(This article contains Massive spoilers For the final of season 3 of “The White Lotus”.)

Until season 3, most fans have agreed that Belinda (Natasha Rothwell) was the only major character in the series to be a good person. Everyone is shown to have a kind of dark side by all of their respective seasons, but throughout season 1, Belinda does not hurt anyone. Her only crime is to trust Tanya too much (Mcquad Jennifer Coolidge), a woman mega-riche who offers to give Belinda the money she needs to start a well-being business and does not follow.

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The story was a poignant story of the way the rich can cause so much distress to the people of the lower class who surround them without even realizing it. Tanya hardly seems to understand that she taunts Belinda with a golden lottery ticket all season. She does not notice that Belinda performs an excessive amount of emotional work to keep Tanya happy, all in the pursuit of what the public knows how to be a dead end. When Tanya abandons Belinda to run away with a guy she has just met (The guy being Greg, who would end up assassinating), she is not cruel or nasty – she is thoughtless, like so many rich people on “The White Lotus” tend to be.

This is why it is fascinating for Belinda to finish season 3 on almost the same note. Having suddenly acquired $ 5 million (essentially by Strongrming Greg), Belinda said farewell to Pornchai (Dom Hetrakul), a guy who had recently approached Tanya with his own idea of ​​starting a well-being business. She tells Pornnchai that “circumstances have changed” and that she must suddenly leave Thailand and that the well-being affairs they have spoken will not happen.

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It even seems that Belinda channels a little Tanya here, speaking to Pornchai in a way that seems subtly disdainful and negligent. Belinda sympathizes with Pornchai, it seems, but that is offset by the way she is clearly expressed by money and happy to get out of the city.

To defend Belinda, it is not as mean as what Tanya did. In season 1, Tanya is the one who offers to give Belinda a ton of money to start a business, and she certainly seems to mean it in their initial conversation. Season 1 also devotes much more time to show that Belinda has done the job to get there; She writes a large filler full of ideas for Tanya and remains several hours after work to conclude the agreement.

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Meanwhile, in season 3, Pornchai is that of raising the idea, and Belinda does not seem so comfortable with. Tanya actively led Belinda, while Belinda obtains only passively the hopes of Pornchai. The end result, unfortunately, is always the same. Season 3 does not show us much from Pornchai’s point of view, but it is sure to say that he probably has a broken heart that Belinda.

Returning the scenario darker is the way Belinda, as a American, is in a more privileged financial situation than Pornchai, even before she took $ 5 million. The US dollar goes further in Thailand than in Hawaii; Belinda cannot be as relatively rich in Pornchai as Tanya for her, but she is still in a position of power over him. All the season, she was the power to help Pornnchai realize his dreams, and it was he who tried to make the situation work while she was distracted with other things. If this scenario had been told from Pornchai’s point of view, Belinda would probably appear much more like Tanya than we would like.

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Although for the additional defense of Belinda, the show has at least one gesture at the idea that this result is that Tanya wanted. Greg apparently said to Belinda off screen that Tanya had always felt bad about the idea of ​​waving on her, and Those who remember season 2 Can remind you that Tanya has indeed spoke with regret of the situation. Without forgetting that “The White Lotus” has always specified how untouchable the rich are; We know that Greg will probably never be brought to justice, no matter what Belinda does, so hey, maybe Belinda should At least, remove something from the situation.

The biggest surprise moment with Belinda is the way she obtains the $ 5 million in Greg first. At first, Greg offers him $ 100,000 to stay silent on where he lives. Belinda seems reluctant, but his son Zion (Nicholas Duvernay) convinces her to see Greg again. Throughout this meeting, it seems that Belinda is unstable by the way her son behaves ruthlessly, almost as if she realized that money already corrupts her soul. When she leaves the meeting and says that she cannot take the money from Greg, it almost seems to be a rare case of someone on “The White Lotus” doing the right thing. But then she reveals that all this is a tip to get as much Greg as possible. It’s a tip that works.

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This scene is the moment when Belinda reveals his sneaky side, and it’s fascinating. It is also a moment that throws some previous scenes at a different day; For example, earlier, during breakfast, she talks about money and acts annoyed when Zion jumps at the opportunity to talk again about Greg’s offer. With hindsight, it seems likely that Belinda knew exactly what she was doing there.

In a New York profile of the Mike White showrunner Published before the first of the season, author Kelefa Sanneh mentioned a conversation she had had with Natasha Rothwell about her character Belinda. It is only now, after the final of season 3, that we can understand exactly what Rothwell was talking about. As Sanneh wrote:

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“On set in Thailand, I mentioned to Rothwell that many fans piermed belinda as an oasis of December, and I asked when she ever wished that her character could be as somer of the others. She told me that she had had thought carefully about giving agency, and Suggested that it might be possible to read her not as a spa manager with a Heart of Gold but as a strategic operator whose big idea – That Tanya will invest in her new business – Suggests a certain degree of “narcissism” and “pride”.

Belinda’s last moments of the season show that she and her son celebrating on the return boat at the airport. She does not seem guilty of what she has done, and Zion does not seem shaken either the massacre he had witnessed Earlier in the day. They can be surrounded by suffering, but they are rich now, and that’s all that matters.