The White Lotus season 2 finale: Why did Tanya have to die?

We assumed that The White Lotus season 2 finale was going to have its fair share of big moments — but who could have expected the death of Tanya?

First and foremost, we do have to give a great deal of credit to creator Mike White and the folks at HBO for legitimately making us believe that Jennifer Coolidge’s character was going to be around forever, like this constant that was going to be around from one season to the next. In a way she may still be, judging from what White said in a post-episode featurette.

In this, he strongly suggested that we could find out more down the road as to whether or not Greg was really going to get away with what happened to his wife. Portia is still out there, and she seemed well-enough aware of what was going on when Jack dropped her off close to the airport. Meanwhile, the fact that both Tanya and the folks on the boat are all dead suggests that this is a story that won’t quite go away.

As for the reason behind killing Tanya in the first place, a lot of it touched back on something the character said in season 1, when she said that “death is the last immersive experience [she hadn’t] tried.” White explained the decision in the following way:

“Not that I really wanted to kill Tanya, because I love her as a character and obviously love Jennifer, but I just felt like we’re going to Italy, [plus] she’s such a diva, a larger-than-life female archetype. It just felt like we could devise our own operatic conclusion to Tanya’s life and her story.”

White didn’t want to have Tanya die at the hands of someone else. Instead, he preferred the idea that she would have this sort of “derpy” death (falling off the boat) after taking out all of these criminals first. It was effective — but yeah, it’s really hard to envision the future of The White Lotus as a story without Tanya in it.

Related – Go ahead and get more news when it comes to The White Lotus, including a possible season 3 tease

Are you still shocked to lose Tanya following the events of The White Lotus season 2 finale?

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