Every Episode Of "Euphoria," Ranked

Alternate title: "The One Where Jules Goes To the Big City"

What happens: Cassie's flashback. Rue falls into a depression because of Jules. Rue asks Fez to intimidate Nate. Nate calls the police on Fez. McKay suggests Cassie get an abortion. Jules visits an out-of-town friend.

Thoughts: Euphoria can traffic in some pretty depressing material, but this penultimate episode from the first season is really giving us nothing but misery. Cassie is contemplating an abortion, Fez has to flush his whole stash down the toilet during the police raid, and we can't forget this was the episode that spent a half hour detailing Rue's travails to pee. While Cassie is an MVP of the show and her ice skating scene at the end is beautiful, we do have to endure Jules traveling to see a whole new cast of characters who have yet to reappear. All in all, this is mostly a set-up episode for the Season 1 finale without many iconic moments or levity.

Alternate title: "The One Where It's Halloween"

What happens: McKay's flashback. Nate is suspended from school and forces Tyler to take the blame. Cassie attends a fraternity party with McKay. Jules gets super drunk at a Halloween party. Kat hooks up with Ethan. Cassie realizes she's pregnant.

Thoughts: Remember McKay? How he had a whole episode dedicated to his floundering football career and frat initiation only to be scrubbed from the second season almost entirely? So much of this episode seems irrelevant now, and the rest is unadulterated misery as we watch Nate blackmail Jules and Tyler into taking the fall for choking Maddy. While the Halloween costumes are incredible, this party provides fewer great moments than other Euphoria bangers. Plus, the plot line about Jules getting plastered here isn't explained until her special episode, which seems like a miscalculation.

Alternate title: "The One Where Nate Gets the DVD Back"

What happens: Rue wants to get better. Kat and Ethan break up. Cassie's mom hides the knives. Nate threatens Maddy with a gun to give him the disc. Nate gives the disc to Jules.

Thoughts: The definition of a piece-moving episode, this is another late-in-the-season finale setup piece. Nothing much of consequence happens although everyone seems in a lot of anguish hoping something will change for them. Cassie and Lexi's mom emerges as a real MVP here ("Lexi hide the knives in the bushes"), but otherwise there is little forward momentum.

Alternate title: "The One Where Kat Is Told To Love Herself"

What happens: Nate is taken to the hospital. Cassie keeps hooking up with Nate. Kat is accosted by social media influencers. Cal has a face-off with Fez while Lexi looks on. Cal asks Nate where the sextape is.

Thoughts: This episode is primarily the come-down from the explosive Season 2 premiere, but it's got some good moments scattered throughout. Maddie and Cassie running alongside Nate's hospital gurney in their heals. Lexi awkwardly flirting with Fez at the convenience store. Pregnant dream Cassie. We also get this season's only good Kat scene in this episode, when she goes from a Khal Drogo sex dream to being bullied by a group of social media personalities into loving herself. But that scene (which has not been touched on again since) is not enough to boost it up the rankings.

Alternate title: "The One Where Everyone Is Sexting"

What happens: Nate's flashback. Nate breaks into Tyler's house and beats him up. Kat's sex video leaks and she becomes a camgirl. Jules and Nate start texting. McKay accuses Cassie of being too sexual. Rue takes fentanyl.

Thoughts: I hate Nate. You hate Nate. We all hate Nate. And that makes it very difficult to love the Nate-centered episode in Season 1, where we learn why he's such an asshole. Plus whatever sympathy we do have for him is squandered as we watch him assault an innocent man for "raping" Maddy and then proceed to catfish Jules. This episode has a bit more going on than other connector episodes (the fentanyl scene is tense and Kat's revelation that people are into her is exciting), but it's still a lull between the compelling premiere and juicier mid-season highs.

Alternate title: "The One Where Police Come To School"

What happens: Maddy's flashback. Rue is dating Jules. Maddy's mom presses charges on Nate for choking her. Cassie reconciles with McKay. Rue apologizes to Lexi and they rollerskate with Jules.

