The Watch - ‘Euphoria’ Season 3 Premiere

Episode Date: April 13, 2026

Chris and Andy discuss the ‘Euphoria’ Season 3 premiere (specifically Andy watching his first episode ever), creator Sam Levinson’s audacious filmmaking style, Zendaya’s stellar performance, and much more (1:00). Subscribe to the Ringer TV YouTube channel here for full episodes of The Watch and so much more! Hosts: Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald Producers: Kaya McMullen and Kai Grady Additional Video Supervision: Sarah Reddy Order and it will come. Like today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hello, and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. And I am an editor at the ringer.com. And joining me in the studio with a green apple on his head. It's Andy Greenwald! I'm excited. I'm excited too, man. We are releasing this on Sunday night.

It's The Watch. We're really just talking about the first episode of Euphoria tonight. And by first episode, you mean the first episode ever? You're like pure driven snow. It's unbelievable. Do you think you have a ton to add besides the fact that it's your first episode? How long is this episode? People can email us at the watch at Spotify.com.

They can follow us at the watchpod underscore on Instagram. You can watch us on ringer dash TV on YouTube. And you can watch us on Spotify where you can also listen to us. And you can also listen to us on a bunch of other podcast platforms. Greenwald, we are here for a grand experiment. Rarely in the history of this podcast. The 14-year history of this podcast. Do we basically like say, hey,

this show in the middle or end of its run that one of us hasn't watched ever before, we're just going to jump right in. And I think it will give us a unique, if possibly not particularly functional take on this show. First episode of Euphoria, the third season, much delayed. In between, Sam Levinson did the idols,

Zandaya made one of the best movies of the year, the drama. She's in Dune. There's obviously a roster of actors on this show that have pretty much exploded Sidney Sweeney, Jacob Belority, et cetera. I have been watching the show more or less since the beginning.

I think I caught up on season one a little late. I was a real fan of some specials that they did, some like one-offs that they did, and really loved season two. I'm seated. I'm seated not only for this show, but I am seated for your... Seated.

Yeah, I am seated. Yeah, like, you know, like I have my popcorn and my... Mm-hmm. And my son. I just can't wait to hear what you have to say about this because I don't know what the experience is watching this without the lore or without the context without anything.

And I want to be clear, I didn't Google anything. There were multiple times during my viewing of episode 301 where I briefly wondered, perhaps the path, the history of the character. How does Maddie know her? Yeah. I don't know who's Maddie. Alexis Demi's character. Who's Alexa Demi?

She is the manager of Dylan, the little actor guy. she's... Oh, right. Okay. You did watch this episode. Yeah. But I didn't know who was a character or not. Like, is that actor guy important?

Has he been on the show before? He hasn't been on the show before. Okay, see? This is what I'm saying. Yeah. Nor did I do my other tried and true method of watching television, which is continually text you during the experience. Now, some might say that I didn't do that because you were on stage in San Francisco

talking about basic instincts with Mallory Rubin. Yeah. But others might say because I was showing great restraint. Sure. And respect for the purity of the experiment. Maybe next episode you'll want to look up some stuff. Nope. Okay.

Here's why. This was exhilarating. I loved this experience. It felt freeing and just, uh, I feel uncaged. And as someone whose opinions are famously caged, get ready. Here's genuinely, what I mean is what I love most about television, ongoing television, why I talk about it, why I work in it. why I watch it, is that experience of cumulative narrative storytelling and the investments

that we make in a show and we make in the emotional lives of fictional people and in the creators to continue to deliver what we grow to expect from these characters or to surprise us in ways that delight us and rapturous even further. That commitment, that relationship, Chris, can also be a yoke. It can drag things. down. And at its worst, it's what we see with the kind of toxic fandom that exists online or even inside of our own bitter hearts, where shows cease to be what we want them to be or more charitably cease to match the highs with which they announced themselves. And the experience of watching it becomes one of diminishing returns into resentment and disappointment. I have been guilty of this in my personal life. And I've been guilty of this on this podcast. as well when shows that I have loved missed the mark or miss the mark perhaps arbitrarily that I have set for it. And it is very, very hard to engage beyond that point. So to turn on a show with no prior knowledge other than the fact that, I mean, I will cop to the fact that I am aware that this is the

