Not much happened tonight on the penultimate episode of “The White Lotus.”

There was no pay off of last week’s big incest story. The Ratliff brothers didn’t even share a scene.

There was so nervousness about sister and brother this time, with Piper and Lochlan getting uncomfortable. But thank God that was a bust, and Piper retreated to her room. (You could hear the audience echoing Parker Posey’s “Piper, no!”)

The big story was all about Walton Goggins’ Rick and pal Frank, played by Sam Rockwell, going on their murder mission. Rick brought a gun to meet Jim, the man his mother once told him killed his father. Jim is played by the great Scott Glenn, who bears a physical resemblance to Goggins. If Jim doesn’t turn out to be Rick’s father, who left the mother, I’d be surprised.

The best scenes were between Rockwell and Patravadi Mejudhon, the elegant Thai star who plays Hollinger’s wife, Sritala, a famed actress and owner of the hotel. Mejudhon lights up every scene. When she’s with Frank, she’s kittenish and easily impressed. Rockwell is magic once again, fawning all over her, freelancing to keep her busy. When he falls off the wagon, the results seem less dangerous than hilariously weird. Maybe next week he’ll be dressed up as an Asian woman.

Jason Isaacs’ Timothy is the most underwritten character. Knowing he’s going to jail and losing everything, all he does is walk around stoned and fantasize suicide – or murder of his wife or son. He mumbles from taking drugs and drinking. No one notices. Why wasn’t he written as pro-active or smart about his situation?

The most sinister part of the show was Belinda finally speaking to Greg/Gary. He offers her $100,000 not to rat him out to the US authorities. She says she has to think about it. He gives her the evil eye, setting up a red herring for the White Lotus about who gets killed in the final episode. Will Greg murder her? I don’t think so, but you never know.

If violence is coming, the participants are in two groups. One is the guard, Gaitok, who spots the hotel robbers at the fight. His girlfriend prods him to be more courageous, so maybe — since has one of the guns floating around — he’ll do something about it.

Or: One of the robbers, who’s now bedded Lauri (Carrie Coon) has a mean Russian girlfriend. She could come after Laurie. Or Jim’s goons might come after Rick, since he didn’t kill Jim but knocked him off his chair.

Regardless, at this point I’m not sure it matters.There’s no overarching theme to the season. So many of the beats and plotlines are retreads from the first two seasons. Piper and Lochlan wanting to stay in Thailand is the same as the kid in season 1 who remained in Hawaii. The hotel manager nervously sang tonight, same as the hooker in season 2.

In tonight’s episode the sensation Aimee Lou Wood, as Chelsea, had almost the same conversation she had last week with Saxon (Patrick Schwarzenegger) about him being soulless, and so on. Wood is a gem, it’s too bad she hasn’t had more to do than act shocked about Saxon. Let’s hope she’s not collateral damage.

Nothing great for Parker Posey tonight. Victoria has gained no insight into anything going on around her. Her own character was not advanced this week. She hasn’t even questioned what happened to her missing Lorazepam, or wondered if her husband’s total fog could have been caused by the pills. If she’s seen clues that her husband is a criminal or that her sons have had an unacceptable encounter, it has not been shown to the audience.

But there’s a lot of beautiful cinematography.

Next week will come what I feel will be the unsatisfying end of this soap opera. I don’t think of the main cast will die, but again, I might be wrong. I think Gaitok may die a hero, and that Rockwell’s Frank could go on to another season. I hope wherever the White Lotus is set next, the guests go into town and look around a bit more.

Wait: this week’s inside joke, TV star Jaclyn has a last name– Lemon– making her Jac Lemon, get it? Jack Lemmon. I always loved the story of Jack Lemmon taking his mother’s urn to the Ritz Carlton Bar in Boston for one last drink. Now there’s a story!

For “The White Lotus,” apparently gay incest was okay but possibly having a trans child with different pronouns was not.

In the new Harpers Bazaar, one my favorite actresses, Carrie Coon, reveals that sensitive material was tossed to the cutting room floor.

Coon reports that her character, Laurie, supposedly had a back story including a daughter at home going by they/them pronouns. She might have been trans. Laurie had to explain it to her friends — played by Michelle Monaghan and Leslie Bibb — and of course, they weren’t good with it.

Coon tells HB: “The season was written before the election. And considering the way the Trump administration has weaponized the cultural war against transgender people even more since then, when the time came to cut the episode down, Mike [White] felt that the scene was so small and the topic so big that it wasn’t the right way to engage in that conversation.”

It’s amazing that the graphically displayed sexual threesome involving two brothers passed muster, but this conversation did not. Is this why “White Lotus” feels so slow and dull this season? Very little happens (as we’ll see Sunday night) or otherwise feels timely or provocative. If only there had been more of this kind of thing instead of Jason Isaacs prolonged moping around.

Episode 7 airs tonight. I haven’t seen it, but the word is a little meh. Stay tuned…for 10pm and follow me on Twitter at @showbiz411.

PS Carrie Coon also plays Mrs. Russell on “The Gilded Age,” which will return soon. Mrs. Russell is a social climber extraordinaire, with little restraint at all.

“White Lotus” Ratings Down Almost 10% on HBO with Crazy Incest Episode

When Janet Drucker was made Executive Producer of the Peacock soap “Days of our Lives,” in August 2023, it was a big deal.

Drucker had been with the show since 1984. She was succeeding Albert Alarr, who’d been forced out after a litany of sexual harassmant claims and sued by one of the soap’s star, Arianne Zucker.

The word was the show would now be run by women.

Now Drucker is out after 20 months. She’s being replaced by Noek Maxam, her younger, male second in command. They say Drucker is retiring.

“Days of our Lives” is run by Ken Corday, the son of the couple who created the show in 1965, Betty and Ted Corday. He ran it so badly that “Days of our Lives” moved from broadcast TV on NBC to streaming on Peacock, where it often looks like summer stock. The sets are cheap, and the writing is more like a parody of soaps.

Still, it’s in production in some form, which is notable. One day someone will write a real behind the scenes story of what has gone on. No soap story will ever be that good, or full of more drama.

Zucker’s lawsuit has still not been settled.