Euphoria season 2 wrapped up on Sunday, February 27th, and there was a lot to unpack this season. Rue hits her lowest point, along with Nate and his dad, Rue and Jules’ relationship, Cassie and Nate, Maddy and Cassie, Fezco and Lexi, THE PLAY, the list goes on and on and on. This season was…intense to say the least. I’m here to hopefully, and as quickly as possible, help you wrap your head around all of it. As I said, there’s a lot, so make sure to grab a snack, lean back, and enjoy.
In this season of Euphoria, Rue starts off by somehow convincing everyone around her that she is sober when she in fact is not. She reconciles with Jules at the beginning of the season, but that all gets ruined when their new friend Elliot tells Jules that Rue is still using, leading Jules to tell Rue’s mom. At this point, Rue is into harder drugs has a suitcase of drugs to sell from a local lady drug-lord, to make money, to get more of her own drugs. Once Jules tells Rue’s mom about the drugs, she finds that suitcase and claims that she dumped out all of the drugs. Things go south quickly when they have an intervention for Rue and she basically goes crazy and screams at everyone, destroys her house, and goes on the run so that she doesn’t have to go back to rehab. She’s also freaking out since her mom dumped out thousands of dollars worth of drugs that she has to now make up to pay Ms.drug lord lady. Eventually, they get her back home and she starts getting clean with help from her sister and her mom, vows to stay clean until the end of her junior year. She even goes to Elliot’s house to reconcile with him because, even though he lost her trust when he told Jules about the drugs, she also realizes that he saved her, and they try to slowly go back to being friends.
Elsewhere in Euphoria land, there’s lots of drama going on with Cassie, Nate, and Maddy. In the first episode, we see Cassie get into a fight with Lexi on their way to a New Year’s party. Cassie ends up getting out of the car and decides to go off on her own. That is before she is picked up by Nate, driven to the party, and basically taken right to the bathroom so she and Nate could…well you know. BUT, guess who comes banging on the door right as Cassie is hooking up with her best friend’s ex-boyfriend? None other than her best friend, queen Maddy herself. Maddy figures out that it’s Nate in the bathroom but doesn’t know he was in there with Cassie because she is hiding in the bathtub. Throughout the rest of the season, we see Cassie fall for Nate harder than ever, all while trying to convince Maddy to leave him for good because they weren’t good together. Meanwhile, Nate is trying to turn Cassie into Maddy by buying her new clothes and changing her makeup and hairstyle, but Cassie sees absolutely nothing wrong with him trying to turn her into his ex-girlfriend. At one point, Rue reveals to Maddy that Cassie and Nate have been hooking up, and boy does Maddy go crazy. Ultimately she decides to take the high road and not let the whole Cassie and Nate situation take over her life, for now.
In flashbacks this season, we learn that Cal is gay and has been since high school, but I feel like some fans of the show could already sense that. At one point in the season, Cal gets very drunk and goes home to basically tell his family that his whole life has been a lie and that he’s done with them, and then he pees on the floor and leaves. The next day we see that Nate’s mom is ecstatic that Cal is gone. She’s drinking wine, dancing around to music, and having deep conversations. At one point during this conversation, his mom alludes to the idea that Cal might have abused Nate when he was younger and that that’s the reason why he turned out the way he did. But Nate shut this conversation down quickly, so we might never know for sure but some flashbacks in the show might lead us to believe that it’s true. After a couple of days, we see Nate take a gun and go to Maddy’s house to get the flash drive of his dad and Jules that she had. He gets the flash drive, traumatizing Maddy in the process, and gives it to Jules to do whatever she wants with it. How refreshing it is to see Nate Jacobs doing something good for once.
The twist that most people were most interested in this season was the budding relationship between Fez and Lexi. They had always known each other but they didn’t really KNOW each other, you know what I mean? At the New Years’ party, they started talking and from then on they were inseparable. Texting each other and/or talking on the phone every single day. They could talk to and confide in each other like they couldn’t with anyone else. It was very cute and everyone watching the show, including me, was very invested in this relationship and seeing where it would go.
Now, everything that had happened throughout the entire season was leading up to the last two episodes, which consisted mostly of Lexi’s play called “Our Life”. The play left many people with some…strong opinions to say the least. Lexi’s play focused on the lives of the main Euphoria characters as they dealt with all of their issues such as drug abuse, self-consciousness, depression, etc, and how they all intersected with each other because they were all friends. Now, it’s SUPER important to note that what Lexi wanted more than anything for this play was for Fez to show up and watch, she even saved him the best seat in the house, but he left her hanging. Or at least that’s what she thought. Remember at the end of season one when Ashtray killed Mouse the drug guy? Yes, well that came back to get them. So let’s take a little break to talk about Fez and Ashtray.