chaos menu of seasons, that this was many years in the making, that the wrangling of talent was quite difficult, that there were aborted other versions of the show in which maybe they were still in high school if the timing worked out differently. I think there were different pitches. A detective show we had heard about, which sound interesting to me. I am also aware that the filmmaker, creator, author behind the show, Sam Levinson made The Idol. I will not be referring to that show again during this podcast today during the next five minutes. Okay. No. So to turn on this episode and be greeted with a riot of color and outrageous situations

was fun, thrilling, exciting. I didn't have any baggage. I was not laden, I was not weighed down by anything and certainly not by dozens of tightly packed balls of fentanyl. That's right. Although stay tuned for the after show

in which. So it was a, you could hear me get excited about this project over the last few weeks and it actually is super fun And you can tell me your feelings coming at it from a different place, but I do have a sense that entering into this season, this premiere with this attitude is actually helpful.

Because if I had investment in these characters as young people over time and not just a normal time between seasons, quite a long period of time now since the show debuted, I would probably feel a type of way about where Sam Levinson has chosen to pick up their stories again. as just I'm entering a new world where these are the stakes and this is the aesthetic

and this is the tone. Okay, let's see. Yeah, I think that there's been some well-reasoned criticism of this season so far. I've only watched the first one. Critics were given the first three to check out.

There's six this season. I'm sort of saying, like, what is the reason for euphoria beyond being euphoria? Like, beyond making more of an incredibly successful series that HBO has a, financial and vested interest in having stay on the air. It's got three of the biggest stars of

their generation on it. You really, like, you know, like you can't let that opportunity get away from you. And cracking the story, like you mentioned, has been something that has gone through several iterations, reported iterations. There's a Kim Master's piece and the Hollywood Reporter that came out after the idol that went through some of the, you know, at least behind the scenes stuff that was being anonymously, for the most part, talked about, but like that you like mentioned, Rue becoming a private detective, Rue becoming a surrogate mother, what are we going to do? Is it going to be like shortly after high school? Is it going to be a massive time jump? You have to accommodate, you know, these people's schedules, but also them aging, but also

there are different artistic interests as the years go on. I was kind of curious for you, you know, obviously there's like the, no, it is not jumping into the two towers. without ever having heard anything about Hobbits and just being like, I guess now I'm just watching this, although I do wonder if somebody could do that because there's just like, yeah, it's a big fight, I like it. With this, like, did you find yourself

being emotionally caught up in it at all, or was it simply, wow, what a boisterous, riotist, like, daring piece of filmmaking this was? It's the right question to ask. I think Zendaya is such a, this is not a hot take. This is a freezing cold take. I think she's an incredibly unique and charismatic star.

When she is on screen, like all great movie stars, I'm invested in her predicament. And one of the things that this season in this episode does very well is drop us right into a circumstance that is outrageous and thus complete. It's like jumping. It literally is canon. balling into a pool. She is, I'm meeting her, and she is a drug runner trying to cross the border from Chihuahua into Texas. Yes. In a manner that is quite risky.

