The ‘White Lotus’ Season 3 Finale Danger Meter
Practically every character faces some sort of risk heading into Sunday. Let’s rank them from least to most precarious—as well as speculate on their capacity to kill.
On The White Lotus, death is as inevitable as all those dreamy ocean shots: Like the crashing, salty waves, a killing is a-coming. And in case we’d gotten too hung up on hand jobs and high school grudges, the penultimate episode reminded us that we’re on the ropes, and the fight’s almost over:
But who’s up on the spinning roulette wheel of death? Episode 7 puts each character in varying stages of physical or spiritual peril—at this point, you could make the case that just about anyone (except, obviously, Zion) is the floating body we saw in the premiere. And, as monk Luang Por Teera reminds us, “Every one of us has the capacity to kill”—so any of our protagonists, even those who seem the most innocent, could be the murderer.
But as we head into Sunday’s finale, who’s most likely to shuffle off this mortal coil and be reborn into the next life, and who’ll be the one sending them off? Let’s look at all the pieces on the board as we approach the final episode, assessing the likelihood of each character’s death—and the potential that they’re the killer. (The list goes from who’s least to most likely to die in the finale, as determined by a percentage based on vibes.) Without further ado, let’s begin.
Luang Por Teera
Why he should be concerned: Luang Por Teera should be fine. He’ll be ensconced in his prayer center, still giving sage advice to white savior types, when all hell breaks loose. And as far as we know, Luang Por Teera has no enemies (other than maybe Victoria, who will probably want to rain hellfire upon him when she learns she’s losing two of her babies to his “sex cult”). But in the thick of her lorazepam withdrawal, would she even be functional enough to find a gun, track him down, and shoot him?
Probability of being the dead body: 3 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Luang Por Teera reminds us that we’re all capable of violence—but of anyone on this show, he’s the least likely to go full John Wick.
Probability of being the killer: 1 percent (although wouldn’t that be fun to watch?).
Sritala
Why she should be concerned: Sritala is in Bangkok, far away from the White Lotus and whatever’s about to go down there. But since her bodyguards are pretty much useless, she might be vulnerable if she decides, for whatever reason, to head back to the hotel. It’s more likely, though, that she’s nursing Jim Hollinger back to health and nursing her wounded pride as a result of Rick’s deception.
Probability of being the dead body: 8 percent.
Is she capable of violence? Sritala clearly loves demoralizing Fabian (and she’d have a field day if she caught wind of his open mic night), but I don’t see her dusting off whatever fight moves she picked up from her days as an actress.
Probability of being the killer: 2 percent.
Dr. Amrita
Why she should be concerned: We know that Dr. Amrita, like Zion, is close to the action when everything goes down. As far as we can tell, Dr. Amrita escapes unscathed—but the shooter is clearly nearby, since one of the bullets shatters the glass of her meditation room.
Probability of being the dead body: 16 percent. We know Dr. Amrita isn’t the dead body we saw floating in the pond, but she’s in the middle of an active shooting. I’m not counting her among the survivors just yet.
Is she capable of violence? Dr. Amrita has dedicated her life to Buddhist meditation and teaching; she doesn’t even lose her calm around basket cases like Rick. But it doesn’t really matter if she has some secret rage building up inside her—we already know Dr. Amrita isn’t the shooter. Moving on!
Probability of being the killer: 0 percent.
Zion
Why he should be concerned: We hear the shooting unfold from Zion’s perspective, so we know he isn’t a victim—yet. However, he and Belinda are clearly in Greg’s sights; he’s been eyeing them like a hawk on a power line.
Is there a better way to get to a mother than through her son?
Probability of being the dead body: Well, he’s not the dead body, but he could be a dead body, eventually. 19 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Zion would do what it takes to protect Belinda; he offers himself as a kind of bodyguard for her in Episode 7, saying that Greg won’t do anything to her while he’s there. (Maybe he should have rethought that meditation sesh since he knows Greg is out to get his mom!) But we know he didn’t instigate the hotel shooting, at least.
Probability of being the killer: 0 percent.
Pornchai
Why he should be concerned: We haven’t seen much of Pornchai since Zion showed up—maybe just because Zion’s been cockblocking, or maybe because he’s about to make a grand return in the finale. He’s another hotel employee who could be milling around at the time of the shooting, and if Greg does have something to do with it, Pornchai could end up being yet another thing Greg takes away from Belinda—especially if Pornchai tries to protect her. And if he ends up dead, it could be a lesson to Belinda that she should have taken Greg’s money and run.
