We all dream about fire and snakes because we’re all afraid of fire and snakes.” This conversation sets the tone for the episode, titled “The Meaning of Dreams.” Fires, tsunamis, the workings of the unconscious mind—these elements keep resurfacing across the show’s multiple storylines.

So, here we are, in The White Lotus season again. The third to be precise, with Parker Posey’s Mississippi accent grating away and a bunch of deeply miserable people spending five figures a skull for a trip to Instagram’s idea of Thai paradise – with all manner of melodrama and bloodshed stuffed into the infamously stingy annual leave allowance that Americans put up with.