Sony announced some new films and shifts on already announced release dates. Two Spider-Man universe films are getting a bit delayed, we’ll just need to wait a little bit longer to see how these turn out.
Madame Web, starring Dakota Johnson and Sydney Sweeney, is moving from October 6, 2023 to February 16, 2024.
Kraven the Hunter, starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson, is also moving from October 6, 2023 from January 13, 2023.
An untitled Sony/Marvel film is also set for release on July 12, 2024.
Sony‘s Spider-Man related Madame Web has added a new star to the roster, Sydney Sweeney. The film will be directed by S.J. Clarkson from a screenplay by Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless and previous draft by Kerem Sanga.
Sweeney joins Dakota Johnson on the film that is an intriguing one. Madame Web, aka Cassandra Webb, is generally an older woman in the comics. She first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man #210 in 1980 and was created by Denny O’Neil and John Romita Jr. A supporting character, she has myasthenia gravis and is connected to a support system resembling a web. Different storylines had her youth restored and myasthenia gravis cured… because comics.
But, the character is clairvoyant and a mutant, who has passed her powers along to Julia Carpenter when she was attacked and killed.
It’s unknown who Sweeney is playing and it’s generally thought that Johnson would be playing Web… but which version? Webb is also the grandmother of the fourth Spider-Woman, Charlotte Witter.
The film joins the successful Sony Spider-Verse which of course has the main Spider-Man films but also two Venom films and the upcoming film featuring Kraven the Hunter.
Euphoriawraps up its second season in a final episode that is violent, emotional, and occasionally even farcical. Writer/director/creator Sam Levinson begins with last episode and arguably this season’s tensest storyline with Fezco (Angus Cloud) about to go to Lexi’s (Maude Apatow) play, but Custer (Tyler Chase) wants to have a little chat aka the police are on his door step to get him and Ashtray (Javon Walton) for the murder of Mouse way back in the season premiere. Since last episode, Ashtray has known what’s going on and immediately slices Custer’s throat in a move that causes Fezco to backhand him for this act of violence and then help him arrange the evidence so Fezco can take the fall. However, this doesn’t end up working out. Walton’s wordless, glance-heavy approach to acting has been one of the highlights this season, and Levinson mines so much emotion from letting the camera linger on him and remind the audience that he’s a kid facing death.
After the violent opening sequence, Sam Levinson goes idyllic and gives us one last look at Lexi and Fezco’s relationship as a kind of what it could have been. Apatow and Cloud continue to have fantastic chemistry even if they’re just chatting over the phone, and even their differences make for both entertaining and real conversations. For example, Lexi mentions her abhorrence of guns while Fezco mentions how they’re necessary for protection, and you can see the kind of violent people he has had to deal with in the tension in his face. But on the flipside, Fezco’s life goal is to have a farm like Little House on the Prairie, which Lexi has never seen, and they bond over this innocent (If problematic in its treatment of Native Americans.) show, and they have realize they have shared values like curiosity, empathy, and caring about their families. The season finale of Euphoria Season 2 is dark and violent, but there is room for sweetness like Rue’s (Zendaya) reaction to Lexi’s play and asking to spend time with her as well as Rue giving Jules (Hunter Schafer) a forehead kiss. (But that seems more like a goodbye than a reconciliation especially with how little screen time Jules has gotten in the back third of the season.)
However, these moments are few and far between and mainly center on Rue healing through art and conversation from the trauma of her addiction and father’s death. This episode is mostly drama-filled beginning with the aforementioned murder and flowing into Lexi’s play, which completely goes off the rails with Cassie (Sydney Sweeney), Suze (Alanna Ubach), and Maddy (Alexa Demie) all jumping on the stage. Mentioning that she’s a villain in her monologue is on the nose, but that’s Euphoria trademark at this point, and Levinson and Sweeney unleash the horror film monster inside the high school cheerleader, who played the victim even when she was sleeping with her best friend’s boyfriend. Cassie’s monologue is cringeworth and even veers into racist territory when she compares her treatment in Lexi’s play to Afghan women being beheaded. She completely lays into Lexi for just being an observer and not taking chances in life, which causes Suze to intervene and shows how self-centered Cassie is because Lexi was trying to keep the family together. Combined with Fezco not showing up, Lexi is in a real down place, and Maude Apatow uses more passive body language to show how overwhelmed she is by her sister’s actions.
