The White Lotus fans are still reeling from that whirlwind of a finale, but that hasn’t stopped the cast from continuing to throw us into further turmoil with their post-episode tributes. And lord, I was not ready for the emotional journey that Walton Goggins was about to take me on.
Warning: We’re getting deep into spoiler territory here.
The 90-minute season finale from Thailand turned chaotic real quick and despite many fans holding out hope for our girl Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood) and her partner Rick (Goggins), series creator Mike White had other plans. The episode’s tragic turn saw Rick’s need for revenge result in a shootout, killing hotel owner Jim Hollinger (Scott Glenn), his guards, as well as the loved up couple.
Taking to Instagram after the episode aired, Goggins shared a moving tribute to the pair. And by tribute, I mean almost a dozen pictures on-set as Rick and Chelsea, and I’m not sobbing, you are.
“Rick + Chelsea. With the heaviest of hearts… To me, ours was a love story. It was only ever a love story, hindered by unresolved, childhood trauma. We all have them… but can we move past them?” he wrote on Monday.
“In the depths of our despair there is always beauty around us. If we can sit with our pain, just sit with it… not react… not be defined by it…It’s there… the love the world is constantly giving in any given moment is there. Always waiting for us to see it… Trust me I know.”
He took a moment to thank White, saying: “Thank you Mike White for your imagination, your tender heart, for the privilege of giving us the opportunity to tell it.”
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He also gave a shout-out to his scene mate and longtime friend Sam Rockwell (Frank), before leaving us with a quote by Greek writer Aeschylus — who is, surely not by coincidence, known as the father of tragedy.
“‘Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God,’” Goggins wrote.
And if that wasn’t enough, Goggins also shared a whole bunch of selfies with Aimee Lou on his Instagram Story — all set toFleetwood Mac’s‘Silver Springs’, of course.
Meanwhile, in her own tribute post-finale, Wood shared a photo on Instagram of graffiti that read, “I love you. R+C Forever” (a nod to Rick and Chelsea).
“Ionly went home once whilst filming White Lotus. This is what I saw on the first day back there. R and C forever,” she wrote.
This was followed this with a picture of the couple simply captioned “The perfect storm”. Girl, why are you doing this to us??
For weeks, fans have been concerned the clues about Rick and Chelsea’s deaths have been there all along, whether it was her foreboding necklace, the many reminders that bad things “come in threes”, or that final dinner scene when Rick says he’s planning for them to be together forever.
And in the most twisted way the series could’ve imagined, they can have that in the afterlife.
“Chelsea has this kind of romantic fatalism about their relationship, and you want to buy into it,” said White on the decision to kill off Chelsea, per Cosmopolitan.
“She says to him, ‘Stop fixating on the love you didn’t get and start thinking about the love you have. I’m right here.’”
When Rick just couldn’t do that, giving into the age-old mistake of ignoring what’s right in front of him, it seemed like the couple’s tragic fate was sealed, according to White.
“It’s a classic theme of Greek tragedy. Somebody killing the thing that they love to try to get some revenge,” White said.
That #JusticeForChelsea petition better be in the works.
Source: Instagram
