This White Lotus Season 3 Death Has Fans Outraged

Spoilers for The White Lotus Season 3 finale ahead. Not every guest at Thailand’s White Lotus resort got the ending they deserved. HBO’s White Lotus Season 3 finale featured not one murder, but three (not including that fake out). However, social media is particularly distraught over the death of Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood).

In the episode, Rick (Walton Goggins) gets confronted by Sritala’s husband Jim (Scott Glenn), who insults his parents in one go. After seething with rage, Rick spots Jim without his bodyguards and catches him off guard, taking the gun from inside his jacket and shooting him in revenge for his father. This murder leads Sritala (Lek Patravadi) to reveal that Jim was actually his dad.

However, Rick has zero time to process this development before her guards return, leading to a resort-wide shoot-out. Sadly, Chelsea gets killed in the crossfire. As Rick carries her body, Sritala instructs Gaitok (Tayme Thapthimthong) to follow and shoot him, causing them to both fall in the pond, bound together for life — though not in the way Chelsea had hoped.

Writer-creator Mike White explained his decision on HBO’s White Lotus podcast, saying Chelsea’s death legitimized her spirituality and steadfast beliefs that she and Rick were soulmates bonded together for life.

“I like the idea of giving her a lot of prattle that seems like nonsense, but that ultimately, you’re like, ‘Oh, maybe,’” he said. “She has this deep sense of belief - amor fati – that things happen for a reason. Maybe somehow that takes off the edge of the sadness of her death in some way because it feels like she has some kind of higher power to what happens next.”

Fans Are Devastated

Naturally, viewers took to X (formerly Twitter) to let out their emotions, which ranged from anger and frustration to all-out devastation. “IT WASN’T SUPPOSED TO BE THEM, WHAT HAPPENED TO FOREVER,” one fan wrote. “Rick and Chelsea deserved a much better ending MIKE WHITE YOU WILL PAY FOR THIS,” another said, directed at the show’s writer and creator.

However, others were only sad about Chelsea and blamed Rick for her demise. “If Rick really loved Chelsea the way she loved him he would have never put her in that position,” one fan argued. “The worst thing is Chelsea died for a man that didn't even treat her well, he never deserved her love.”

One fan paid tribute to Chelsea by referring to her quote to Rick in the finale, “Stop thinking about the love you didn’t get, think about the love you have. I’m right here. I love you.” Sadly, it wasn’t enough to console him. “Oh, Chelsea you were too pure of heart,” they wrote.

Walton’s Reaction

Goggins was just as devastated as fans and took to Instagram to deliver a meaningful eulogy to Rick and Chelsea, sharing photos from his time on set with Wood in Thailand.

“To me, ours was a love story,” he wrote. “It was only ever a love story, hindered by unresolved, childhood trauma. We all have them… but can we move past them. 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.”