Probability of being the dead body: 21 percent.
Is he capable of violence? There’s a far-fetched but not impossible scenario where Pornchai has been in cahoots with Greg this whole time. According to one internet theory, the monitor lizard in Belinda’s room was actually a talisman of protection or good luck; since Pornchai was the one who got it out of her room, could he be a symbol of bad luck?
Probability of being the killer: 9 percent.
Fabian
Why he should be concerned: Fabian is at the White Lotus day and night; he could easily get caught in the crossfire as he does his best to pretend that everything is hunky-dory at the hotel. Fabian tried to quash Belinda’s concerns about Greg a few episodes ago, so it would be a fitting comeuppance if his disregard for her warnings (and her safety) somehow resulted in his own death. But no one besides Belinda has any real beef with Fabian, and I don’t expect Season 3 to end with yet another dead hotel manager. (And if it does, I hope the other White Lotus managers can get some good hazard pay.)
Probability of being the dead body: 22 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Only when it comes to Gaitok’s ego.
Probability of being the killer: 4 percent.
Kate
Why she should be concerned: Kate’s the monkey in the middle between Laurie and Jaclyn, trying to play both sides after their vacation-shattering blowup. So far, it’s unclear whether Laurie’s rage or Jaclyn’s vanity could result in physical, and not just verbal, assault. But these women already wield words like sharpshooters; they don’t need guns to do damage. (There’s also the possibility that the Russians could come back to the ladies’ villa and try to rob and/or extort them; see more on that below.)
Probability of being the dead body: 23 percent.
Is she capable of violence? Kate can shoot daggers, all right, but the group’s designated peacekeeper may be the least likely of the three to explode and kill her besties.
Probability of being the killer: 11 percent.
Jim Hollinger
Why he should be concerned: No amount of wealth can buy peace or good bodyguards on this show, as Jim Hollinger found out when he faced Rick’s wrath. Rick couldn’t bring himself to shoot the old man when he confronted him, and Rick does seem at peace with that decision for now. But is it just me, or did Hollinger show a hint of recognition when he repeated the name of Rick’s mother?
There’s a chance that Hollinger could follow Rick back to the White Lotus; after all, Sritala knows that he’s checked in there for the week—another one of the many holes in Rick’s plan. Maybe he’ll have a final confrontation with Rick where Hollinger’s bodyguards (finally back from their smoke break!) and/or the police try to apprehend him, leading to the gunfire we hear in the premiere and, perhaps, Hollinger’s death.
But we also have to remember that Hollinger is recovering from a stroke (part of the reason he’s so feeble in Episode 7) and may not have even survived his encounter with Rick. (Falling backward onto your head at that age … not great.) In that case, those bodyguards—and probably the Thai police—are definitely after our antihero.
Probability of being the dead body: 24 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Even if Hollinger had nothing to do with the death of Rick’s dad, it’s pretty clear he was up to some shady shit in his land-grabbing days. “You hit a roadblock, you had a lot of options,” he says. So we know he was likely capable of violence back when he was hale and hearty. He might not be able to do much himself now, but he could still send his lackeys after Rick. I do kind of doubt he’d want to create a scene at his own hotel, though—he seems more like a back-alley, under-the-cover-of-night kind of operator—so Rick and Frank had better watch their backs as they booze their way down the streets of Bangkok.
Probability of being the killer (by proxy): 41 percent.
Frank
Why he should be concerned: Frank was an accomplice in Rick’s half-baked plan to get access to Jim Hollinger. If Hollinger decides to go after Rick, Frank could be on his hit list, too. Among his many slipups, Rick called Frank by his real name (although finding one Frank in a sea of washed-up Americans might be a challenge). But I don’t see Frank taking a trip to Koh Samui after his bender; he’ll probably be far away from the shooting at the White Lotus, nursing some light alcohol poisoning.
Probability of being the dead body: 25 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Frank can’t go back to America for some undisclosed reason, and he was able to get his hands on a gun pretty easily. But now it’s in some trash can in Bangkok, and Frank’s probably more interested in carousing with topless women than shooting anybody.