It's purely cinematic. It's like the idea she drives her car up to this sort of, up this ramp up to the top of the border wall. She can't get the car to get down to the ramp going down. So she is symbolically stuck between stations on the top of the wall. and the car will neither tip backwards nor forwards and she has to do this incredible balletic move out of the car and down the ramp so that the car doesn't fall on her at any given point

and there's a bird. It's like a really good silent movie sequence. Chris, cinema. It speaks to a point that you made that I was, some might say gently resistant to, others would say outwardly hostile to. In our discussion of a show, I said I wouldn't mention again,

the idol, that you were making the case, case that Sam Levinson, on his own, is a filmmaker to watch, is an interesting director and creator and visual storyteller. Separate and apart from the drama and soap opera of that show, this opening sequence makes the case for itself on its own terms. And frankly, that was kind of my feeling about the entire episode. Am I particularly invested in the things that seem to motivate him? I would say through one episode, fairly strong, trending no. But the way in which he is telling the stories, particularly the Rue story, which maybe this is

intentional and maybe this is a good thing, is just so much more compelling than any of the other stories that are a part of the show. And maybe that's an argument for why continuing, you know, season three makes less sense than let's just tell a new story with Zendaya, whatever the case may be. I thought that there was such a dynamism and such a flare. And, you know, it's the kind of thing that our old friend Sam Esmail would often say on the podcast, which is when he approaches things, if the visual storytelling is not just worthy, is not just worthy, is eye-catching, is dramatic, is invested, is full of specificity, he's in.

And generally, that's not how I approach television, because I'm maybe it's, conservative mind or maybe it's just the more writer-driven mind or maybe I'm just nervous about people who are going to have to do it 24 to 48 more times. I want to see if the thing has legs. I don't really care so far with this. The audacity of the opening was enough for me. Yeah, this is a show that does not have, or at least to my knowledge, does not have a blueprint. It is not a show about X and Y needs to happen for X to be a complete statement. I mean, I'm sure that this will probably be the last season of you for. Euphoria, I'm just because of the complications behind the scenes in terms of mounting it, but

it can do whatever it wants. I think the heart of the show is Ruse Addiction Story, and it's been the most gripping parts of it for me. I know people who are like, I liked Euphoria, the fucked up version of 90210,10,10,1, that it was in the first season, you know, and the kind of, um, kind of. post-tumbler kind of take on teenage dreams that it was in the first season. But it, to me, left the atmosphere

when it became a far more cinematic rather than television storytelling mechanism of if I want Rue to run across the city all day for an entire episode, like, we can do that. We can make an episode about that. There are obviously all these other plot lines, but to me, she's the heart

and the head of the show. And the stuff that's happening around it, it's interesting to try and make the two meet. And if I had any problem with this episode, it's like seeing how they're going to get those two like sort of roads to converge eventually. With only six episodes, I'm sure they'll figure something out.

But I really, really, really, really am invested in the Rue character. Her performance is remarkable. And then, you know, as far as like what you're talking about with, the visual aspect of it. Not only do I think he's a talented filmmaker, I just really like the way he shoots Southern California.

Yeah, the light, the yellows. It's really, really dramatic. And even the more garish stuff, like the, you know, Sydney Sweeney and Jacob Allorty's house. Yeah, and like the idea of like bulldozers moving sand back and forth. And, you know, this was relevant to a conversation we were having in our previous episode about, you know, a completely incomparable show like your friends and neighbors

that I'm going to comp anyway, which is like when characters are having hyper-real, let's say, charitably conversations that I don't recognize as conversations that human beings have with each other, if you put them in like a garish 80s cocaine narnia, I'm paying a different sort of attention. Yeah.

Because the hyper-reality extends past the dialogue, it becomes the whole point of the scene. So the way that they're living in this place that is like a combination of the house from Wild at heart and also an old age home imbues the entire thing with a sense of, yeah, cinema, but also of a comprehensive

storytelling. You might not like the story, but someone's telling you something. Yeah, and he's able to push the limits of what's in a frame. So when when Cindy Sweeney and Jacob Allorty are having their big dinner where she's explaining to him that she is going to join only fans

to pay for her flower budget at her wedding. What was the candle budget in that scene? That was what I was going to say. that you could do that and say, like, there's low lighting or there's five candles and they have like 80 candles going. And that might be why these shows take so long and cost so much and, you know, the amount of times they may have to go in and whether those are fake candles. But like, it's just pushing it to the limit of what people can accept, you know, and then seeing like the results of that on screen is pretty impressive. If you have, this is a tough argument to make, but I'm going to try to make it. the best version, I would think, of an opportunity to have a budget, an HBO Sunday night show,

ascendant stars like a Lordy and Sweeney, the best version would be to have something incredibly compelling because you have all of these, you have the best ingredients at your disposal. The worst outcome would be timidity. We have the best ingredients, but I'm just going to to make the food analogy, I'm just going to make a, I'm trying to make a lobster mac and cheese. I'll put some truffle oil on it.

