Welcome back to The High Low!

It has been a minute! And this special ✨ Monday edition ✨ is different from past issues. Euphoria had its finale last night and I had big feelings that I need to share. Thank you for indulging me.

✨Read to the end for an impressive heel collection shown off by a person who can’t wear heels.

It was a big week for two series finales on HBO/Max. One ended beautifully and the other is Euphoria.

Hacks completed its fifth and final season. It wasted no time to unveil Deborah’s cancer diagnosis and her rejection of treatment. Instead, she wants to take a trip to Paris with Ava. The whole episode is a celebration of their special bond with the dread of Deborah’s death (via assisted suicide in Switzerland at the end of their trip) looming over them. Spoiler alert: Deborah decides to live and returns to Las Vegas to work on one more standup show with Ava.

Euphoria also had its third and final season. (It was originally listed as the show’s “season finale” which makes it confusing, but HBO has since confirmed it’s the end.) Honestly, the series ended with season two in my mind. Actually, let’s back up a bit and do a little review of season 3…

Seasons 1 and 2 of Euphoria were, as the kids used to say, chef’s kiss. The show established a style that was all its own, due in large part to the makeup, lighting, and music. All three of these were completely changed in season 3. I don’t know the tea behind the show-altering decisions — including the omission of the ambience achieved through Labrinth’s iconic music — but they have all hindered the legacy of the series.

Since season 3 began, there has been loud and fiery discourse online about how bad it is now. How creator Sam Levinson has ruined Euphoria. My take was that it’s not so much “bad” as it is a completely different show — one that isn’t as good, one could certainly argue. Season 3 has felt less like Euphoria and more like Levinson wanting to do an epic mobster/western tale. It felt Tarantino-esque with all the fetishizing shots of female bodies (cis and trans). It lobotomized Nate and introduced a new big bad named Alamo.

Personally, I think Alamo is an interesting enough character, as is Bishop, but given they had only 8 episodes to wrap everything up this season, it felt rushed to have to introduce new people. It also led to disregarding main characters like Jules. She was reduced to being a sugar baby who is also an artist who suddenly seems to know nothing about art history. She was an after thought the whole season, the few times she ever even appeared in an episode.

As for Nate and his docile, defeated demeanor and wild demise, I actually didn’t mind any of it that much. It felt the most honest for the sadistic golden boy to suddenly be basic and rightfully humbled by life after high school. I mean, being buried alive and ultimately unalived by a rattlesnake isn’t the epitome of realism, but it was dramatic TV that felt somewhat karmic. It’s too bad he was taken out when he was at his least aggressive, but… eh!

Of course, Nate wasn’t the only death this season. There were quite a few in the final episode, but there’s one in particular that has rightfully warranted major upset — Rue. This was something that was theorized from the very beginning. As a character afflicted with addiction issues, it’s very much within the realm of reality for Rue to die of an overdose. In fact, this was the feared fate felt in every episode of the first two seasons. Audiences watched with anxiety, rooting for Rue to overcome her addiction just one more day. In season 3, however, there was anxiety surrounding her death at the hand of others. And ultimately that is what took her life.

Levinson has said that he wanted to tell a real story of addiction. The problem with this reasoning for her death is that, as a viewer, it doesn’t look like Rue died because of her addiction. Yes, she took the Percocet laced with fentanyl, but it was murder. This was an intentional hit from Alamo. Also, it didn’t feel like any of the other times she used in the first two seasons. She was literally lassoed and dragged down a road in this episode. Her use of the pill seemed less like drug abuse and more like an actual painkiller. Of course there’s a fine line and in real life there is no simple feel-good pill without consequences for addicts and fentanyl doesn’t only target people with addiction, but the context matters for the message that Levinson claims to be trying to convey. As a storyteller, this particular message is muddy and does a complete disservice to the show, the character, and the intended message.

Needless to say, Rue’s death was horrible. It would have been more poignant if it wasn’t a murder by a strip club drug lord and instead just Rue spiraling from basic life stuff and turning to an immediate dopamine fix. That would’ve been a gut punch but it’d be the realistic ending with a powerful message about addiction that Levinson sought to create. Instead, I’m left looking back at the whole season and rethinking my initial assessment of “it’s not terrible, it’s just not Euphoria.” I’m wondering if it not being Euphoria is, in fact, what makes it terrible in the end.

For my peace of mind, I’ve decided season 3 isn’t canon. To me, it was just a fever dream. A bad, bad fever dream. Rue is still alive and in high school. Her future is yet to be determined. Ideally, it is one of redemption and joy.

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✨ Thank you for reading to the end. As promised, here is an impressive heel collection shown off by a person who can’t wear heels.

See you next time! 🖤🩷