‘The White Lotus’ recap: Trouble brews on a low simmer, until another gun shows up

Mystery and tension build in episode 2 of ‘The White Lotus.’

Hello again, fellow “White Lotus” guests. How’s your stay so far? Last week’s Season 3 premiere had so much setup, we didn’t even get to all the characters. Let’s start off with the trio of traveling girlfriends who open this second episode: there’s Jaclyn, a famous TV actress living in Los Angeles (Michelle Monaghan), upscale Austin socialite Kate (Leslie Bibb), and Laurie (Carrie Coon), a New York City corporate exec who shares just a tad less enthusiasm for everything as compared to her beaming travel companions. Typical of loving childhood friends who also love to dish, Kate and Jaclyn start out talking about how “great“ Laurie looks, only to unpack her divorce and work troubles with Kate ultimately mentioning how “defeated” their friend looks. “I thought you said she looked great,” Jaclyn points out with a mischievous smile. Caught out, Kate replies, “Well, she does, but she also looks tired…” (Don’t pretend you haven’t said similar about a friend.) Over breakfast, the friend group are approached by their impossibly sexy Russian wellness mentor Valentin (Arnas Fedaravicius), who informs them that he will be conducting biomarker tests to help design their care plan. The ladies are intrigued by him, and Jaclyn in particular urges Laurie to have a fling: “Somebody’s gotta try that, and you’re the only one who’s single,” she says. Later, some vague barbs of catty competitiveness come out when the trio trade the stats and findings from their respective tests. All I can say is: watch this space. There’s also the most mysterious of the traveling bunch, the brooding Rick (Walton Goggins) – a weathered older man decked out in Hawaiian shirts who looks tortured all the time, despite the fact that he’s on this trip with the lovely Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood), a happy-go-lucky younger woman from Manchester who seems inexplicably devoted to him. Soon after arriving, Rick asks about the famous owner of the hotel, but is frustrated to learn that the man is not there – he’s recuperating from a stroke in Bangkok. At Chelsea’s behest, Rick has a stress management session with Amrita (Shalini Peiris, from the harrowing first scene of this season), where we finally get a little more insight into his seemingly permanent issues: his mother was a drug addict who died by overdose when he was 10, and his father was murdered before he was born. Ouch. Rick says “weed helps,” but he didn’t travel with it. Amrita promises that meditation can bring relief to his “psychic pain,” saying that “it helps you see that the identity you’ve created brings you suffering.”