TV Show review
Review basis: 3 seasons · through April 6, 2025
July 11, 2021 · TV-MA · Returning Series
Woke Score
Lower is better
Review
The White Lotus is a dark comedy anthology series that follows wealthy guests and resort staff at luxury hotels over one week, as personal secrets, class tensions, and darker impulses surface in paradise settings. Seasons shift locations from Hawaii to Sicily to Thailand, with themes evolving around privilege, sex, money, and human dysfunction. Progressive or identity-focused comments from characters appear at times but are consistently satirized as naive, hypocritical, or petty rather than endorsed or central to the storytelling.
Breakdown
These are the editorial factors and ratings behind our score for The White Lotus.
Woke representation / casting
Diverse international and LGBTQ+ performers appear naturally in resort settings across seasons; identity elements serve character-driven satire on desire and power without foregrounded representation signaling or mismatches.
Woke political dialogue
Occasional progressive lines on privilege or identity surface from characters but are routinely undercut by comedy, hypocrisy, or absurdity rather than treated as insightful or authoritative.
Identity-driven story themes
Core focus stays on class, sex, money, and personal psychology; cultural or identity subplots remain secondary and satirical, not activist or central messaging.
Western institutional / cultural critique
Satirizes wealth inequality, elite entitlement, and cultural tourism through individual flaws and absurdities; avoids explicit modern activist frameworks such as systemic patriarchy, decolonization, or institutional guilt.
Woke character or canon changes
Not relevant
Anti-woke backlash and complaints
Negligible direct complaints framing the series as pushing woke or DEI agendas; reception more often highlights its post-woke qualities and satire of progressive attitudes.
Creator track record context
Primarily shaped by Mike White's documented rejection of identity politics restrictions on art and his adjustments to avoid overt political elements in favor of universal human observation.
Production
