Warning: This article contains spoilers for The White Lotus season 2.

Season 1 of HBO’s The White Lotus entered the awards circuit as a miniseries last year and cleaned up. SAG Awards, Primetime Emmys, you name it. But before all those trophies, word had gotten out that a second installment was in production. And now, season 2 has come to a close, following an onslaught of fan theories regarding what exactly would happen. And the end result was a doozy, including the shocking death of a fan-favorite character.

Both seasons share the trait of having a plethora of famous actors, including Aubrey Plaza, Theo James, Alexandra Daddario, and, of course, Jennifer Coolidge. But there are other similarities between the installments that heighten the series’ overall feel of a cohesive whole. Check out our breakdown of the biggest parallels below, as we await a third season that could be set in Asia (via Variety).

MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY

Tanya McQuoid’s linear storyline

     HBO

Fans loved seeing Jennifer Coolidge return to the spotlight in season 1 of The White Lotus. She won multiple awards for her scene-stealing turn as Tanya last year, and it was a pleasant surprise seeing her return this year, despite season 2 having an entirely new location, cast, and storylines. Tanya was single in Hawaii and met Greg (Jon Gries) at the White Lotus hotel there. In the second installment, we see them vacationing in Sicily as a married couple. It was tragic, to say the least, to see that the death teased in season 2’s first episode pertained to this couple.

“In the end of last season, Tanya is sitting with Greg in the last episode and he’s talking about his health issues and she says, ‘I’ve had every kind of treatment over the years, death is the last immersive experience I haven’t tried,’ and I was thinking, it’d be so fun to bring Tanya back because she’s such a great character, but maybe that’s the journey for her, the journey to death,” creator Mike White said in an HBO Max featurette, via Deadline. “Not that I really wanted to kill Tanya because I love her as a character and obviously love Jennifer, but we’re going to Italy, she’s such a diva, a larger-than-life female archetype, it felt maybe we could devise our own operatic conclusion to her life and story.”

The Hotel Managers’ Sexual Inclination

     Warner Bros. Television Distribution

It wasn’t just Coolidge nabbing numerous trophies last year. Murray Bartlett rightfully won a handful of awards over the past year as Armond, manager of The White Lotus Hawaii. As season 1 progressed, we learned that Armond was attracted to men, especially when he fell off the wagon. Cut to season 2, where Sabrina Impacciatore plays the character of Valentina, manager of Sicily’s White Lotus location. After a few episodes of her rejecting men’s advances, we come to learn the ultimate truth: she prefers her own gender, just like Armond (may he rest in peace!).

Flash-Forwards Laced With Death

Speaking of “RIP” — both seasons begin with scenes that will ultimately resurface later on. And both scenes share an ominous glimpse of what to come: someone has died. But who? Both deaths remain a mystery until the seasons’ finales. And both were certainly surprising to fans, as to who was killed off. With season 2, for instance, some incorrect death guesses by viewers were Portia (Haley Lu Richardson) and Ethan (Will Sharpe). Season 2 put a clever spin on its flash-forward sequence by showing one of its principal characters, Daphne (Meghann Fahy), in good spirits at the end of her vacation. In season 1’s opening scene, we had initially seen Shane (Jake Lacy) sittting alone and looking utterly sad at the end of his trip.

Obnoxious, Young, Wealthy Men

While we’re on the topic of Shane, Jake Lacy’s Emmy-nominated turn as an infuriating newlywed is a concept that’s echoed in season 2. Enter Theo James as Cameron, another young wealthy dude who’s equally self-centered and with a wife he’s not exactly “happily married” to. Mike White brilliantly achieves a balancing act with both these characters, making Shane and Cameron extremely dislikable while each possessing a trait that makes them a bit tolerable to watch. For Shane, it was the fact that he was correct in claiming that hotel manager Armond did, in fact, double-book the infamous “pineapple suite” by mistake. If Shane were wrong, then it would have been game over for his character — at least in the viewers’ eyes. And then with Cameron, his despicable actions throughout season 2 are actually strengthening the bond of another married couple we’re somewhat rooting for: Harper and Ethan. It’s this effect that makes James’ scene-stealing persona tolerable to watch, despite his unfavorable decisions.

Infidelity and Raunchy Sexual Discoveries

     HBO 

Theo James brings us to the final similarity on our list when it comes to The White Lotus seasons. Multiple characters across both installments are plagued by infidelity: Cameron and Daphne, Nicole (Connie Britton) and Mark (Steve Zahn), Tanya and Greg, Ethan and Harper (but maybe not?), Dominic (Michael Imperioli) and his wife. And on the topic of intimacy, both seasons have a shocking scene that reveals explicit sex that the (male) involved characters didn’t want the world to know about. In season 1, Shane walks in on Armond performing on Dillon (Lukas Gage). In the latest installment, Tanya walks in on Jack (Leo Woodall) and Quentin (Tom Hollander) in action. What will season 3 bring? Only time will tell.