheme, a pill–popping mother, an eldest son riding off the coattails of his father, a daughter who seems to function as the moral compass but whose obsession with Buddhism boils down to simply an act of rebellion against her mother, and a youngest son who acts as a people pleasing mediator, often leaving all sides unhappy. Not to mention childhood friends Kate (Leslie Bibb), Laurie (Carrie Coon), and Jaclyn (Michelle Monaghan), who are horrifically competitive with each other. The inherent ridiculousness of these caricatures can be pointed and laughed at—“Aren’t these rich people so freaky?”—but that’s where the critiquing seems to end.
As much as The White Lotus has billed itself as capital critique, it hasn't always walked the line between voyeurism and exposé well. In a review by The New Yorker, Inkoo Kang explains how Mike White has struggled with this delicate balancing. She writes, “At this point in the show’s award–laden run, it almost goes without saying that its creator, Mike White, glamorizes the lodgings as avidly as his most grounded character scorn them.” In Season 1, Olivia Mossbacher (Sydney Sweeney) and her college friend Paula (Brittany O’Grady) “read” the likes of Freud and Nietzsche and criticize Nicole Mossbacher (Connie Britton) for destroying the social fabric with her capitalism as a tech CFO—while they themselves are still actively participating in the benefits of that wealth. It seems The White Lotus has yet to graduate from that surface–level rejection of capitalism. It’s trendy to be class–conscious, just not so class–conscious that you don’t buy what they’re selling.
The latest ad campaign and brand partnerships, though admittedly odd and a bit inharmonious, are the typical treatment of anti–capitalist media for mainstream consumption. The Korean thriller show Squid Game underwent similar treatment after its first season became a hit. Though the deadly game the characters play was a condemning allegory for capitalism, the concept of the game became a watered–down cultural obsession that received two real–life adaptations: Netflix’s Squid Game: The Challenge and Mr. Beast’s “$456,000 Squid Game In Real Life!” (which later became a full series). The Hunger Games, a dystopian anti–war series, suffered a similar fate when it was marketed as a teenage love–triangle. Original intent goes out the window when art gains such mainstream success and becomes highly profitable.
The commodification of The White Lotus has culminated in perhaps the only way it ever could: a real–life stay at the on–screen hotel. The show has notoriously only ever been exclusively filmed at Four Seasons’ locations, and following the second season in Sicily—where watchers flocked to the Four Seasons’ location in Taormina, Italy after season’s premiere—the show officially partnered with the “luxury hospitality brand” to create a White Lotus exclusive experience. As a part of the premier of Season 3, Four Seasons locations across the globe offered exclusive themed events like an afternoon tea event where participants get the “essence of Thailand through an elevated culinary experience” and exclusive screenings of episodes. Because, if you’ve been watching The White Lotus and the death, colonization, and exploitation haven’t turned you away, you’re more than welcome to live these very lives. Assuming you can afford it, of course.