This season Fez and Ashtray have been trying their best to lay low, that is after Fez pounded on Nate during the first episode at the New Years’ party. But after that they laid low. At the beginning of the season, a girl named Faye comes to stay with Fez and Ashtray, and at first, no one thinks much of her except that she is a drug addict As the season goes on, the audience can see that she is more than that and she cares for Fez and Ashtray as she starts building a relationship with them. At the end of the season, Faye’s boyfriend Custer comes to their house and secretly tells Faye that he is working with the police to get Fez and Ash to take the fall for Mouse’s death. At first, she says nothing to Fez or Ash, out of loyalty to Custer, but when he comes back the next day with a recording device, while Fez is getting ready for Lexi’s play, her loyalties change. She discreetly finds a way to let Fez and Ash know what is going on and not to say anything out loud. Sadly, Ash decided to take things into his own hand instead of letting Fez handle it and he stabs Custer in the neck, killing him. Yup, Ash is really good at letting his anger and love for Fez get the best of him and killing people as a result.
So back to the play, a lot of stuff happens in the play, some we didn’t know about and some we didn’t but basically, it upsets Nate and he ends up breaking up with Cassie because it’s her sister’s play. As revenge, Cassie goes up on stage and tries to ruin Lexi’s play, but Maddy breaks her vow to be the bigger person and she goes on stage to beat her. She runs Cassie off the stage and chases her around the halls before eventually ending up in the bathroom and basically telling her that Nate isn’t worth it. During this little intermission, we see Nate driving to go see his dad and having a talk with him about what he has put Nate through and his life choices. We see Nate hold the same gun that he pointed at Maddy, at his dad and we wonder if he’ll shoot him as revenge, but instead, we start hearing police sirens in the background. Turns out that he decided to get revenge on his father by turning him into the police for child pornography. Another surprising act from Nate Jacobs, who knew he had it in him. Back in the auditorium, the play must go on, even though Lexi is heartbroken because Cassie ran up on the stage and because Fez isn’t there. At the end of the play, Lexi bows and gets a standing ovation from the crowd, as she should, and she is extremely satisfied.
AHHH, stay with me, I know it’s been long but we’re almost done, I promise. When the play, the bows, and thank yous are done, we see Jules go up to Rue (who I must add absolutely loved the play because for the first time she was able to see herself as a person who went through something traumatic, instead of the lowlife drug addict that she saw herself as), and she apologizes to her and tells her how much she loves her. How does Rue respond? With a simple kiss on Jule’s forehead and then she walks away, and that’s that. Back in Fez and Ash’s house, chaos has erupted as the police burst into the house looking for them. At this point, Fez had told Ash to go out the back door so that the police won’t find him and he was willing to go down for the killing of Custer. Ashtray was not having any of that. I think it’s because he was sick of having to have Fez cover for him and protect him, so this time he wanted to protect his older brother instead of the other way around. So instead of going out the back like Fez said, Ash grabs every gun and round of ammo that they have in the house and locks himself in the bathroom. He ignores Fez’s pleas to come out and when the police come charging in, he then pleads with them not to shoot because there is a child in the bathroom. Ash and the police exchange some shots, one of Ash’s shots hitting Fez in the abdomen leading to him collapsing on the floor. At one point, Ash stops shooting and one of the cops goes into the bathroom to see if he is dead. The bathroom door opens to show Ash on the floor, seemingly dead until he pops up and shoots the cop dead. At this moment both Ash and Fez know what comes next and they lock eyes as the camera pans from Ash in the bathroom to Fez’s face of pure anguish, as we hear one last gunshot and a body falling to the floor. I know, believe me, I was screaming at the TV the whole time.
Okay okay, so now we’re done, really. The season ends off with Rue feeling pretty good about herself and being clean, Ash is dead and Fez was shot and arrested, and no one knows what’s going to happen with Nate and Cassie, but it doesn’t look too good for them. Oh and if you’re wondering why I didn’t mention Kat in this summary, it’s because her storyline was horrible this season. Basically, she didn’t like how her relationship with Ethan was going so she faked having a brain tumor and broke up with him. Yea…they did Kat dirty this season. It’s safe to say that everyone is looking forward to the next season of Euphoria. Although no one is looking forward to having to wait two years for it. But I guess there are other shows we can get wrapped up in. Perhaps the new season of Bridgerton might do the trick? I’ll have to do everyone a favor and find out:)