My Review of "Euphoria: Season One"

Euphoria: Season One was released back in 2019 and I heard a lot of good things about this show. The problem was that it sounded like a brooding high school drama that wouldn't interest me. Still the hype continued to escalate and I couldn't help but finally check this show out.

The story starts off with a narration from the main character Rue. She's a drug addict that has recently cleaned herself up. Unfortunately the rest of the school knows however they seem to be pretty cool about it. With Rue's narration she introduces us to all of the main characters of the show.

We have a new trans girl that had recently moved to the small town named Jules. She's somewhat of a directionless free spirit. Also everyone seems to be attracted to her on the show. Maybe it's her carefree attitude everyone gets attached to.

Then we have our main antagonist Nate. This guy is your stereotypical high school quarterback alpha male. They make him into a very interesting character as he helps us understand privilege in the social hierarchy of the town and in school. He does some pretty crazy stuff in this season that you kind of have to throw your mind out the window to enjoy.

There are also a slew of other minor characters that have some good screen time to allow us to understand who they are. These characters have small side stories throughout the show that still have a cascading affect to our main characters of the show. Some of these side stories are pretty compelling. They make you want to know more about them even though their stories are more side stories than the main story.

I love how they how they play with action and reactions to this show. Everyone is affected by everyone in this show. One small action will have a domino effect with the rest of the characters of the show. Not only are they affected in an obvious way but their mental issues are affected as well. So we have to consider mental circumstances as well as exterior when things happen.

This show is also incredibly tense. They were able to play around with tension throughout the show. Everyone of these characters are tightly wound and are able to explode at any time. As high school kids they are extremely emotional at every situation. They're all pretty much ticking time bombs. As the audience this is incredibly disturbing because they did such a great job in making us like all of the characters. Yes even the Nate has some sympathy from me even though he's a scumbag.

All of the characters are fleshed out with Rue explaining their backstory. We learn that they're the way they are because of their upbringing. None of them are inherently evil. They were brought up this way out of chance and because of this we see who they are. With that we see a glimmer of innocence in each one of the characters. We know their intent even though sometimes their actions are pretty messed up.

It's been a long time since I've ever seen a young adult show this complicated. They're willing to go the extra mile to include as many current issues we have to talk to the youth of today. Although it's hard to know what the appropriate age for viewing this show. There is a lot of full frontal nudity which include a lot of male nether regions if you know what I mean.

Still I think this is a great program for youth to watch to bring out more difficult conversations. A lot of the kids in this show don't really have outlets to talk about their issues so they suffer alone. I hope that this show will be able to alleviate some of those frustrations with our youth today. Maybe it'll bring up more conversations and help the world be a better place.

I was all in after the first episode and was at the edge of my seat until the climax at the 3rd last episode. The last two episodes were actually great because they dive a little deeper into Rue and Jules' characters. They did this in an interesting manner that talked about the characters and the overarching themes of the whole season.

You also have to add the art direction of the show. This show oozes style and very unique. Music is also a critical part of the show as well. They even name some of the episodes after famous songs of the 90s. It's very cool and I now understand why everyone is going on and on about this show.

Overall, I really loved it and can't wait to pick up the second season. I really hope that the writing continues to be as stellar as this first season. This has broken all my reservations on brooding teen shows. I have to give this season a 9 out of 10. They hit it out of the park with this season.