You know what I mean? The second best option is I'm going to, you know, paint their faces like I'm a fucking Dutch master and I'm going to have them gulping down giant 80s martinis

and shoveling spaghetti into their mouths while they talk about online pornography. Yeah. It is a choice. A widely held misconception that only fans is only I've heard this a few times in this episode.

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instead of watching from the sidelines. Same day delivery, it's on Prime. Visit Amazon.com slash Prime. to find millions of items delivered fast, available in select areas, terms apply. I have another cultural comp, but I do think in the service of, if we are even servicing it, like can I talk about the storylines and you can tell me or not tell me? Yeah, I mean, I have not re-watched too, so I will do my best, but I am not the keeper of the war. I'm not going to fact-checked you, brother.

Yeah. I don't even want to know the lore. Okay. But from my understanding, here's where we're at. I knew ambiently that Zendaya's character was named Rue and had addiction issues. If I were watching this cold, I am. I would not be aware of her addiction issues. I would be aware of the fact that mistakes made in her past have made it impossible for her to have a future.

And that's where she is. So she finds herself outrageously running drugs and being a courier for drugs along with a friend. Yes. For a mild-mannered woman who seems to also have a lot of... Played Lori, played by Martha Kelly. Who has a lot of redneck farmer associates where they... cook or make pills. At the same time, although we don't yet see the overlap, Jacob Allorty is living with his

fiance, played by Sidney-Sweeney. Cassie. And they're living in, as we can't keep describing this mansion, this fun house mansion anymore. And she is trying to make content so that she can have income as well, both to pay for their wedding and to find value in this world. And he is sort of a harried... He's taken over for his father's construction company and is trying to be...

become a developer building retirement and old age homes in Southern California. It's sort of like a would-be Rick Caruso type. Sure. Look, that's interesting way of putting it. Yeah. We also are seeing Mod Apatow's character working for a television executive played by Sharon Stone, making... On like a C.W-type night-time soap. A nighttime soap, something that definitely doesn't exist anymore.

But sure. In this world, it does. And that's, and then someone else is managing an actor, and that crosses that storyline. Maddie is managing one of the actors on LA Nights. Maddie and Lexi are still friends. And I will say one of the hardest things I laughed was when Maddie accompanies her client to a premiere.

And it looks like an Amazon straight to streaming movie called If I May, If I Might. Yes. But I believe it's all HBO and HBO Max. And everything's on the Warner Brothers lot. Yes. Look, I think And that's really, I mean, like, you've got, like, on the surface level, you've got it.

So Rue has become basically indentured to Lorry over the course of the end of the season. It really turns into the uncut-Gem's second half of Goodfellas sort of vibe of the show really comes out. And Rue gets in deep with this character, Lori. There's some stuff that I think would be explained later. that happened perhaps in between the two seasons and some of that is going to be related to the character played by Angus Cloud

who tragically passed away in between season two and three the actor himself. You don't know about Jules. I won't spoil anything about Hunter Schaefer's character. The only thing I would just really say is that the Coleman Domingo diner scene is sort of a...

It's a callback to the others. It's a callback. It's like a continuing a variation on the theme of what their special was. I mean, there was two sort of stand-alones. One was Rue's kind of trying to

accept a power greater than her part of the 12 steps, and the other is about Hunter Schaefer's Jules' character. And this conversation that they're having in the diner about Rue kind of needing to get her head around the idea of a god and God being in control

and not her is obviously fundamental to her saying, I thought maybe God might be this other drug dealer or rather a pimp who will pull me into this other world and away from Lori. And that's our guy, Mr. Echo. As our eye, Mr. Echo. Who shows up, well, she delivers drugs and uses the bathroom and then becomes friends.