Probability of being the killer: 8 percent.
Piper
Why she should be concerned: Piper’s dad has spent half their vacation fantasizing about killing his family. Piper hasn’t been featured as a victim in one of Tim’s daydreams, though. While Tim has realized that Victoria and Saxon couldn’t survive the horrors of their new lives in less-than-stately homes and less-than-designer clothes, he might be hoping Piper will be OK with her future as a bald-headed Buddhist. Besides, Tim doesn’t have a gun anymore, and even if he got his hands on another one, all that lorazepam would probably make him easy to disarm.
Probability of being the dead body: 30 percent.
Is she capable of violence? I’m sure she’s indulged in fantasies about gouging Saxon’s eyes out, but Piper sublimates her violent impulses by meditating and lighting lots of (Diptyque??) candles.
While I do see some kind of rupture coming in her near future—now that Lochlan wants to follow his sis to Thailand, the whole idea seems a little less glowy for her—I think it will result in an emotional outburst rather than some kind of guns-blazing eruption.
Probability of being the killer: 10 percent.
Jaclyn
Why she should be concerned: Jaclyn’s refusal to admit that she hooked up with Valentin—and, you know, her general air of unrepentant narcissism—has Laurie seeing red. Jaclyn fans the flames when she calls out Laurie’s string of mistakes: her failed marriage, her dead-end job, and her determination to be disappointed by everything and everyone in her life.
They got through, what, five days of vacation before going scorched earth? The blond blob is splintering, but I’m not sure Jaclyn has pushed Laurie quite to the point of murder. I don’t want to entirely rule out the possibility that Jaclyn will say something that pushes Laurie (or even Kate, if those rumors about Jaclyn hitting on her husband are true) over the edge, but after Laurie’s night out with the Russians, she might have other things on her mind than Jaclyn.
We also can’t forget about Jaclyn’s entanglement with Valentin (Laurie sure hasn’t!), who, it turns out, was definitely involved in the hotel robbery. If he’s anything like his buddy Aleksei, he’s not above some light extortion, and he knows a pretty damning secret about a famous woman that he could use to blackmail her. He also knows the ins and outs of her hotel room; as an employee, he could sneak in and make off with her Gucci accessories and Hermès watch. If she causes a scene, could he (or one of the other Russians) use a gun to try to keep her quiet?
Probability of being the dead body: 35 percent.
Is she capable of violence? Would Jaclyn be so desperate to maintain her marriage and, more importantly, her reputation that she’d kill Valentin? We already know that she has a selective memory when it comes to the past and her own misdeeds; it’s not hard to imagine her getting Valentin out of the way and then continuing on with her perfect life as if nothing had ever happened.
Probability of being the killer: 21 percent.
Laurie
Why she should be concerned: Laurie escapes from her friends’ triangle of sadness to hobnob with the Russians at the Muay Thai fight, where the combatants get out their aggression with literal gut punches instead of emotional ones. But she might have just gone from the frying pan into the fire. After she hooks up with Aleksei—in what we can only interpret as a “Fuck you, I can bone a Russian, too” directed at Jaclyn—he asks whether she can spare a measly $10,000 to pay off his poor, sick mother’s debts. (Ever the gentleman, he says he’ll take payment via wire, Cash App, PayPal, or Zelle. What, you don’t have Venmo, Aleksei?)
Laurie’s saved by the intrusion of Aleksei’s perpetually bent-out-of-shape girlfriend. She gets out of there with a good travel story and $10,000 still in her bank account, but she also gets a long look at the stolen jewelry, which Aleksei clearly hasn’t been using to help his poor mother in Vladivostok.
It seems like the robbery’s been kept pretty hush-hush (the guests who weren’t directly involved haven’t mentioned it at all), but it’s possible that hard-nosed lawyer Laurie has heard something about it and is sharp enough to put two and two together. And Aleksei, despite his obtuseness, will probably realize that she spotted his hoard. Will he come to the hotel to make sure she stays quiet about it—and maybe try more forceful methods of getting that $10,000?
Probability of being the dead body: 38 percent.
Is she capable of violence? Laurie didn’t hesitate to give Jaclyn a good tongue-lashing, and I can picture her using a gun to defend herself against Aleksei (or even a rampaging Nadya) if she needs to. Jaclyn might drive her just to the edge of murder, but a common enemy in the Russians might bring these ladies back together (even if they’re better off far apart).
