Hi, I’m Michelle, and I’m Hooked On Euphoria, Even if It’s Bad For Me (HBO’s Euphoria)
★★☆☆☆
**Spoilers for Season 1 - 2 ahead
The First Drag
I finally watched the first episode of Euphoria a couple months after the entire first season had already been out.
It was 2019, and I had some friends over. My friends are usually hard-pressed to find and recommend something that I haven’t already watched, so when it came out that I hadn’t yet already binged and finished the most-talked-about show of the season, our entire party came to a screeching halt and we began to play the first episode.
We sat there, and I could feel the eyes on me. Was I laughing at all the right times? Did my brows pique with intrigue? Was I fascinated by the intricate lighting and tempo-driven cinematography?
Yes. I recognized all the beats and understood when I was supposed to feel fascinated, dismayed, or shocked.
But did I feel connected to any of the characters and compelled to finish the rest of the season?
Nah. Not really. At some point within the episode, it just kind of felt like a drag. I felt a bit like this:
But I stuck through it because I knew it was the pilot. I gave it its fair chance and let it take my attention. They’re still setting up the stakes, I reasoned. They’re still introducing all the characters. They’re world-building. Hello, Rue.
I watched as Rue is found overdosed on the floor, covered in vomit. I watched as she gets out of rehab only to abuse again. I watched as Jules has violent sex with a mysterious older gentleman she met on a dating app—an aptly named “DominantDaddy”. I watched as Maddy has sex in a pool with a random dude at a house party. I watched as Cassie and McKay have sex in an all-too-awkward, “don’t-worry-this-doesn’t-end-in-a-rape” (an actual line from the show) kind of way at the same house party. I watched as Jules pulls a knife on popular, bad-boy, Nate, at the house party. Then I watched as Nate returns home from the house party and walks past a family portrait with who other in the center than his picture-picture father? The closeted DominantDaddy.
This big reveal at the end of the episode was slightly titillating, and then that was it. My interest was a curtain’s flap in the wind. A mere moment.
Once the flashing lights had stopped and the buzz of seeing Zendaya snort a line of coke had worn off, I realized I was pretty apathetic toward the show because I didn’t feel particularly attached to anything or any character. I didn’t spend enough time with any of them and I felt like there was just a lot of cheap tricks played on me, such as its:
Really cool and distinct cinematography
Good music and good lighting
Diverse cast
Entertaining events transpire in an entertaining setting
Former Disney star cussing and doing drugs (ooOoOoOoO)
Romanticized drug paraphernalia and teen angst
All of that stuff is intrinsically just cool and fun to watch on screen.
Thing is, though, I really wanted a little more than that. You don’t get to pull out all the tricks on me for no reason other than to dazzle me. I want to care about something, damn it.
But I just didn’t know where to invest any of my empathy or attention by the end. There was so much untamed gluttony and debauchery in every scene, I truly didn’t know where I fit in as a viewer.
“Cool, someone’s doing something nuts again. But does anybody actually want me to care about them, orrrr?” I asked myself. “Does our main character and focalizer, Rue, really even give a shit if I liked her and cared about her wellbeing?”
All of her actions in the pilot told me a big, fat no.
Rue wouldn’t care if I came back to watch her story unfold. And so I found myself unsure of what to even root for because the main character clearly didn’t want what the rest of the show wants for her: to get better.
Well, if I couldn’t focus on Rue, my next best bet was to pay attention to this whole Jules-Nate-DominantDaddy situation. Thing was, I didn’t really give a shit about that either. I didn’t spend enough time with those characters to understand why this would even matter to me outside of it just being juicy neighborhood gossip. It was just all… depravity—no tenderness or reason to care in sight.
And when you handle such juice, you better make sure it’s sweet, not just a blast to my senses.
By the end of the first episode, I honestly just felt untethered and uncatered to as a viewer. And if I wanted to simply party, I would’ve just turned off the TV.
Peaking, I Think
Skip forward to two and a half-ish years later. It’s now January 2022, and Euphoria Season 2 was about to be released.
Oh, and I had just gotten married.
The day after my wedding, I was still feeling outside of my body with exhilaration and wanted something to prolong my high, keep it going.
Now, I was pretty much bed-ridden the day after my wedding with a hangover from 1) a metric shit-ton of alcohol, 2) the most social interaction I’d had in two years, and 3) all the emotions of a wedding.
In bed all day with a hankering to feel light and weightless, Euphoria reared its glittery head once again. Everyone was talking about its sophomore season coming up and posting screengrabs from its first season. The Euphoria meme supply was a’plenty, and I wanted in.
Without anything else to do, and no other show really popping out at the moment, I decided to give it another go before Season 2 came out.