Well, I think she gets, first she's nearly killed because it turns out that the drugs that Lori gave her to give to this new guy was fentanyl. Or laced with, touched with. A young woman dies of an overdose. And everything in the scene is beyond over the top. And again, because of the absolute DGAF, DGA meets DGAF, which is how I would describe Sam Levinson's aesthetic. I'm weirdly, okay, like even the candle scene, I'm going to get my notes that you're referring to.

I wrote, ah, this is everything. Looks good is stupid. Yeah. But okay, fine. Like, I was enjoying it. And again, when you have... I still laughed. Like, the thing that he does, as much as he gets great images, he's...

he knows exactly what people are good at. Or he sees people in a way that I think is very specific. So the Zendaya performance we can talk about, I'm pretty mesmerized by her at this point. I think just coming out of the drama, one of the things I love so much about her is her lack of vanity. Totally. As far as like Rue, who's like run ragged throughout the series,

but also like in the drama, like her interest in taking on difficult roles, but more like roles that fuck with her public persona a little bit? There's a scene in this episode where, I mean, she is famously one of the most beautiful stars in the world and also one of the most fashionable and always people are checking. And charming. But my kids are like, love her, but also look for her red carpet looks. Like they want to know that is part of her mythos. And so then for her in this show to be a dirtbag, but also a dirtbag who is placed next to all of the young women at,

what's the guy's name Alamo's party and her just be like wow you look great that's cool look how you look like that is such it's an intentional

turning everything on its head that works so he sees Zendaya in a certain way or their collaboration Sam Levinson yeah Sam Levinson does and they've you know

they did a film together like they've done a lot of work together and I think he sees like the comedian in Sydney Sweeney and I think That cut the biggest laugh of our marathon recording today.

It got the silentest little snort. I think he sees the humor in her persona. And I think she is in on the joke, but like 80% in on the joke. I think White Lotus was that too. This is funnier to me. Like her Cassie is funnier to me than the White Lotus thing. I think those are the only two things I've ever seen her in. I have some other films I can recommend

If you'd like to check them out Yeah please give me a list Maybe it's movie night with the girls on Friday Let me know which one I should fire up How's made anyone but you double feature? Can't wait The Yeah like in terms of like the

The setup for Alamo You know wearing tidy whiteies and a bathrobe In true like last act of Boogie Night's fashion Deciding to do William tell to her To William tell him if she's a rat or not are worth keeping around is such a provocation and such an absurdity, and it is entirely, in my opinion, earned by the noise she makes when she survives. Because she is so, to your point, he knows how she's going to react. And you get the sense that maybe that's how she laughs when she's surprised by

something or delighted by something or the real her, quote unquote, that people who work with may know. And what comes out of her is so natural and riveting that those moments make me excited to keep watching the show. I think that there's big picture what seems to motivate

our friend Sam is on some level deeply uninteresting to me. The show the voice of the show, and he writes the show alone and directs it, comes alive on two moments to me. One is how stupid writer's rooms and groupthink are inside Hollywood.

When everyone's like doing like little snaps up about how we need to do representation right in the show and he's like, he's like my parents watching MSNBC. He's like, got him. The other moment is when Jacob Alluredi says, it's hard to build in Southern California. This is a motivating issue, you know, among a certain class of people here,