But the messiness doesn’t stop at the Howard family enacting their dynamic on stage, but gets even wilder when Cassie uses the names of the characters in the play to allude to her situation leading to a verbal confrontation with Maddy. After a short lull, the play restarts, and of course, it’s a scene based on last season’s infamous carousel “ride” leading Cassie to assault the actress playing her. Maddy jumps up on stage to take Cassie out, and she ends up slapping and hitting her head against the wall with cellphones filming everything. Most of the episode focuses on the more substantial Rue and Fezco plotlines, but there’s a little coda where Sam Levinson includes a shot of Maddy using a Coke can as an ice pack and has her basically tell Cassie that this is just Round One, and that she doesn’t sympathize with her because she was dumped by Nate (Jacob Elordi) last episode.
And speaking of Nate, there is a resolution to his and his father Cal’s (Eric Dane) plot this season. After dumping Cassie, Nate gets in his car with a gun, jump drive, and a bottle of beer hell bent on something with Levinson cutting between him driving and Fezco, Ashtray, and Faye (Chloe Cherry) getting ready for their door to get kicked in. He ends up finding his dad and a bunch of queer people squatting in one of the Jacobs construction sites. Returning to patriarch mode, Cal’s voice deepens and gets more serious as he wants to find some kind of peace with his son.
However, that doesn’t happen as Nate reveals that he saw Cal’s stash of sex tapes growing up and had traumatic dreams of Cal having sex with him. Sam Levinson firmly points the camera at Nate’s angry face while Cal mentions that he does feel happier, which is the opposite of how Nate wants him to feel. So, that’s why he plants the jump drive on the scene as East Highland’s police come in and arrest Cal while Nate strides out. However, there are a few shots of him looking back with the blue and red on his face that might be regret or his dad’s reputation getting irreparably damaged. Or maybe he knows running the family business is out of question now. Cal is a pedophile, and it’s good to see him face justice. However, there’s zero evidence that Nate will try to break the cycle of toxicity in the Jacobs family with him pointing guns at people to get his way and straight up saying to his dad’s friends that he hurts people to get what he wants.
There’s still the dangling plot thread of Rue owing Laurie money, and it seems like the last two episodes wrapped up her storylines with Leslie, Gia, and Ali. But the season two finale is the most hopeful Rue’s story has been in a long time with Zendaya’s giving an emotionally vulnerable performance in her reaction to the play. Sam Levinson weaves in flashbacks from her father’s wake to actors on stage and the audience that Rue is watching from, and she ends up beaming at its ending: an awkward candid photo of Rue, Lexi, Cassie, Maddy, and Kat at the wake taken by Suze. The play inspires her to reconnect with Lexi, who has provided contexts and a narrative for what she’s feeling. The most touching scene in the episode (Along with Lexi dedicating the play to Fezco) is them hugging and empathizing over their dads with this scene bridging over to a voiceover mentioning that Rue was clean for the rest of the school year. Because they don’t know what’s going on with Fezco and Ashtray, these scenes seem like a bubble of hope that will probably get burst next season. But it’s nice to see Rue grow as a character, and even though Jules being relegated to the sidelines is unfortunate, it could symbolize that she’s moving on from that relationship to new ones.
However, not everything with Rue works in this episode. She gets Elliott (Dominic Fike) to ask forgiveness for telling her mom that she’s using drugs, but then also thanks him for getting rid of them and kickstarting her path to sobriety. Elliott is still using drugs so he’s probably not the best friend for Rue, which is something he alluded to in the season two premiere. However, instead of just having this short encounter, Elliott plays a whole acoustic song co-written by Zendaya and series composer Labrinth with lyrics referring to Rue growing apart from her friends. Fike has a fine voice, but this scene drags on , and the themes in the lyrics are explored in further depth during the play. Plus the play is more powerful because of Lexi and Rue’s long friendship, which is strained, but has potential. The scene is redundant and would be better off as a DVD extra (If those still exist.), especially since the fate of Jules and Rue’s relationship ends up being told in voiceover. The pacing and placement of the scene is way off, but an incisive acoustic ballad for recovery and separation makes sense in contrast with the highly choreographed, postmodern pop “All for Us”, which played when Rue relapsed at the end of season one.