This time, I gave the entire first season an honest try and binge-watched all the episodes. I realized throughout my watch that, hey, I was a bit high off Euphoria. I was… kind of enjoying my time watching the show.
Things were looking up!
Euphoria did a great job at keeping me significantly entertained this second time around. Like the first episode, there was a lot going on everywhere I looked and I just droned on and on from episode to next episode. I still didn’t care much for the characters but the cinematography got even better, the acting kept improving, and Labrinth had catchy-enough tunes. Every time Jules (Hunter Schafer) was on screen, I didn’t dare look away. Nate (Jacob Elordi) became more interesting and haunted. I was happy that Rue had gotten sober, and I liked watching her relationship with Jules develop romantically. The plot also started to center around the Jacobs family’s secrets and its stakes, which was a step in a positive direction for the show.
And then—sigh—the finale happened and literally undid all the work the season had worked so hard on.
Jules and Rue split up. Rue subsequently relapses. None of the characters actually pay for any of their actions in a way that feels right or just. And then it just… flatlines without addressing much else. Like at all.
I don’t mind a season finale having a couple loose ends (I am aware of what a cliffhanger is and understand shows do this), but Euphoria’s loose ends felt more like a result of the entire first season’s excitability, its shiny-object syndrome, and its inability to resolve them in a way that’s actually titillating—it felt so unmoored, unfocused. And then the final minutes of the finale break into song, which, to me, was just another trick.
When the credits rolled, I honestly felt empty and confused. Did I not just spend 8 whole hours with these people, thinking we were going somewhere? What the hell just even happened?
When I really started to dissect the season, all I could point to was dramatized trauma that nobody really learns from. All it is is fun to watch.
When it was all said and done, I finally realized what Euphoria meant to me.
This is a show I watch to straight up indulge and eavesdrop. I don’t watch it to understand myself better, and I don’t rely on it connect with anyone. (Even though this literally is my high school experience on screen, the fact that I can’t connect with any of these characters says a lot to the show’s ability to create empathy, but more on that later.)
What I want from Euphoria is its second-hand smoke.
So after entire season of people doing whatever they wanted and getting away with it, here’s what I realized: I am entertained, but I am not at all invested.
Me at the end of Season 1, unsure of what to make of what just happened (or didn’t happen).
The Come-down. Or, Sobering Up
This leads me to say something blasphemous.
I think Euphoria is more entertaining and fun than it is good storytelling.
I have fun watching these characters indulge in all this violent and beautifully-shot debauchery, but I still just don’t know if any of the characters really have any redeeming qualities (at least that we’ve seen yet). I don’t know what anyone is working toward anymore. I don’t even know what I’m waiting for anymore. I really don’t. At the end of every episode, so much has happened and yet nothing has happened. There are clearly no rules in Euphoria except for the ones tattooed on the inside of Rue’s and Jules’s bottom lips.
I just don’t know if I can spend any more time waiting for something good to happen in Euphoria. For someone to make the right decision. For people to learn. For literally any action to have any consequence.
Some characters are likable, sure, but redeemable? I’m unconvinced. Almost all of the characters own their share of deep trauma (totally fair), but what I don’t think is fair is allowing these characters to literally never try and be a better person. To me, Euphoria is what happens when you let people’s trauma go unchecked.
Euphoria plunges you into trauma porn and abuse, and convinces viewers it’s justification for a character’s unchanged shitty behavior, or worse, that it’s character development.
Episode after episode, it’s just character after character making the wrong choice, literally committing a crime, extorting or hurting others, and then it repeats without any real repercussions. (And I do not consider Maddy getting the shit choked out of her at the fair a repercussion. I also don’t think Nate’s mental anguish over his dad’s sexuality and disconnect is punishment fit for his crimes—you know, beating an innocent man an inch away from death, falsifying your identity to gather child porn and then using it for extortion, the list goes on.)
This poor bastard almost gets beaten to death for our viewing pleasure. If you’re looking for justice or for your perpetrator to face consequences, choose another show, guy!
In the end, all of the characters (except for Ali and, like, a couple others) are implicit in really terrible behavior and never truly make it up or learn from it. They all threaten, lie, commit crimes, extort, and emotionally and/or physically abuse others. This is what makes it so challenging to truly connect with a lot of these characters on a level that’s compassionate.
You can’t just ask me to “feel for Rue” or these characters without showing me I can trust them to be kind and good humans. And you can’t keep showing me the same clips of her eulogy at her father’s funeral to explain why oh why she’s so broken. You definitely can’t keep having Zendaya cry her eyes out and break down doors when her motivations are rooted in 1) hurting the people she’s talking to, 2) getting high. It all just falls so behind its nuanced cinematography, and frankly, it’s contrived.