Thoughts: The Maddy episode from Season 1 gives us a LOT of Maddy between her flashback and the extended sequence where the police are brought in to investigate the bruising on her neck. Every Maddy moment is a gift and Alexa Demie steals the show in this episode. We also get Kat coming into her sexuality more and #Rules continuing to blossom. All in all, a very solid episode even if it doesn't reach the high highs of the episodes to come on this list.

Alternate title: "The One Where Cassie Pukes in the Pool"

What happens: Jules and Elliot kiss. Cassie cuts things off with Nate. Cassie throws up in a hot tub. Cal pees on the floor and comes out to his family. Elliot tells Jules that Rue has been doing drugs.

Thoughts: The first two thirds of this episode really putter along on cruise control as we endure extended driving sequences of Cal, the dull Kat/Ethan drama, and the Rue/Jules/Elliot love triangle which is far-and-away the most convoluted, unrealistic, and just plain boring plot the show has served to us. But just when I thought all hope was lost, we get two incredible sequences back-to-back. First, the Cassie hot tub sequence which is magnificently disgusting and instantly iconic. And then, the Cal-pissing-in-the-foyer-while-telling-his-family-they-are-terrible grand finale. Those two moments of classic, unbridled Euphoria mayhem alone dragged this episode up the ranking.

Alternate title: "The One Where Kat Drinks Piña Coladas"

What happens: Kat's flashback. Kat makes money camgirling. Jules tells Rue to sober up. Maddy finds dick pics on Nate's phone. Rue kisses Jules, tries to get drugs, and then calls Ali for help.

Thoughts: The Kat flashback is arguably the best of Season 1, and to watch her slug down those drinks on vacation (I'm still waiting for my editors to green light my "I Drank 72 Virgin Piña Coladas in a Week And This Is What Happened To Me" piece.) and then turn into a fanfiction icon is delightful. Plus, in the present timeline, we get the new outfit reveal and her entrance into the world of camgirling. Elsewhere, we've got Maddy coming to the shocking realization that Nate might be gay and the beautiful, startling, tender moment where Rue kisses Jules for the first time. This episode is a fizzy, dishy burst of wonder, and the fact that it doesn't even crack the top 10 is a testament to just how good Euphoria can be.

Alternate title: "The One with Lexi's Play"

What happens: Lexi's play is performed. Fezco promises to come to the play but never shows up. Nate angrily leaves the play which is calling him gay.

Thoughts: "Wait, is this fucking play about us?" Yes. Yes, it is Maddy, and honestly it is a ridiculously bad piece of writing. Like with High School Musical 3's senior musical, literally no one is going to understand what this play is about. And between the play itself, the play with the inspiration characters standing in, and then scenes separate from the play with the same characters, this episode was very hard to follow. Was Nate's molestation dream a part of the play? Is the play supposed to be completely true or is it fictionalized? How did Lexi manage to cast 40 ripped jocks to perform a locker-room orgy scene? Did the school approve it? Did she get the musical rights cleared to use "Holding Out for a Hero"? SO MANY QUESTIONS. For as baffling as it was, the final dance number and the sheer audacity for this show to earnestly give us the "I'm writing a play about us" storyline is immaculate. This episode was a fever dream, but I loved every second of it.

Alternate title: "The One Where Cassie Attempts to Overthrow the School Play"

What happens: Cassie storms the stage of Lexi's play. Ash has a shootout with the police. Nate calls the cops on Cal. Elliot plays Rue a song on his guitar. Rue reconnects with Lexi and doesn't say "I love you" back to Jules.

Thoughts: Ugh. The award for the most depressing episode of Euphoria certainly goes to this Season 2 finale. Everything with Ash/Fez has taken a decade off of my life. My roommate was so nervous, she stood in the kitchen while I narrated every excruciating second of that sequence which seemed to last 50 years. While the episode wrapped up certain plot points (goodbye Cal, Nate's-girlfriend-bowl), it also seemed to spend a lot of time on largely irrelevant plots while leaving huge questions from the season unanswered. Is Rue still on the hook for thousands of dollars to a potential human trafficker? Unclear, but we did get a full, unabridged guitar number from Elliot. How is Jules digesting everything that happened this season. No clue, but Lexi's tech crew got some great one-liners. The finale had some gut-wrenching, poignant moments, but felt a bit uneven and messy, especially compared to how tight other episodes in the past have been.