However, the most heart-rending parts of the Euphoria Season 2 finale is the SWAT raid on Fezco and Ashtray’s house. It’s already been set up by a soft minor tone score from Labrinth, gaps in conversation, and heavy breathing from Angus Cloud, Chase, and Cherry. (Walton is always the stoic.) But when it happens, Euphoria truly becomes the crime drama set up in this season’s premiere. Fezco immediately surrenders, but Ashtray holes up in a bath tub with a machine gun and shoots back at the SWAT team injuring Fezco in the process, who is pleading for the police to take him alive because he’s just a kid. Firing a semiautomatic might seem cool and badass, but by inserting shots of Ashtray’s completely overwhelmed face, it grounds his last moments as he keeps firing and never surrenders. Also, Levinson puts in some of the Rue voice over about how her father’s death seemed like a movie and was unreal on shots of Fezco being ziptied and carried out by the police.
The crime plotline seemed like another show than Euphoria for much of this season, but by centering it around characters fans care about like Fezco, Ashtray, and scene stealer Faye, it ends up adding a lot of tension and danger to the show. The shootout is utter carnage and tragedy with bullets flying indiscriminately and destroying Fezco’s grandmother’s house and legacy as well as Ashtray’s life before it really started. Most of the other parts of the episode deal with Rue’s continued grief over her father’s death, and this plot will eventually give Rue and Lexi something to grieve at in the third season because Sam Levinson focuses on the moment, and not other characters’ reactions to Ashtray’s death and Fezco’s arrest.
Elliott’s musical interlude went on for far too long and Jules along with Kat were forgotten, but “All My Life, My Heart Has Yearned for a Thing I Cannot Name” is heartbreaking season finale centered around griefs, both old and new. After missteps trying to make him sympathetic, Levinson shows real consequences for Cal Jacobs and plunges Nate into even more darkness. He uses the power of narrative to help Rue contextualize her life and have Cassie continue to ruin her life through Lexi’s play. Also, Lexi’s arc is probably the most compelling one this season with her going from the sidelines to the literal spotlight, and Maude Apatow being a charisma-filled, yet vulnerable leading lady. Finally, from the first scene of season two, Sam Levinson colored in the world of Fezco, the drug dealer with a heart of gold, and turned what started as a Tarantino-esque fever dream into cold, sad reality.
Compared to season one, Euphoria isn’t as effective giving the main ensemble their own journeys, but Rue’s struggles with addictions and journey to hope continue to be compelling and harnesses Zendaya’s unparalleled skills as a performer whether she’s the center of the story or reacting to art about her character’s life.
Although Sam Levinson wisely bookends “A Thousand Little Trees of Blood” with sequences of Rue (Zendaya) dealing with her withdrawals with the help of her mom Leslie (Nia King), little sister Gia (Storm Reid), and sponsor Ali (Colman Domingo), Euphoriais back to its multiple storyline juggling ways in “A Thousand Little Trees of Blood.” And they range from sick and twisted, yet compelling (Anything Nate Jacobs touches) to too damn sweet (Fezco and Lexi talking about her playing and crying and Stand By Me) and utterly forgettable (Kat and Ethan break up after barely interacting this season). There’s also that crime plot line baked in, and Laurie doesn’t make an appearance, but it definitely seems like Fezco (Angus Cloud) and Ashtray (Javon Walton) could be in trouble from the police or a rival drug operation. This episode feels like a deep breath before a tragedy, and its ending is especially bleak after the slight hope at the end of the whirlwind of “Stand Still Like the Hummingbird”.
Levinson spends most of the opening of “A Thousand Little Trees of Blood” showing Rue struggle with drug withdrawal as there’s bit of time between her returning to rehab. She has less screen time than the previous episode, but Zendaya still gives a strong physical and verbal performance as Rue calls Ali and apologizes for reducing him to his addiction to crack and struggles with his ex-wife and children. It’s interesting to see the difference between the eloquence of Zendaya’s narrator and the sheer emotion of her speech patterns as Rue with her realization that Ali is under no obligation to forgive her. This idea continues in his interactions with Gia, who helps him make dinner, and he gives her attention and advice in contrast with Leslie, who’s trying to keep the family together, and Rue, who is consumed by her addiction. They aren’t chatting away like buddies, but Ali can get through the defenses Gia has built for herself after the trauma of her dad dying and Rue overdosing. Domingo is one of the true “good” people in Euphoria, and the fact that he helps and believes in Rue even after she treated him like shit gives an air of hope to every scene he’s in. That’s why the dark coda to this episode hits so hard because he’s not there when Leslie gets a fateful call from a healthcare provider.
