Euphoria Is a Monument to Sam Levinson’s Lack of Creativity

by

Okay, so Euphoria is back, and honestly, it’s… a lot. Zendaya, as Rue, kicks off the season in a truly shocking way – she’s dealing guns! And she plays it with this weirdly upbeat, almost influencer-like energy, like she’s showing off a new product. It’s unsettling, to say the least. The whole season feels obsessed with bodies – not in a way that serves the story, but with a lot of explicit imagery – think ice cream and cocaine on skin, violence, and just… a lot of degradation. It’s hard to ignore how incredibly thin the actresses are, too. What started as a show about addiction and the opioid crisis feels increasingly empty. Sam Levinson clearly wants to make a statement about fentanyl and the darker side of America, but what he’s delivered is visually stunning, but ultimately feels emotionally vacant. It’s a beautiful, hollow spectacle, and I’m left wondering where the substance is.

Levinson, who has been sober for many years, used his experiences with addiction as inspiration for Euphoria. However, his tendency towards provocative and boundary-pushing content ultimately had a greater impact, shifting the show’s focus from the characters’ personal struggles to simply shocking the audience. Over time, Euphoria became less about Rue’s sobriety, Jules’s experience as a transgender teen, or Nate’s difficult family life, and more about constantly challenging viewers with increasingly extreme content—revealing outfits, intense conflicts, violence, and flashy visuals. The show reached a peak with the season two finale, where Lexi’s play dramatized Cassie’s affair and betrayal, essentially acknowledging and amplifying the show’s own reputation for sensationalism. However, the play also unintentionally highlighted how Euphoria now relies heavily on style over substance, and how the writing has stalled, with the creator primarily revisiting past themes rather than developing new ones.

The first three episodes of Euphoria show that the show hasn’t really moved forward. Though four years have passed since the last season (and five within the show’s timeline), the characters are stuck in the same high school dramas and limited perspectives. They’re still dealing with the same relationships, conflicts, and naive ideas about love and success. If the show was intentionally trying to critique Gen Z’s self-absorption and immaturity, it might be interesting. However, the creator only hints at that idea. The biggest problem is that the characters themselves feel underdeveloped. Even if Euphoria was meant to be a satire of today’s youth, it wouldn’t fully work because the characters aren’t compelling enough. The new season introduces thriller elements – Rue is caught between criminals, Nate is in debt, and the show explores themes of redemption – and is dedicated to the memory of Angus Cloud. But this genre shift feels superficial, like another stylistic choice for the show. Ultimately, neither the creator nor the characters have matured.

The last season of Euphoria ended with a lot of unresolved storylines. Rue owed money to a drug dealer after her mother got rid of the drugs she was supposed to sell, and her relationship with Jules had fallen apart following Rue’s relapse. Nate gave Jules a compromising video of Cal and asked her to destroy it, then turned Cal in to the police for his crimes. He also ended things with Cassie after their affair was exposed. Meanwhile, Lexi and Fezco were about to go on their first date, but a police raid on Fezco’s home led to his brother, Ashtray, being killed after he murdered someone who was providing information to the police. The new episodes, narrated by Rue, show how these characters, despite seeming to have moved on, are still connected to each other and to East Highland High. The show largely achieves this by undoing any progress the characters had made, which allows it to avoid taking risks or developing its characters in new ways.

Rue has fallen back into working for Laurie, this time smuggling drugs across the border by carrying balloons filled with powder to pay off a $100,000 debt. She’s still connected to her friends Lexi and Maddy, and maintains a relationship with Fezco, who is serving a 30-year prison sentence but communicates with her by phone. She’s also still heartbroken over Jules. Rue openly admits she misses high school, highlighting how little she’s changed. Maddy is working as an assistant to a Hollywood manager, landing the job by distancing herself from current trends and embracing a strong work ethic, but she’s still upset about Nate choosing Cassie. Cassie and Nate are back together, living in an over-the-top mansion in East Highland, where Nate has taken over his father’s construction business and Cassie is creating awkward and suggestive videos for TikTok. Meanwhile, Jules has left art school and is now a “sugar baby,” financially supported by wealthy clients, including a plastic surgeon who responds to her direct questions with inquiries about her family’s awareness of her work. Her parents are unaware of what she does.

Over these three hours, Euphoria mainly focuses on tying up loose ends and setting the stage for Nate and Cassie’s wedding. While there are some stressful scenes – like Rue and Faye nervously trying to hide drugs while crossing the border, Rue being questioned at a party, and a disturbing visit to a rehab center – the episodes feel slow-paced. This is partly due to Rue’s constant explanations and the way the show struggles to balance its established characters with its new, more dramatic style. Despite the guns, cowboys, and heavy themes about American disillusionment, the episodes lack a strong sense of momentum.

The third season of Euphoria largely focuses on the driving forces of sex, money, and power in American society, and while that feels accurate, the show doesn’t offer much insight into why these things dominate, especially for Gen Z. Creator Sam Levinson explores these themes through familiar styles and imagery – sometimes heavy-handed, like Rue’s symbolic journey with a heavy bag, or dialogue that feels either forced or underdeveloped. The season’s issues aren’t just that it rehashes ideas from other filmmakers like Korine, Tarantino, and Ellis; it’s that Levinson seems more interested in shocking the audience with provocative imagery – like unnecessary close-ups or offensive language – than in exploring complex themes like forgiveness and redemption for characters like Rue. Zendaya delivers a strong performance in a scene where her character confronts the devastating consequences of her addiction, but it stands out mostly because it’s the only moment where a female character is given real depth or a glimpse into a life beyond surface-level struggles.

Levinson often depicts women as sexual objects, similar to the imagery in soft-core pornography, and this raises questions about why Euphoria portrays women willingly accepting submissive roles. The show features scenes of control and objectification – like a character wrapping another in plastic or a woman on a leash – which echo themes from other works, such as Wuthering Heights. These moments, along with depictions of female characters working as strippers and even overdosing, prompt us to consider what Euphoria is saying about the experiences of womanhood, including the pressures, opportunities, and challenges they face. Is the show offering a critique of the violence and dehumanization women endure, or is it simply repeating these harmful patterns? Ultimately, the series leaves us questioning its stance on how women are treated and perceived.

Levinson’s work, like Ryan Murphy’s, often presents shocking content and then seems to question why we’re watching it. Euphoria sometimes feels similar, presenting its characters’ flaws and beliefs as something to mock – for example, Lexi dismissing Rue’s faith as judgmental, Cassie justifying her behavior with a cynical take on supply and demand, or Nate’s disturbing threat to his housekeeper. These moments hint at Levinson’s view of American culture as corrupt and hypocritical, suggesting a commentary on our collective mindset. However, these potentially insightful moments are often undercut by scenes that simply objectify female characters, preventing the show from offering any real depth. Instead, Euphoria seems to embrace the same nihilistic philosophy as Levinson’s earlier film, Assassination Nation – the idea that it’s all just for entertainment, regardless of the consequences.

Read More

2026-04-08 19:55