Alternate title: "The One Where Jules Sees A Shrink"

What happens: Jules attends a therapy session. She talks about her mother's addiction, her relationship with Rue, transitioning, detransitioning, Nate's catfishing, and why she got so drunk on Halloween.

Thoughts: Ranking the special episodes is quite hard, because on one hand they are a beautiful feat of writing and acting. Both are essentially just hour long conversations delving into the residual psychological trauma of the first season. Jules's episode reveals a lot about her backstory and how her relationship with her addict mother is impacting her relationship with Rue. While it's an exquisite, self-contained pearl of an episode, I think there's a ceiling as to just how good it can be without the strength of the full Euphoria cast to bolster it. The show is at its best when the whole gang is together, and in this episode, it's just Jules from the main cast as her conversation is with a therapist we hadn't seen before or since.

Alternate title: "The One Where Rue Goes to a Diner on Christmas Eve"

What happens: Rue meets up with Ali at a diner. They discuss sobriety, addiction, her relationship with Jules, suicide, her father's death, and his faith that she can get better.

Thoughts: As with Jules's episode, there is no denying how gut-wrenching and perfect these moments and performances are. Zendaya and Colman Domingo are giving award-worthy monologues here, and despite the whole episode being a single conversation in a diner booth, I was captivated the whole time. While the Jules episode has more plot, it lacks the extra oomph that Domingo's Ali provides here as he spars with Rue. I'd honestly love to see a special episode like this for all the characters at some point. Imagine a full hour of Maddy at a diner?!?!?!

Alternate title: "The One Where McKay Throws a Party"

What happens: Rue's flashback. Rue returns from rehab. Jules hooks up with Cal. Kat loses her virginity. Maddy flirts to make Nate jealous. Jules cuts herself with a knife and meets Rue.

Thoughts: Euphoria came out of the gate HOT, and everything there is to love about the show is front and center in the pilot. The characters arrive fully formed up to their armpits in shenanigans. Rue's getting pee from Lexi. Maddy and Nate are feuding. Jules, Kat, and Cassie are all hooking up with toxic men. Not to mention we get the first meeting of Jules and Rue and the start of their love story. The party episodes of Euphoria are always the best, and this one starts of the show with a banger. Plus the reveal that the man hooking up with Jules is actually Cal?!?! Such a great way to end a premiere.

Alternate title: "The One Where Rue Has Musical Hallucinations After Winter Formal"

What happens: Rue recovers from a kidney infection. Maddy steals the DVD from Nate. Nate and Cal wrestle. Cassie gets an abortion. Kat and Ethan make amends at winter formal. Maddy and Nate try to make each other jealous. Rue and Jules decide to get on a train but Rue stays behind and does drugs.

Thoughts: For as strong as the first season of Euphoria starts, it ends even stronger. We're back to another party (a school-sanctioned winter formal), and the whole cast is scuttling around the dance floor airing their petty grievances. Maddy and Nate are in a dance battle. Jules and Rue are declaring their love for one another while Kat and Ethan finally get on the same page. Mix in the heartbreaking scene of Cassie getting an abortion, and Jules's decision to leave Rue at the train station, and you've got a tragicomedy Shakespeare wishes he could have concocted. The whole season then concludes with Rue's relapse, depicted as a musical maelstrom where she's carried down the street by a company of burgundy dancers. Euphoria loves an experimental sequence and this one intertwined the beauty, horror, and frenzy of her using perfectly.

Alternate title: "The One Where Cassie Has Never Ever Been Happier"

What happens: Cal's flashback. Rue tells everyone she's just smoking weed. Laurie gives Rue a larger stash of drugs. Cassie becomes obsessed with Nate. Everyone is confused about Oklahoma. Lexi decides to write a play. Ashtray beats up Cal. Nate decides to get back together with Maddy.