Before diving into the utter drama of the Nate/Cassie/Maddy situation, I want to touch on this episode’s main misfire, and a character arc/relationship that has been scattershot all season. I kid you not, but Kat (Barbie Ferreira) got her boyfriend Ethan (Austin Abrams) to break up with her because she faked having a brain disorder and then jumped down his throat when he feigned skepticism about it after she pivoted from talking about possibly breaking up. It’s dysfunction at its finest, and I feel bad for the waiter, who lost out on the table at the restaurant that they’re meeting at. Honestly, the conversation is a metaphor for how Kat and Ethan have been characterized all season, which is vague and written in broad strokes like the scene about self-love that ended up having nothing to do with the conversations they actually have. Also, I hate to say this, but Kat and Ethan could have been written out of this season, and it would have had no effect on the story although he is involved in Lexi’s (Maude Apatow) play down the road.
Sam Levinson crafts scenes where Nate (Jacob Elordi), Cassie (Sydney Sweeney), and Maddy (Alexa Demie) are apart to really vent their feelings about the situation of Nate and Cassie sleeping together even though Maddy loves Nate and is Cassie’s best friend until going full darkness with a bit of an erotic thriller when he finally decides to act. For the most part, Sweeney is in freak out mode and playing Cassie totally unhinged leading up to a scene where she reunites with Nate and says that she ruined her life to be with him. Her mom Suze (Alanna Ubach) plays off her with pure disdain as she just wants to drink her wine and watch day time TV instead of having her daughter try to justify betraying a friend. There is a look towards of the end of the episode where Suze maybe realizes that she should have been more listening and empathetic towards her daughter and figured out why she was so obsessed with Nate.
Yes, she could have been more like Samantha (Minka Kelly), who Maddy babysits for and opens up to after sharing a couple glasses of wine at her pool. Before they chat, there’s another scene of Maddy trying on Samantha’s clothes and presumably fantasizing about a stable life with nice things as Levinson cuts to a camera on the digital clock in the closet. However, Maddy isn’t punished, but finds a listening ear in Samantha, who slept with one of her friend’s boyfriends in college and never heard from her again. This definitely sets Maddy off, but they end up finding common ground when Samantha shares that people back then thought she was too “messy” to be a mom or married. Characters have said the same thing about Maddy this season, and Nate’s mom Marsha (Paula Marshall) even refers to how she behaved at the carnival last season when Nate choked her. Marsha also mentions that she was glad Nate didn’t get her pregnant because she would have kept the baby out of spite. The chat between Samantha and Maddy shows that she can break the cycle of break up/get back together with Nate and get a fresh start.
However, this is all undercut when “A Thousand Little Trees of Blood” goes full horror, including a creepy static shot of Nate sitting in Maddy’s bedroom with a gun while she changes after her babysitting job. It gets even worse as Sam Levinson goes for intense close-ups, and Nate doesn’t address their relationship or the cheating at all. He just wants the CD of his dad having sex with Jules (Hunter Schafer) so it won’t get out that he’s the son of a pedophile when he takes over his dad’s real estate company. This sequence and another one where Nate gives the disk to Jules shows how free he feels without his dad in the picture, but he’s still “flawed” like his wine-drunk mom Marsha said earlier in the episode. These two scenes show that Nate is beyond redemption even though Jules darkly jokes about him being a good person, and he continues to be manipulative inviting Cassie over to stay with him as she is in the throes of emotion. Jacob Elordi channels real darkness in his portrayal of Nate from his half-bored line delivery to his overpowering physicality as every woman he interacts with this episode from his mom to Jules is afraid he’s going to get violent. It’ll be interesting to see what happens with the CD he gave Jules, especially after an earlier scene in the episode implied that he wanted to wipe all traces of his dad’s pedophilia to not ruin the family business.
A dark cloud of toxic masculinity in the form of Nate Jacobs was over Euphoria this episode, but there was room for sweetness in Lexi and Fezco’s interactions. Cinematographer Marcell Rev even lights up their scenes making it feel like a relaxed mid-afternoon hang instead of an emotional roller coaster with rain and darkness. Fez continues to be interested in Lexi and asks about the premise of her play that he basically deduces is Stand By Me with women so they end up watching the movie, crying, and singing at the end. This time is a nice escape from the conflict between Maddy and Cassie as well as Fezco getting reprisals for Ashtray killing a rival drug dealer in the season premiere either from other drug dealers or the police. It also fits in with Lexi’s character as she uses fiction and fitting her life into narrative to make sense of things, hence, the play.