Probability of being the killer: 28 percent.
Chelsea
Why she should be concerned: Unlike nearly every other character on this season of The White Lotus, Chelsea hasn’t done anything to bring death down on her head: She hasn’t cheated on her boyfriend (although she might have been tempted when she was meditating with Saxon) or stolen from the gift shop or even talked shit about her new best friend, Chloe (even if she deserves it). Her karmic balance sheet should be in the green, but I can’t get over her insistence that bad things come in threes: After the robbery and the snake bite, could a third, more lethal danger be coming for our dear, daffy heroine?
Chelsea’s romantic nature could be what spells her doom if Rick comes back while Saxon is sniffing around. After all, her boyfriend was pretty heavily featured when Luang Por Teera was talking about how anyone could be a killer:
In Episode 5, Chelsea says that Rick would never lash out if she cheated on him—she’s faithful because of love, not fear. But she might not know her boyfriend as well as she thinks she does: After all, she says she fell for him because he told her his whole life story the first night they met, but it’s pretty obvious that he failed to mention his dead parents and that lifelong grudge against Jim Hollinger. Chelsea also says that she and Rick are in a spiritual battle of hope and pain, and “eventually one of us will win.” Maybe the battle can only end with one of them dead.
Probability of being the dead body: 39 percent.
Is she capable of violence? When Rick gets back, he and Chelsea might get into a lover’s quarrel about what he’s been up to while he hasn’t been answering her calls; if she finds out about the drugs (no harm, no foul) and topless ladies (what the fuck?!), her endless devotion to her rizz-lord bf could lead her to send him to the next life (where she’d surely continue to haunt him). She’s always been the one to calm Rick down when he’s in a rage, but who keeps peace for the peacekeeper?
Probability of being the killer: 14 percent. But I don’t really think Chelsea has it in her!
Mook
Why she should be concerned: Mook’s been busy pushing Gaitok into a life of badassery that he simply does not want.
Someone who apparently loves violence as much as she does is bound to get caught up in it eventually. Way back in my recap of Episode 2, I predicted that Gaitok might sacrifice himself to save Mook during the shooting. I still give some weight to that theory: If Gaitok had to save her, it would be a fitting payoff for their season-long arc—this whole time, she’s pushed him to be bold and take some kind of risk, and he’s always hung back, out of fear or pacifism or both. If Mook’s life were on the line, that could finally be enough motivation to get Gaitok to act.
Probability of being the dead body: 41 percent.
Is she capable of violence? It seems like all Mook wants is to dance and get Gaitok to shoot somebody. But why? Does she just want a little excitement at the White Lotus? Does she really think he’ll get a promotion and some brand-new life if he guns down anyone who could be a robber? Or could she be working with the Russians—now confirmed as the thieves? In that case, maybe Mook and the Russian trio want to encourage the bumbling Gaitok to commit some act of heroism that would allow a second—and maybe even bigger—hotel heist to unfold. Or Mook could be stringing him along because she’s planning to distract him during the break-in.
Probability of being the killer: 56 percent. Just not getting good vibes from her lately, sorry.
Chloe
Why she should be concerned: In Episode 5, she tells Chelsea, “Gary might kill me. I honestly think he’s capable of it.” Greg clearly knows about her and the brothers, and now he’s trying to drag them in, too—he wants to watch Saxon and Chloe have sex so he can swoop in to claim her instead, like a deviant little boy taking his mom back from his dad. I’m not sure he would go so far as to kill her just because Saxon doesn’t agree to it, but Chloe’s proximity to a known criminal—and the joy she takes in pushing his buttons—makes me worry for her (if only because I don’t want Chelsea to lose her new best friend).
Probability of being the dead body: 42 percent.
Is she capable of violence? I think Chloe is capable of pretty much anything that would deliver her from her eternal ennui. As Charlotte Le Bon, who plays the French Canadian sylph, says: “There’s a void inside of her. She fills that void with partying, sex, and chaos.”
There’s also a fun fan theory that interprets Chloe’s Maggie Simpson necklace as a subtle sign that she’s the murderer:
Chloe says she doesn’t want to go out and find a replacement for Gary—if she kills her Mr. Burns and somehow ends up with his money, she wouldn’t have to.