Thoughts: This random, middle-of-the-season connector episode had NO REASON being as good as it is. But somehow the series managed to work three of its most perfect sequences into one episode. First, we have the heartbreaking opening sequence about young Cal falling in love with his best friend on the wrestling team, but getting sideswiped by his girlfriend's pregnancy. Not since Up, has there been such a debilitating romantic opening. Second, we have the exchange between Cal, Ashtray, Faye, and Fez regarding "Jewel" when Cal breaks into Fez's house and gets his ass whooped handily. And lastly we have the "Is Cassie auditioning for Oklahoma" bathroom scene, which is possibly my favorite scene of the whole series. The writing of every character crescendoing to Cassie's rant. I HAVE NEVER EVER BEEN HAPPIER than I was watching that scene. Add in the fact that Rue gets the stash from Laurie, we first learn about Lexi's play, and we get the Cassie-dressed-as-Maddy sequence in this episode! It's less cohesive than the top three but every disassociated moment is perfect here.

Alternate title: "The One Where Rue Runs 500 Miles"

What happens: Rue's mom destroys her drug stash. Rue doesn't want to go to rehab. Rue tells Maddy that Cassie is dating Nate. Laurie gives Rue morphine and might be involved with human trafficking. Rue escapes and runs home.

Thoughts: While "Ruminations: Big and Little Bullys" is a collection of a thousand tiny moments interwoven together, this episode is one giant moment stretched out to fill a whole episode. And, though episodes have focused more-or-less on a character before, this Season 2 masterpiece is the Rue Show. Zendaya acts her ass off front to back as she begins the episode with a blistering fight with her mother before spiraling into a prolonged chase sequence and eventually falling into the clutches of a potentially evil drug dealer. While the rest of the cast take a back seat to Zendaya here, the sheer force of her performance and the breadth of what she's asked to accomplish sucks the wind out of you.

Alternate title: "The One Where Nate Gets a Bottle to the Face"

What happens: Fezco's flashback. Ashtray kills Mouse with a hammer. Cassie and Nate have sex in the bathroom of a New Year's Eve party. Maddy bangs on the door. Rue takes drugs from Elliot. Rue and Jules get back together. Fezco and Lexi chat before he beats Nate.

Thoughts: But as I said before, I like my Euphoria best when the whole ensemble is shining. As with Season 1, Season 2 begins with the entire cast converging on a New Year's Eve house party, and the whole event is pure chaos. You've got Cassie and Nate hooking up while Maddy is on the other side of the door (accompanied by the iconic Cassie-in-the-tub and Maddy-pounding-on-the-door images). Fez and Lexi begin the start of their flirtmance. Rue and Jules exchange an awkward encounter post-train abandonment, and then there's the cathartic ending we've been waiting for with Nate getting a bottle to the face. So much happens in this episode, it sets up the second season spectacularly, and even McKay is around!

Alternate title: "The One At the Carnival"

What happens: Jules's flashback. Maddy spills the chili. McKay doesn't call Cassie his girlfriend. Kat gets mad at Ethan and has sex with an older boy. Nate grabs Maddy by the throat. Rue looks for her sister. Jules meets up with Nate who threatens her.

Thoughts: The best episode of Euphoria is the carnival episode from Season 1. As with others on the list, it's a whole-cast-at-a-party episode with every character bringing their hottest, most confident, bad bitch version of themselves to the fairgrounds. Maddy and Cassie link up to cause havoc for Nate. Jules scares Cal half to death with Rue by her side. Kat puts the moves on an older crush. Plus we get horny Cassie on that carousel, Gia smoking weed, and Maddy's ridiculous chili cook-off outfit. This episode also happens to be the Jules flashback episode, and with her as the central character for much of Season 1, this episode reveals so much about her and her motives. The horror she feels when she realizes that Nate has been catfishing her at the end of the episode is palpable, and her return to Rue is somehow both everything we hoped for and incredibly depressing.

Me watching to this episode: "Bitch you're my soulmate."