While continuing to focus on his strong suit as writer/director/creator, namely Rue’s addiction and letting Zendaya’s explore those painful emotions, Sam Levinson also resolves (for now) the Nate/Cassie/Maddy situation while giving each character some time on their own to chat with either their own mothers or mother-type figure about relationships and who they are as people. The support or lack of support they get ends up dictating their actions this episode, and we also see this is in Rue’s story with Leslie fighting to get her in rehab and not just detox as the hour concludes. “A Thousand Little Trees of Blood” didn’t have the momentum of the previous episode, but it felt less bloated than many of the episodes this season that juggle multiple plotlines even if Kat and Ethan’s stories this season have been non-starters.
Euphoriareally bounces back in the middle episode of Season Two. It leans on its two main strengths: a unique visual style from writer/director/creator Sam Levinson and cinematographer Marcell Rev as well as music that brings out the inner lives of characters whether that’s Labrinth’s score (He has a cameo in “You Who Cannot See, Think of Those Who Can“) or the cues chosen by music supervisor Jen Malone. Beginning with a montage of Jules and Rue in various famous paintings (Frida Kahlo’s self-portrait, “Birth of Venus”), photographs (John Lennon and Yoko Ono by Annie Leibovitz), and films (Titanic, Brokeback Mountain), Levinson sets up a basic, yet powerful theme of our own self-reality being different that what people perceive and explores it through different cast members of Euphoria culminating in powerful montage that nails where different characters are in their stories in one image. There are other connections between the storylines like alcohol’s ability to make character’s tell the truth about themselves (Often in a disgusting way) and love triangles, namely, Rue/Jules/Elliot and Nate/Cassie/Maddy.
Sam Levinson spends this episode cutting between three major storylines. There’s Rue, Elliot, and Jules hanging out and failing at platonic relationships and monogamy broken up by a liquor store theft that shows Dominic Fike can do funny and mixed signals. Along with this, there’s Maddy’s birthday party, which means Cassie’s anxiety is on overload as she wants to celebrate her friend and also feels guilty about sleeping with Nate behind her back. Finally, in a sequel to the flashback sequence from last episode, Cal Jacobs dusts off his old jeep and drives to the gay bar where he shared a tender moment with Derek as a teenager and realizes he hates himself, is a hypocrite, a fool, and predator.
The early part of the episode leans heavily on the chemistry between Fike and Hunter Schafer as Jules and Elliot joke about Rue faking an orgasm at the start of the episode and start messing around until Rue sends them a text about being outside. The faked orgasm happens because Rue is so high from the stock of drugs she got in the previous episode (And is definitely not selling), and Levinson contrasts the awkwardness between Rue and Jules with the physical bond between Jules and Elliot. Elliot is definitely being manipulative in this episode, but he has a moment of clarity when he comes clean later in the episode and tells Jules that he has been doing drugs with Rue. For once, he speaks directly instead of hiding behind flirtation or jokes.
Intensified by Rue getting high, “You Who Cannot See, Think of Those Who Can” spends a lot of time showing Rue’s feelings about her dad’s passing and relationship with Jules in dream sequences set up Labrinth’s vocal and scores. As mentioned earlier, Labrinth appears in this episode singing and embracing Rue as she thinks about her father and is actually swaying by herself in her room. This is the slowed down, sadder version of the musical number at the end of Euphoria Season One, and Rue sits in her grief and negative energy. In fact, after Rue drinks alcohol, Zendaya strips the humor from her performance and goes darker and more straightforward. Her actions may have had an influence on Elliot finally telling Jules about his and Rue’s drug use that is how they initially bonded in the season premiere. Labrinth’s fallen angel score and vocals convey Rue’s emotions in this episode better than any dialogue and shows Euphoria is at its best when it shuts the fuck up and lets him, Rev, and Sam Levinson paint with sound and light.
In contrast with these more physical sequences, the party is a little talkier with some flat CW-esque line delivery from Jacob Elordi about where he stands with Cassie and Maddy. However, Alexa Demie gets to channel some of the energy from the carnival episode last season and pick apart Nate’s tone of voice with Kat backing her up and helping her call out some of his toxicity while also wanting to be with him. And, of course, this is happening while a super drunk Cassie is in the hot tub right next to him. After being rejected and snubbed by Nate, Sydney Sweeney nails Cassie’s sad, drunk state as she dances alone to a Sinead O’Connor song and becomes interwined with balloons all leading up to an epic moment of vomit that kills the party and once and for all reveals that something isn’t right with her. Cassie is suffering alone this episode with Lexi turning her story into a play, Maddy and Nate dealing with their relationship status, Kat not being into her underwritten relationship with Ethan, and her mom trying too hard to be Amy Poehler’s character in Mean Girls.