Probability of being the killer: 24 percent.
Belinda
Why she should be concerned: As I guessed in my recap of Episode 6, Greg tries bribing Belinda before taking more extreme measures to keep her quiet. Despite Zion’s protests that she should take the $100,000, Belinda argues that she’d be an accomplice to murder if she did—and unlike some of the White Lotus’s guests, she has qualms about that. Of course, refusing to be bought off by someone who was probably responsible for murder is a pretty good way to get murdered yourself. Belinda’s next steps aren’t clear—maybe the shots we heard in the premiere are fired by some kind of international police force that she calls to come after Greg, or maybe they’re fired by enforcers hired by Greg himself.
The last time we see Belinda in Episode 7, she asks whether she’ll ever get peace in this lifetime. If Luang Por Teera is to be believed, death is the ultimate source of peace: “Death is a happy return, like coming home,” he tells Tim. Let’s hope Belinda isn’t manifesting her own death by asking to be left out of all this mess.
Probability of being the dead body: 50 percent. Sure, you can argue that Belinda should be much higher on this list: A man who already had someone murdered is out to get her, and even Zion thinks she could be floating in the Gulf of Thailand soon. But Belinda’s just too beloved to die! And her death would represent a punishment for doing the right thing—which seems to run counter to the karmic themes of this season. Plus, I believe the spirits will listen to Zion’s prayers (just like they listened to Tim’s) and keep his mom safe. I just have to!
Is she capable of violence? If Belinda is this hesitant about even taking money from a possible killer, then no, I don’t think she’d ever commit violence herself. It’s possible that Belinda could shoot Greg (or his hired guns) in self-defense, but who cares? When it comes to Belinda, I support women’s rights and women’s wrongs.
Probability of being the killer: 22 percent.
Rick
Why he should be concerned: As mentioned, Jim and Sritala can definitely track Rick down! Even if Jim Hollinger doesn’t go to the hotel to confront him, he’s almost certainly sending his goons and/or the police. His bodyguards seem like they’re more for show than actual, you know, guarding, so I could see them making a mess of things and creating havoc at their employer’s hotel, even if they’re explicitly instructed not to. Rick might be their target, but anyone could get caught in the crossfire—employees, other guests, and especially Chelsea, who would probably put herself between her boyfriend and a bullet if she needed to. Even though he held himself back from killing Hollinger, Rick’s not in the clear yet.
Probability of being the dead body: 54 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Three people were featured as Luang Por Teera gave his monologue about violence: Tim, Gaitok, and Rick. Questions about what each of those three is capable of—and whether any of them could be the killer—have followed them all season and will loom large in the finale. Rick tells Hollinger that “the secret to life is knowing when to stop,” and he ultimately held back instead of shooting the old man point-blank. But the rest of the night’s high jinks indicate that Rick might not have totally mastered self-control yet. He seems content enough now, but could he regret his decision not to kill Hollinger? Or will he walk in on Chelsea and Saxon and redirect his rage toward her?
Probability of being the killer: 55 percent.
Lochlan
Why he should be concerned: Lochlan is fighting plenty of demons, and he thinks a fresh start in Thailand could keep them at bay. But to make that move, he’d have to survive (a) his rampaging dad; (b) Saxon, who might just have it in him to push Lochlan off a ledge to erase those memories of incest; (c) his sister, who could be rethinking whether this whole running-off-to-Thailand thing is such a good idea now that her baby brother is doing it too; and (d) Greg, who may want to involve him in some sex fantasy (or kill him for boning his girlfriend). That’s a lot of opps! And a couple of them could make sure that Lochlan (or the spirit of Lochlan, at least) never leaves Thailand at all. One increasingly popular theory argues that, now that Tim doesn’t have a gun, he’ll poison his family with the pong-pong fruit that Saxon was playing with in the premiere.
If none of them do get to Lochlan, though, the food at the monastery just might do him in.
Probability of being the dead body: 75 percent. Tim and Greg might be the two worst people to have after you right now; Lochlan’s gotta survive both. And let’s not forget that he’s floating in a lily pond in the credits, just like the dead body we see in the premiere.
Is he capable of violence? Lochlan told Saxon that one day he’d take him down—while he already did that in one manner of speaking, maybe it was a hint that he could end up killing his brother. But for the moment, it seems like Lochlan’s ready to throw himself into the peace-loving ways of the monastery.
