One of the many pleasures of The White Lotus, the HBO show in its second season that does that old-school thing – makes you impatient for the beginning of the week for the next episode to drop – is the grain of squeamish recognition that comes with the horror.
Mike White’s characters are grotesque, but they aren’t grotesques, and even in the worst-behaving characters it’s possible to see some shadow of impulses one sees in oneself. It’s been so long since TV this good came along, I’d forgotten how it went – harassing your friends, spouse, anyone who’ll listen: “Hurry and catch up so we can discuss.”