That theme of suffering alone continues to a much less sympathetic character: Cal Jacobs. The veneer of stern patriarch is all but gone in this episode as he returns to the gay bar he frequented with Derek and slow dances with man whose face almost gets superimposed with Derek’s. As O’Connor’s music plays (The same song as Cassie dances to.), Levinson slyly cuts to the other, predominantly younger denizens of the gay bar to show that Cal is in his own little world. Eventually, awkward looks turn into full on melodrama as Cal is unceremoniously kicked out of the bar when he tries to relive his wrestling and then rants to his wife and sons about how he loves to sleep with men and transgender women while urinating in the foyer. Even though both feature nostalgic New Wave music, Cal’s scenes in this episode are the polar opposite of the previous as Eric Dane goes full id and destroys his reputation and persona of town father in a single night. He’s super pathetic and doesn’t respect people’s boundaries and is definitely the worst part of Euphoria, but it’s nice to see Sam Levinson utterly cut him down to size instead of creating sympathy for him.
Lexi’s play auditions and Fezco, Ashtray, and Faye’s movie night seem extraneous and not as connected to the three major storylines, but for the most part, “You Who Cannot See, Think of Those Who Can” lets Levinson, Rev, and Labrinth wallow and play in light, darkness, music, and emotion that is bolstered by strong performances from Zendaya, Hunter Schafer, Sydney Sweeney, and Eric Dane with Sweeney and Dane seasoning their tears with gallows humor. With the aid of alcohol, drug abuse, projectile vomiting, and public urination, this episode rips the Band-Aid of the facade that characters have built for themselves whether that’s a play tent in a snow storm (Rue) or a well-built mansion (Cal Jacobs).
The second episode of EuphoriaSeason 2 begins right where the last one ended with Nate being beaten to bloody pulp by Fezco. This is because in the last season, Nate tipped off the cops on Fezco’s drug business to blackmail Rue and Jules so they wouldn’t bring a DVD of his father/town leader Cal (Eric Dane) having sex with Jules. This plot point gets revisited in the closing moments of the episode, but only after writer/director Sam Levinson threads together an episode looking at the dreams the characters of Euphoria have about relationships and the often dark reality. “Out of Touch” is a dense, yet visual stunning hour of television sprawling across the families and friends of everyone in the main ensemble in contrast with the premiere staying confined to the Fezco flashback and a New Year’s Eve party with a drug dealer pit stop.
After going full gory medical drama, Levinson uses Nate being unconscious to probe his inner thoughts that are bathed in angelic light. This dream sequences shows a softer side of one of the most sociopathic characters on television as he loves, respects, and desires Cassie and wants to build life with her while breaking the cycle of abuse and in the Jacobs family. His dad is an almost comedic figure doing yoga stretches instead of being a menace and interrogating Cassie and Lexi about who attacked Nate at the party and then taking a gun to Fezco’s gas station although he doesn’t start shit because Lexi is there being awkwardly flirtatious around the malt liquor cooler. There is also a darker side of these sequences with images from Cal’s sex tapes, and Nate having sex with his ex (and Cassie’s best friend) Maddy showing up in an image overload. None of Cassie and Nate’s actual interactions are like the dream sequence with a truck ride to some houses under construction ending up being super-terse except when Nate says they can’t see each other again, and they end up having sex on the second floor of an unfinished house in the pitch black. Maddy and her penchant for violence and outburst (As seen in a quick cut montage) is what comes between them, and honestly the Jacobs family has bigger fish to fry thanks to the aforementioned CD.
