Spoilers. Obviously.

Belinda (played by Natasha Rothwell), the nicest character in The White Lotus, the character we root for more than anyone else, appears to have an unhappy ending in the season one finale. After watching her grow excited and more confident with her business idea, the wind is finally taken out of her sails when Tanya (played by Jennifer Coolidge) informs her opening a business together isn’t going to happen at this juncture. Belinda appears to be heartbroken. Tanya then gives Belinda an envelope thick with cash.

Belinda’s final scenes in The White Lotus feature disappointment and tears. They also feature an envelope thick with cash.

From what we’ve learned over the six episodes of The White Lotus, we can surmise Belinda is a competent White Lotus employee and familiar with the staff. So she’s not new. She’s not naive. She’s hopeful for a better life via guest Tanya, but once Tanya cancels a dinner meeting, it’s pretty clear what’s going to happen. What’s not clear is that envelope thick with cash.

It’s disappointing Belinda’s business plan isn’t given a fair shake. But it’s a relief Belinda did not go into business with Tanya. Tanya didn’t exactly process her grief, she just moved her issues from Belinda to the soon-to-be-deceased Greg. If Belinda’s new fling doesn’t happen, Tanya most likely continues to use Belinda as a surrogate therapist/friend, even if they are in business. But the fling occurs and now it’s maybe a relationship? Who knows? Who cares? Tanya bids Belinda adieu and to assuage guilt, gives Belinda the greatest gift a hotel guest can give hotel worker: an envelope thick with cash.

You know what doesn’t treat you like a therapist? An envelope thick with cash.

In a recent Vulture interview, show creator, writer and director Mike White discusses most every character except Belinda.

“At the very beginning, [Armond says], “We’re interchangeable helpers.” It’s like they don’t exist, this idea that once they exit the hotel, they’re pulverized, they vanish. I thought that would be maybe controversial, but it’s like a steamrolling. The people waving in the beginning, by the end they’ve been replaced, and it’s like the experience of these hotel guests — oh, she had a baby, he’s in jail, whatever. My hope is that the critique of that is built into the DNA of it.”

Mike White Accepts the Criticism: The White Lotus creator understands if you feel conflicted about that ending. So does he.
By Kathryn VanArendonk

Of all the interchangeable helpers, Belinda actually comes out ahead. She’s seen waving at the end, like she was at the beginning. Unlike Armond, she’s there. Unlike Dillon, she wasn’t high and used by Armond. Of all the staff, Belinda is nearly where she began at the start, but with a newfound, not taxed, envelope thick with cash.

Maybe Belinda isn’t the character we’re supposed to root for. In the same interview, White says, “I don’t know how to be a general manager of a hotel!” Conversely, I don’t know how to be any of the guests portrayed in The White Lotus. That doesn’t matter. I am able to enjoy the show. I just find the most unbelievable aspect of a show that contains a close-up look at potentially cancerous testicles, a newlywed happy to see his mom on his honeymoon, rampant drug abuse, robbery, murder, and a human defecating in a suitcase, is a 40-year-old hotel worker being disappointed by hotel guest after that guest gives her an envelope thick with cash. 

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