Probability of being the killer: 6 percent.
Victoria
Why she should be concerned: We’ve already seen her death play out on-screen several times; when someone shows you who they are (or how they’re going to murder you), believe them!! Victoria gives Tim the go-ahead to kill her (in his own twisted mind, at least) when she says, iconically, “I just don’t think, at this age, I’m meant to live an uncomfortable life.” Even without his gun, Tim might slip some pong-pong into her morning yogurt to spare her any of life’s discomforts. I will say, though, that the fact that her death has been so clearly telegraphed—ever since she walked into that tsunami in Episode 3—makes me slightly less convinced that she’s about to die.
Probability of being the dead body: 75 percent.
Is she capable of violence? If Victoria got her hands on a gun, it would look a lot like Season 2’s climactic shoot-out, when Tanya chaotically mowed down her gay captors. Like Tanya, Victoria’s not trying to kill anyone; she’d rather just lie down and get another one of Pond’s “gentle but firm” massages. But I think that, if she were cornered, there’d be some fight left in her, despite all her protests. And now that she’s coming down from her lorazepam, who knows what she could be capable of?
Probability of being the killer: 10 percent.
Tim
Why he should be concerned: If he still had Gaitok’s gun, Tim might already be dead. But he’s still in imminent danger—from either himself or, possibly, the feds or other law enforcement officers who might be coming to get him. Victoria’s been worried about the wrong Jonestown-style cult all along; Tim might be the figurehead who takes the family down (via pong-pong smoothies or some other means).
Probability of being the dead body: 75 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Luang Por Teera says that the root of violence is fear, and Tim might have more to be afraid of than anyone else at the White Lotus. He’s scared of what his life will look like when he gets home, and he might be just as scared of dying. But he seems to have overcome that second fear and gathered his resolve when he realizes that the gun is gone. Will he take it as a sign to surrender himself to the feds after all this hand-wringing, or will he find another way to spare his family from suffering?
Probability of being the killer: 75 percent.
Saxon
Why he should be concerned: Tim’s murder circle just keeps getting wider and wider. Now he’s thinking about killing Saxon, too, after Saxon tells him that he’s totally dependent on his dad’s success: “I don’t have any interests. I don’t have any hobbies, OK? If I’m not a success, then I’m nothing. And I can’t handle being nothing.” Tim seems to take this as tacit permission to kill Saxon (as well as Victoria) before he kills himself.
Saxon also has to look out for another quasi-father (son??) figure now that Greg’s got his eye on him. I have my doubts about whether Greg actually wants to go through with that secret sex fantasy—is this the face of someone who wants to watch you have sex with his girlfriend or of a dude who wants to push you off a yacht?
And I definitely don’t think that Saxon would ever agree to it—all his talk about sex has just turned out to be the posturing of a pretty vanilla frat bro. Is Greg just trying to get him in a compromising position so he can blackmail him and get money out of the Ratliffs? (Good luck with that!) Or, if we’re going full Oedipus, does his fantasy involve fucking his mom and killing his dad/Saxon?
Saxon just can’t keep his hands off the old dudes’ girlfriends: Lately he’s been making eyes at Chelsea, who could represent both spiritual and sexual healing for him (and the dude really needs a lot of both right now):
Chelsea, despite all her talk about Saxon’s soullessness, warms up to him enough to give him some meditation coaching in her room. And she’s flustered enough by some light hand-holding that she gives him the bum’s rush (and apparently all the books about Buddhism she’s been lugging around on vacation). If Rick were to catch them together, any hope of Saxon’s redemption might be extinguished.
Probability of being the dead body: 76 percent.
Is he capable of violence? For all his chest-thumping, Saxon never seemed particularly violent. And now that he’s been humbled, he’s apparently looking for a way to be a slightly better version of himself.
Probability of being the killer: 12 percent.
Valentin, Vlad, and Aleksei
Why they should be concerned: I’m grouping these three together because where one goes, the others must follow, like the comrades-in-arms they are (and because there are already enough blurbs in this list, for you and for me). All three of them should be worried after Gaitok finally put two and two together and realized that they’re the hotel robbers, especially now that he’s on a Mook-ordained mission to finally fight like a real man.