The other big dream sequence in “Out of Touch” involves a characters that’s the polar opposite of Nate Jacobs: Kat (Barbie Ferreira). She didn’t get much screen time last episode beyond being sweet with her boyfriend Ethan and keeping Jules company, but Sam Levinson returns to her arc of empowerment and escapism from last season. He goes full visual overload with Kat having a vision of a Dothraki warrior from Game of Thrones killing her boyfriend and having rough sex with her, which basically boils down to Ethan being nice so maybe she should let him go. This extends to the real world as he’s darkly lit during their bowling outing while Kat, Jules, and Maddy get Instagram-ready montages of them bonding and having a good time. The other dream sequence involves, I guess, influencer-type women of different shapes and sizes telling Kat to practice self-love while she’s in her bed practicing self-loathing. Euphoria is never subtle, but it’s some heavy-handed messaging about social media’s obsession with ultrapositivity. Levinson is better at digging into his character’s psyches than social commentary so it’s a bit of an unwanted detour even though it does eventually find its way back to the simple, yet effective message of being afraid to be happy for once. (A bathroom chat between Maddy, Kat, and a fellow Euphoria High student gets the point across in a more natural way.)
The other main plot line in this episode of Euphoria is Jules getting jealous about Rue’s new friendship with Elliot, and by extension, her relapse into drug use although she does go to a Narcotics Anonymous meeting and introduce her sponsor Ali (Colman Domingo) to her mother. Zendaya and Dominic Fike have an easy chemistry in the scenes they share and feel at ease in each other’s presence with Sam Levinson’s images and Labrinth’s score showing their connection over music and drugs. And when there’s dialogue, Elliot brings out an honesty in Rue that’s the opposite of how she interacts with Jules and her mother later on in the issue. (Ali is a fellow addict and can see through her bullshit.) Rue ends up opening up about her dad passing away from cancer and finds a kind of comfort in the messiness of life as she and Elliot understand that her drug use didn’t come out of grief, and she would probably still be using even if he was alive. Zendaya brings a haze and awkward energy to her performance this episode that plays off Fike’s insight and straightforwardness, and it doesn’t feel contrived at all that Jules think Rue is romantically interested in Elliot.
In addition to these multiple relationship tension plot lines, “Out of Touch” has so much else going on from Fezco harboring a fugitive Faye (The girl doing heroin last episode) to the beginning of a Lexi empowerment arc and Maddy having her own kind of a fantasy sequence as she tries on her employer’s fancy dresses and outfits. Two episodes, and Euphoria is juggling lots of plotlines and succeeding with most of them. Sam Levinson dips into the manic crime saga energy from the premiere with Faye’s, I guess, G-plot that involves her escaping from a motel through a ventilation shaft into a dumpster by a Taco Bell. She’s an awkward presence, especially when she interacts with Lexi and Cal and exists more to show shit could hit the fan with Fezco at any time. Angus Cloud definitely plays him in a more harried and terse way even though there are still sparks between him and Lexi, and he treats Faye kindly although she’s really a pain in the ass.
“Out of Touch” doesn’t get as good as its radiant opening sequence where Nate imagines a happier and more conventional alternate future for himself that doesn’t involve lies, threats, and blackmail, but Sam Levinson does a good job of checking in with characters like Kat, who didn’t do much in the premiere, and Elliot, who has amazing chemistry with Rue. Plus Cal Jacobs reminds everyone that he’s the true antagonist of this show thanks to a menacing performance from Eric Dane with just the right touch of paternality. The sequence with him in the gas station is a great little mini-thriller and shows that Euphoria can be suspenseful and not just visually beautiful and have great musical choices.
After over two years off and a couple special episodes to tide viewers, Euphoriais back for second season and doesn’t waste any time getting back in full swing. Writer/director Sam Levinson uses “Trying to Get to Heaven Before They Close the Door” to check in with all the main cast members from season while also telling the origin story of Fez (Angus Cloud), East Highland’s drug dealer with a heart of gold.
The episode kicks off with a potent opening sequence shot on gorgeous, grainy film stock by cinematographer Marcell Rev and introduces us to Fez’ grandmother (A scene-stealing Kathrine Narducci), who is truly a “motherfucking G” as Zendaya’s voice-over puts it. Levinson does tracking shots through the bowels of a strip club before stopping on a dime as Fez’s grandmother puts two in the legs of his father while he’s getting oral sex from one of the strippers. (This is the first of several scenes with male full frontal nudity.) Then, she goes back to the car where young Fez, who has a black eye from his dad’s abuse, is waiting and drives him home launching into full flashbacks of how he became partners with her. This is in addition to being Ashtray’s (Javon Walton) brother and guardian after his mother abandons him.
