Ever since the dawn of television and the creation of the ‘TV dinner,’ lots of partners have watched TV together. It’s that moment of peace at the end of the working and after the “how was your day?” conversation, with a wine bottle companion. All lights are off, your hand holds their hand, while you each look up at the show you watch together. You’re both excited at what this week’s episode will bring up, or what this new season will introduce as a storyline. It’s a ritual to be observed and respected.

But then — boom! You find yourselves watching The White Lotus, the one show that dares to explore some unspoken truths about sex, power, and relationships, all while digging into terribly funny fiction. At the first sight of a conflict, you look at each other and giggle. But the conflict turns into something more serious, more awkward, and why not, more real. That couch union becomes uncomfortable now. You become physically incapable of enduring more. The night has turned into something much more complex.

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Whether this is part of the ritual (it all depends on the season, the subplot, and of course, the kind of couple you’re in), it’s fair to say Mike White’s show has its own vocabulary, pace, and personality. It’s not that it doesn’t look like other shows, but with HBO, we get the feeling restrictions don’t apply, and our fears will likely come true.

One of those unsettling feelings we have gotten with both seasons of the very successful drama, is that couples seem to be always broken, or that they exist under a shroud of mistrust and unhappiness that will end up bursting like an explosive bubble filled with relevant confessions.

Most people agree that it’s a very good, fantastically written show, one of the best things on TV in 2022 and 2021, with its excellent first season. But why does it feel like an unfit Sunday evening pick for couples?

From The Awkward To The Unsettling

     Warner Bros.

The White Lotus rides smoothly between drama and comedy and does a great job at portraying tragedy in the most uncommon of places: a resort hotel where everything should work and where you should indulge in guilty pleasures without fear of consequence.Even if the guests are seemingly wealth and beautiful people, we are able to see our lives reflected in them.

At the beginning, they’re wealthy, beautiful versions of regular people. They have issues, but they shouldn’t affect what’s basically a dream vacation. But the showrunner insists early on that the show’s relationships aren’t perfect. Far from it. This escape from reality will be a spark in what will basically be an explosion of sincerity that will show a darker, violent, and primal side of the union between two people.

In season one, we saw newlyweds whose relationship was a facade. They were endearing up to a point, but Rachel Patton was terribly unhappy. Her fulfillment seemed to be an enigma that she couldn’t resolve, and which turned into a dystopia when her mother-in-law showed up during her honeymoon to get things straight with the hotel, which couldn’t fulfill the snobby petitions demanded by Rachel’s husband. It wasn’t going to end well. It didn’t.

But season two takes this dynamic one step further. Two couples going on vacation together clash silently and enter a final act of infidelity that’s solved in a strangely disturbing way. What’s so effective about this decision by White, is that nothing is confirmed. Only couples who have gone through these situations will see the possible and jarring truth. For couples who have always been under ideal circumstances, doubt will arise.

Not Couples Only

     Warner Bros. Television

In the end, it’s all about twisted motivations and how they result in great depictions of horrible characters. White has made a great deal at making them likable in the middle of chaos and whatever comes after. There’s an inevitable effect in the audience, the couples who decide not to snuggle, the family who see their flaws in an HBO show that’s more down-to-earth than they thought.

But The White Lotus goes beyond what we have presented as a simplistic premise about the probable crisis in households. There are different storylines that range from downright funny to the ones pertaining to crime. It all seems to fit the wheel in a show with a smooth drive through several conflicts at once, and in the same idyllic resort haven where dreams can come true, and nightmares too.

The Truth Is Harsh in The White Lotus

The episode has ended, or the season finale left you hungry for more. You get ready for bed, while reflecting on what you just saw. The best thing you can do is discuss the theories of what just happened and try to extricate yourselves from that situation. You don’t want to live those lives. You don’t want to go to a White Lotus resort.

That version of the truth is horrific for some and funny to others. But it’s still a version of something. Something that won’t likely happen after watching the series, because now you have learned not to submit yourselves to this. Unless it’s actually what you want, which might be the case; The White Lotus simply has the capacity to reflect your darkest, repressed desires. In that case, go make a reservation.

Both seasons of The White Lotus are available to stream on HBO Max.