And even though Zendaya repeatedly gives the performance of her life throughout the show, her phenomenal acting doesn’t excuse her character’s shitty choices and selfishness, either. You do not get to cry because you’re the shitty person here, and ask for my grace. Your actions must earn it.
Trust me, I want to love and care for all of these characters, but they don’t seem to care to receive it. They keep disappointing me. They keep hurting me. I can’t seem to give this shit away for free. And I also can’t just love them unconditionally. It doesn’t work like that.
Every time Rue does something kind or shows a semblance of genuine care for others, the show face-plants you into another one of her lies, admissions of manipulation, or guilt trips. And I don’t like being lied to, manipulated, or guilt-tripped.
This is how a show that tackles such deep issues feels so light. So on the surface. It fails to rightly use its most important and powerful tool: its characters. And it relies on its fancy cinematic tricks and bright lights to distract you from that. And what a shame it is, because the show’s subject matter is honestly some of the most daring and boldest to come out in a while.
I’m happy there’s a show that tackles teenage drug abuse and addiction (among other debaucherous but serious issues). I believe it’s an important and necessary thing to explore. But I’m disappointed that Euphoria simply doesn’t know how to handle or explore such complex issues outside of show-creator Sam Levinson’s own experience and diary-like storytelling. And while, yes, emotions certainly run high in some scenes, the show has abandoned fundamental storytelling.
What is this besides a live reenactment of pages ripped from Sam Levinson’s personal diary?
It’s only when Rue (and her mother) actually vocalizes and tells the audience that Rue is “not a good person” mid-way through Season 2 that Euphoria finally gains a sense of self-awareness. And it’s only after this admission, only after Euphoria finally takes a look in the mirror, that Rue is able to take accountability and apologize to Ali for some awful comments she made while high.
This has been, on my account, Rue’s only step toward redemption thus far. Half-way through Season 2.
But… if Rue’s character and history has shown us anything, it’s that we can’t really trust her. So, we’ll just have to see what happens in Season 3… I guess.
In the end, I clearly don’t trust many characters and my guard is up. So what the hell, then, makes me tune in every week?
Why do I keep giving hours of my life to Euphoria?
A Hit of Hedonism Makes a Full-blown Addict
I said what I said about Euphoria. But I’ll also say this: Euphoria is fucking fun. We have a blast together. We get high together. We steal liquor together. This intercourse we have, it’s sensational underneath the strobing lights and we’ve also invited trauma into the bed.
It is excessive. Gluttonous. Intravenous.
How can one turn their head away from all that? We simply can’t.
I want more. I am properly in the for the ride, regardless of the bumps in the road.
It’s just pure fun. It’s hearing the most piping-hot tea. It’s eavesdropping and knowing you will never get caught. It’s debauchery on full blast. It’s being invited to watch the most intimate, the most cinematic, the most traumatic drama unfold right in front of you. The best part is, you have nothing to do with it.
You are not connected.
It’s so hedonistic, I almost want to go to church and get baptized. I love being able to unplug for an hour a week to join this cast in absolute depravity and drama. Let’s get high. Let’s scream at the top of our lungs at each other. Let’s kick through the doors and pound on the walls, crying, crying, crying. Let’s scare those closest to us. Let’s get close to death. Let’s cheat. Let’s steal. Let’s do whatever the fuck we want and get away with it.
Euphoria is like taking that hit—the one that blasts all your senses and brings you to your knees, unhinged and floating above the shit in your life that actually matters.
You become addicted to all of it.
And there, my friends, is the genius of the show.
Euphoria has the same effect of its subject matter.
That’s exactly why I return week after week, why I keep pounding on the door as if Fez were on the other end, withholding my supply. And yeah, the show has some structural faults, but here’s a nuance I neglected to consider myself: maybe the show wants us to feel this way?
Maybe it’s trying to tell us that Euphoria is uncontrollable; it will not give in to what we want as viewers. It won’t give us clear-cut storylines, it won’t even give us character arcs we’re dying to see. For how can we beat a drug? We aren’t bigger than this euphoria. We will take another hit, and another hit, and another hit, regardless of how jumbled it all gets. Regardless of how, dare I say, bad it is lol.
You know what? I’m taking a page out of Euphoria’s script (if my thoughts seems all over the place, then I’ve done it just right) and I’m just gonna say what our main girl, Rue, would say:
Fuck it.
I still really like Euphoria. I can’t get enough of the stuff.
Hi, I’m Michelle, and I’m hooked on Euphoria, even if it’s bad for me.
