On Sunday, Euphoria concluded its second season in predictably disappointing and messy fashion. Cal Jacobs makes another appearance despite his storyline being wrapped up twice already. Cassie flies off the handle. Kat is mute. Rue is magically clean and apparently off the hook for the $10,000 she owed Laurie. Elliot plays the guitar.
This season finale is a thoroughly choppy and disjointed attempt to find a cohesive narrative in all of season 2’s madness. For the most part, it seems to land on the fact that Rue is still grieving her father, as we cut to the same flashback we’ve seen throughout the season where she reads a eulogy at his funeral while wearing his hoodie. We’re reminded that Lexi is grieving her estranged father as well. However, the whole grief narrative, in both characters’ cases, feels like a useful explanation for convenience’s sake as opposed to an emotional experience that creator Sam Levinson is genuinely interested in exploring. Hence, despite the hour beginning with a literal bang, both Rue and Lexi’s character arcs go out with a fizzle.
“All My Life, My Heart Has Yearned for A Thing I Cannot Name” (a quote by French poet André Breton) begins where last week’s episode left off. Fez is about to attend Lexi’s play when Custer tries to coerce him into fessing up to Mouse’s murder. Last week, it seemed like Faye was helping her boyfriend. But to our pleasant surprise, she’s quite the loyal comrade to her roommates, instructing Fez not to respond to Custer and even lying for him. However, her attempts to save the day are thwarted when Ashtray stabs Custer in the neck because it’s the only thing he apparently knows how to do. From that moment, the duo’s fate becomes rather easy to predict.
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Meanwhile, a furious Cassie decides to ruin Lexi’s play by going on stage and ripping into her for being a dweeb. She calls Lexi a “bystander” who “hasn’t lived” and attacks her doppleganger when she comes out to reenact Cassie’s infamously humping a carousel horse. Cassie and Maddy call each other C-words. Suze tries to intervene because school faculty apparently do not exist. Lexi can hardly defend herself and starts to cry. It’s funny how this portion of the episode becomes pure slapstick, all the while Fez and Ashtray are basically in Zero Dark Thirty.
In the audience, Rue glances back at Elliot, who doesn’t seem like the type to show up to any school function. But we find out pretty randomly that he’s a fan of the arts when he plays the guitar and sings a song for Rue after she shows up at his house to make amends.
Elliot has probably been the season’s most controversial figure, considering the wedge he drove between Rue and Jules and the fact that his presence doesn’t seem that important. The fact that he ends this season crooning a four-minute-long song maybe proves that Levinson doesn’t know what he’s doing in Euphoria either but finds Dominic Fike intriguing. Regardless, he’s a talented vocalist. So there’s that.
Back at Fez’s home, Fez begrudgingly decides to take the blame for Custer’s murder and orders Ashtray to surrender to the cops waiting outside. But Ashtray decides to grab a bunch of guns and hide out in the bathroom. This results in a long, dramatic shootout that’s actually quite impressive in how jarring and nerve-wracking it is to experience. At the same time, it’s strange that the most heart-wrenching portion of this episode is centered around Ashtray, considering that we’ve never been asked to consider or care about who he is beyond a stoic mercenary.
Ashtray accidently shoots Fez from inside the bathroom, and Ashtray gets shot in the head by a SWAT team member. Shockingly, Levinson spares us from seeing a child get murdered, but it’s still a gut-punch when we hear the gunshot.
During the shootout, we cut to Nate drinking, driving, and loading a pistol. He goes to a warehouse where his father is hanging out with his new, hip friends and listening to Kylie Minogue. There’s truly nothing for Nate and Cal to hash out at this point. We understand that Cal has left this permanent wound on Nate, and we’ve watched him experience every symptom of PTSD at this point. However, Levinson seems to understand that he let Cal off the hook a little too easily a few episodes ago and that he should probably be arrested for his sex crimes. Likewise, Nate threatens Cal with a gun but ultimately hands him over to the police. This entire scene felt like an errand that could’ve been handled three episodes ago.
The rest of “All My Life, My Heart Has Yearned for A Thing I Cannot Name” jumps between Rue on her sober apology tour and Lexi’s play, which continues successfully despite Cassie’s interruption. The last scene is of Rue exiting the play and walking through the school hallways alone while she tells us that she remained sober for the rest of the school year and is trying to be a better person.
This narrated scene felt like the end of a high school movie after a character graduates and tells us about what they learned. Unfortunately, this ending doesn’t really feel suitable for a television finale, which usually gives us cliffhangers and things to look forward to. As frustrating as it might be that such an initially compelling season sputtered to this dull conclusion, Levinson has made viewers’ decision to tune in next season a lot easier.
For more, listen to Euphoria’s Martha Kelly on The Last Laugh podcast.