It is curious that Valentin gave Gaitok the ticket to the Muay Thai fight and also planned to show up there with his two buds. Did he put so little faith in Gaitok’s crime-solving abilities that he didn’t think the security guard would recognize a tall, hairless Russian and his little tattooed friend? Or was there some reason he wanted Gaitok to spot them—even if just to rub it in that they got away with the robbery? Either way, this is bound to blow up: I could see Gaitok confronting Valentin one-on-one to give him the chance to turn himself in and Valentin shooting him to make it look like another attempted break-in (or maybe even a suicide). But as we know, Gaitok is good with a gun, and he might use one against Valentin before he has the chance to go through with any sort of plan.
I could also see a situation in which the Russians—who, after all, are pretty familiar with the three blonds’ villa—try to break in and make off with more stolen goods. Laurie, however, might already be on high alert if she realizes that Aleksei was one of the robbers. Enraged by the betrayal of seemingly every guy she sleeps with, could she get her hands on one of their guns and shoot the Russians dead? I wouldn’t put it past her!
Probability of being the dead bodies: 77 percent.
Are they capable of violence? They’re at least capable of threatening violence, as we found out when they held Chelsea and the boutique saleswoman at gunpoint and wrestled with Gaitok at the gate. And we know that Vlad, at least, is pretty comfortable with the idea of death.
Probability of being the killers: 77 percent.
Greg/Gary
Why he should be concerned: After deciding not to take Greg’s bribe, Belinda will have to figure out her other options. Whom should she alert about Greg’s presence in Thailand? The Italians? The Americans? The Thai police? Maybe all of them? The shooting we hear in the premiere could be the sound of their arrival. (Although it does seem more likely that they’d go to Greg’s mansion than the White Lotus. Maybe they’ll come to the hotel just to talk to Belinda, but someone else—like Rick or Tim—will think they’re looking for them and raise hell.)
Whether he’s killed or just locked away in a damp prison cell (Jennifer Coolidge’s hope for him), we can expect that things won’t end well for Greg. He claims that Tanya would want him to live the rest of his life in peace, but she didn’t let that man know peace for a second, even before he’d killed her. If the ghost of Tanya—and you know her spirit’s been following him around and trying to smother Chloe with a pillow—is to have any justice, Greg’s days are numbered.
Probability of being the dead body: 87 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Duh. He may not get his hands dirty himself, but Greg is more than capable of getting someone—and, at this point, maybe more than one someone—killed.
Probability of being the killer: 85 percent.
Gaitok
Why he should be concerned: In Episode 7, Gaitok tells Mook that he isn’t cut out for life as some globe-trotting, gun-wielding bodyguard. Her response is that violence, particularly in defense, is just a part of life. Gaitok might not be entirely convinced, but his affection for Mook could override his pacifist ways. No matter what he decides, whatever’s coming to the hotel is headed right in his direction. As the White Lotus’s security guard, he’ll be on the front lines against the gunmen we heard in the premiere—whether they’re the feds looking for Tim, the Russian robbers making another hit, goons sent by Greg to go after Belinda, police sent by Belinda to go after Greg, Jim Hollinger’s bodyguards hunting down Rick, or some other, unknown threat. Gaitok’s job is to protect the hotel’s guests from the dangers that lurk just outside (or within) the White Lotus; he hasn’t exactly excelled in that role so far, but the finale will represent his final chance to do so. And you can’t ignore the symbolism of Gaitok’s possible death. The security guard—a local and a cog in Thailand’s tourism industry—will very possibly be asked to sacrifice himself for the White Lotus’s wealthy guests, who represent both a key part of the country’s economy and the crime and other harms that tourists often bring with them.
Probability of being the dead body: 92 percent.
Is he capable of violence? Gaitok certainly doesn’t think so. He says that even when he tried to stop the hotel robbers, his heart wasn’t in it; defending himself and the hotel wasn’t a strong enough motivator to get him to hurt someone else. (He might just be in the wrong line of work.) But Mook seems pretty determined to get past his pacifist streak and dig out the violence-loving man of her dreams underneath. I have a feeling that, like Kai in Season 1 or Albie in Season 2, Gaitok will do Mook’s bidding and—like Kai, another local, and unlike Albie, one of the guests—suffer the consequences for it.
Probability of being the killer: 90 percent.