This flashback reinforces Fez’s strong bond with those he considers to be his family, including Euphoria‘s protagonist Rue (Zendaya) and that him being willing to kill for them isn’t just an exaggeration. The opening scene establishes a cycle of violence that Fez is caught up in and can’t escape by chilling on the couch and chatting with Lexi (Maude Apatow) about the origins of Christmas and the ethics of drug dealing. Fez’s world is full of tension, and he’s 100% aware of that like when he chides Rue for joking around after a drug buy where Fez, Ashtray, and her have to strip down because their supplier is paranoid that they’re wearing wires. Zendaya’s facial expressions when a burly drug dealer named Bruce tells her to strip down are pure trauma and going from that charged environment to a New Year’s Eve party takes a toll on both her and Fez, who doesn’t leave the couch until the end of the episode.
The New Year Eve’s party with its unbridled, hazy atmosphere of drugs, sex, booze, and wash cloths covered in shit is a great device from Sam Levinson to take the temperature of the main characters of Euphoria and also play with some different pairings of characters. Until the Labrinth/lens flare/ring light finale of the episode, Rue actively is avoiding Jules (Hunter Schafer) so she spends a lot of the episode dancing and having a good time with Kat (Barbie Ferreira). Kat and Jules bonded pretty early in Season One, but Jules’ relationship with Rue took center stage and made her world “smaller”. It’s nice to see her circulating around the party even as she keeps an eye out for Nate (Jacob Elordi), who manipulated and blackmailed her last season. As mentioned earlier, Lexi and Fez bond, and his upbeat attitude and the fact that he’s generally impressed with helps her enjoy the party while she tries to figure out where her sister Cassie (Sydney Sweeney) went. It’s a real opposites attract situation, and you can tell in Apatow’s eyes that Lexi is happy to spend time with someone who genuinely cares about what she has to say instead of trying to get something from her. Lexi and Fez were both underrated characters in Euphoria Season 1, and it’s nice to see them get the spotlight off the bat.
The third pairing is the darkest and saddest, Nate and Cassie. Before viewers even get time to settle into the party, Sam Levinson whips over to Cassie buying powdered donuts at a gas station and generally wallowing. Of course, she runs into Nate and his big truck, who offers her a ride to the party. Nate’s recklessness and objectification of women is on full display on the ride up as he drinks beer and hits triple digits on the speedometer. Sweeney hits a great range of emotions on the ride up from total fear to elation as she sticks her head out of the window while Orville Peck plays on the stereo. Cassie is struggling with her self-perception, and if she wants to be in relationships or just keep it casual. She’s not in a good place, and Nate takes advantage of this in a messy bathroom hookup that is one of the main sources of tension in the episode as Cassie hides in a bath tub while Nate’s star-crossed ex Maddy (Alexa Demie) uses the facilities and roasts a former classmate, Travis for trying to fit on her. Cassie’s ex McKay (Algee Smith), who isn’t that bad of a guy, tries to have a conversation about possibly getting back together, but she can barely speak after the utter humiliation of hiding in the tub, betraying her best friend Maddy, and being present for yet another instance of male full frontal nudity.
Humiliation and disgust along with the little bits of violence are recurring motifs in “Trying to Get to Heaven Before They Close the Door” with Rue mixing heroin and cocaine and almost overdosing on her new buddy Elliot (Dominic Fike) only saved by her knowledge of drugs’ effects and bringing her pulse back to normal with Adderall. There’s a warm, smoky vibe around Rue and Elliott, and it’s fitting they end up smoking weed by a camp fire, which is where Jules finally finds her. Levinson and Rev pull out all the stops for a big romantic reunion while using light and dark to show there’s still tension, especially between Nate and Fez. This whole episode is full of shots of different characters keeping tabs on each other keeping an uneasy stalemate until it all boils over in a moment of violence in the final moments as Fez’s world collides with the world of the party.
“Trying to Get to Heaven Before They Close the Door” sets the tone for what is likely to be a very dark season of Euphoria with Fez unleashing a killer instinct that’s usually hidden behind jokes and keen insight. Kathrine Narducci’s grandmother barely appears in this episode, but we see the impact her presence had on Fez with repeated dialogue and actions in the present day. Also, Sam Levinson and Marcell Rev have successfully changed Euphoria’s visual look to better reflect its broken and on-edge characters while the music is more oldies and nostalgic needle drops than the latest hotness as almost stand-in’s for the missing parents or homages to folks like Fez’s grandma or his new drug source, a soft-spoken former teacher named Laurie. Euphoria Season 2, Episode 1 is confident, depraved, and not afraid to get its hands dirty with an incident towards the end of the episode that has me anticipating the fallout next week and for the rest of the season.
