The White Lotus season 2 episode 5 recap & review: That’s Amore

The White Lotus season 2 episode 5 sees heat turning up as bodies and passions collide, amidst relationships developing rifts and new friendships presenting shocking revelations.

Recap

Ethan finds the condom that Harper found on the couch and asks her about it, following which she flips the script and asks him the same question.

Realising that she suspects him of cheating, Ethan comes clean about the affairs that transpired that night, reassuring her that he didn’t take part in any of the colourful activities, but it’s evident that Harper doesn’t deem his words as truthful anymore.

Later at breakfast, she keeps passing comments to Ethan and Cameron, making it clear to the two that she knows what happened. Cameron later gets on Ethan’s case about him snitching out and the latter informs him of his mistake and how it was necessary to come clean to Harper.

Later still, Harper decides to torment Ethan more and starts asking steamy questions like if the two boys ever saw each other having sex and if they had threesomes.

Ethan kind of crushes Cameron with his opinion that he has something called the “Mimetic desire”, which is why he always slept with Ethan’s hookups because he wanted to copy someone superior to him.

Cameron later turns the question back to Harper, asking if she ever had a threesome while he starts stroking her legs under the table. Harper seems unsettled but later in the evening, the two smoke cigars while looking at each other, and Ethan notices this weird tension betwixt the two.

Harper also meets with Daphne before this and tells her that their partners cheated on them. Daphne tells her about this trainer she has, indirectly telling her that she relies on the said trainer for promiscuous purposes, later even suggesting Harper do the same.

Meanwhile, Portia and Tanya board Quentin’s yacht, and Jack immediately takes Portia for a tour as an excuse to have sex.

Tanya later accompanies Quentin to an opera before earlier sharing with Portia how she finds the company of these welcoming bunch of gays so comforting because they’re rich themselves and she doesn’t have to worry about them ever coming for her money.

Portia later goes to a dine-out where Jack forgets his wallet and skips on the bill by running off with Portia.

Meanwhile, Lucia brings up her billing needs to Albie, who’s taken aback because he thought she slept with him as a fling, not a prostitute. She tells him to not worry and that she likes him, but Albie promises to take the money from the bank and give it to her later.

Later, he tells Dominic and Bert he needs money and they figure out it’s for the sex he’s having with hookers. Albie is surprised at Bert knowing about the girls’ profession but Bert manages to, barely, conceal the fact that Dom has slept with them as well.

Dom and Bert later have an argument and the former tells his father that he’s the way he’s now only because of how he was raised and the kind of example of a man he was shown by his father. Bert disagrees.

Dom also approaches Lucia with a request to stay away from her son in exchange for her continual usage of his tab for the food billings.

Albie and Lucia take a stroll eating ice cream when she is confronted by a man who gets a bit physical with her. Lucia tells Albie that it’s her pimp. Later still, she meets Cameron regarding the money he owes her, which he promises to give her once he goes to the bank.

Meanwhile, Valentina moves Rocco from the reception to beach duty. Mia approaches her a couple of times, persistent on her wish to sing and play the piano. Valentina refuses until Mia manages to flirt her way to the manager’s heart, promising her an affair as she knows she’s gay.

Midnight at the Palermo, Tanya wakes up to the sounds of sexual intercourse and covertly peeks at Quentin and Jack having sex, before ‘The White Lotus’ season 2 episode 5 rolls the credits.

Review

• ‘The White Lotus’ season 2 nears its end and the dark revelations have already started crowding the narrative, building towards the inevitable that’ll become of this whole salacious, steamy, adulterous, incestuous, and callous ordeal.
• The endgame of Harper and Ethan may depend on the chances of them being open and communicative with each other, and where the suspicious sexual tension between Harper and Cameron goes from here.
• Quentin, the ever-so-suspicious character from the start has been stripped naked and Tanya has caught him doing a rather extreme deed with his alleged “nephew”.
• There are many characters in the show right now who all seem the likely contender(s) of the fate that struck them in the season premiere.
• With how difficult it is to speculate who they might be, it’s imperative to remember how good the first season of ‘this drama ‘The White Lotus’ was and how similarly great of a successor this instalment is shaping up to be.

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Also read: Tanya’s terrible tarot fortune in The White Lotus explained