OK, I hate to say it - this episode did kind of eat | I'm watching Euphoria, so you don't have to. (Episode 2 Review)

So, last week we learned Rue is a drug mule for that lady she owes money to, but she is also considering a career with this other pimp because Lesbian. We learnt that Cassie is trying to be happily married to Nate, but first needs $50,000 worth of flowers for the wedding, so she is turning to OnlyFans. Maddie now works for a talent agency and seems to be living the Hollywood life that she really didn't want. Cassie, of course, is eagle-eyed and watching, and her sister, Lexi, is working on a network TV show. All of this is interlaced with a bunch of random jabs at liberals and maybe now and again a jab towards conservatives. We've seen nothing of Hunter Schafer's Jules.

In this episode, we realise Maddie was trying to get rich by being an OnlyFans manager, but was forbidden from doing so because of her regular job intersecting and causing reputational issues for the actor her boss is managing. So, more OnlyFans. Now, Cassie wants to get in touch - and is not ready for what she'll find. Maddie has far eclipsed her. Rue finds another girl to sleep with, but it looks like she may be the ex-girlfriend of the girl whom Rue has been assigned to clean up the death of. Luckily, this doesn't quite blow up in Rue's face the way I thought. Rue gets to see what it's like to be on the other side of an intervention.

The only person who seems to have gotten out of Euphoria's high school scot-free and living her best life is indeed Jules. I fear there's gonna be some OnlyFans element here too, because Levinson simply cannot help himself. Oh yeah, I remember now - she's an escort! So basically, everybody in Euphoria is doing some form of sex work. Groundbreaking.

It seems finally Levinson has got to some sort of thesis about what Euphoria was meant to mean, and it has something to do with California and evil - something about the state bringing the worst out of everybody. His Cassie theory also seems to spiral into some sort of commentary on women with absolutely no floor to their self-esteem. I'm not sure if the messenger is the right one – I really don't want to hear about women's self-esteem from Sam Levinson – but I don't think that what he's saying is incorrect here.

The element of this episode I enjoyed the most was the sense that Maddie, in her full dignity, was now the girl who had made it good out of high school. Cassie, the girl who thought that she had won, was now at the mercy of Maddie's superior intellect and resources, and Maddie could finally have her revenge.

"My Maddie" from Nate did boil my blood, though.

One final comment before we conclude - someone did mention online that Rue was being played so well by Zendaya that it completely doesn't cross their mind she's very much happily married to a man in real life. Zendaya really does know the ins and outs of Rue, specifically her relationship to women, which is very dialed in. If that is truly just acting, and not any lived experience, it does place Zendaya as potentially one of the best actors of her generation.