I think that I find less compelling. But within that, the comparison that I would make... You're not a big... You're not a big disowning guy. It's just okay. It's okay. That's okay. Look, I've read some compelling arguments

in the abundance or, you know, the abundant sector. The comparison I would make is Brett Easton Ellis. Yeah. Who is a writer who I, despite everything, have a lot of time for it. But the reason I bring it up, and then I'm sorry, so I'll let you go, is that the early books that he wrote when he was very, very young and basically the same age

as the characters he was writing about. So lesson zero and rules of attraction. I loved so, so much because, and maybe this was just me also being young when I was reading them, I felt that they were like absolutely, like, you know, intentionally provocative and over the top, but there was this, like, beating heart of universal youth in them or yearning or something. or telling the world that it's phony from the inside of that world that I found really, really riveting and magnetic. And I've continued to be interested in him and try to read him, even as the books have become paler and paler imitations of that same thing and even sometimes commenting on them or revisiting them. The reason I do it is because his angle and his point of view about this place that we now live in remains so sui generis and it's just it's just him. He is his own genre.

And I kind of felt the same way here where obviously I didn't watch the high school seasons, but clearly we have moved past high school. And so I finding what's being, what motivates him to be like just spinning out from, it feels like the stuff that really motivates someone about the world who has rarely left the three to three area code, be like, don't go south of the border. It's drug runners and fundamentalist religious people and all of that. and it felt kind of pat and very, you know, not particularly steaksy or gripping. But the point of view on it is kind of compelling and funny and clearly deeply felt. And that keeps me engaged.

Yes, every moment that you're like, I think you're referring to the moment where Zendaya's first confronted with the idea that she needs to swallow like 20 balloons worth of drugs, her acting in that scene and her facial reaction to the like what she has to do which is poor KY jelly over balloons

and choke them down so she goes and gets her friend Faye to help her. Big week for KY it's on your friends and neighbors too. Oh good for those guys I'm glad they're reaching out beyond the...

They're finally getting their name out there. It's going to be a big... Guys, I'm not a financial advisor but buy lube stocks. At the hotel I was at and it was just like a really normal hotel have you ever gone into like the hotel general store and the KY jelly is like lower right hand corner

and they're just like just in case this weekend goes a certain direction yeah that's what makes hotels great but it's just like you and a woman who's like selling like you know tourist trap like Kutramal memorabilia and also toothbrushes and you come in there for a magnet toothbrush pringles

snickers and a sex toy that's fine anyways and his performance during that whole scene makes it because yeah it's completely a cliched like south of the border everything goes upside down. She doesn't have a simple task. Her task

is to save herself. She gets in her own way. The second she arrives at this place, the one thing she is told by Daryl Brick Gibson is don't touch anything you're not supposed to. He's given a performance to it. A second, she is

taking off her shirt, dancing with all the girls, hanging out, drinking, smoking weed, even though she's supposed to be sober. California's sober, I guess. So she is a participant in her own downfall. She always has been in the show. She wants to feel something maybe more than she wants to feel clean. Yeah.

Question about that. I know I said I wouldn't ask too many questions about it. But, like, was your takeaway from this episode that she is clean and sober from the addictions that she, like, she was on pills and things in the past? Is California sober, like, actually how you view her after this episode? Or was that meant to the A? I think she was like breaking her edge, really. I think that she's just in a ton of trouble. There is a thing, you know, I was,

it is funny how we consider this stuff because I was reading, this was a surprise no one, I was recently reading a Scottish crime novel from the 80s. And in it, like the tough but tender police inspector, Laidlaw is like trying to,

you talk frankly to a woman who's had a tough time and she's trying to get off the heroin and trying to leave the country and start over it because she's, you know, the Glasgow criminals are circling around her. And he's just like, you look a bit, piquid, I'm sorry, I put you through this, let me get you a gin and tonic. And she's like, thank you.

It's like immediately. And, you know, maybe this is just my like modern, you know, brain where I'm like, she shouldn't be doing that. Right. When in fact, I think for generations and including on this show, you can. I don't know necessarily that they make an explicit statement when she's talking to Coleman Domingo about the degree of her sobriety. and whether or not it's just like off the hard stuff, but still like every once in a while. But like when she was smoking a blunt and drinking whiskey,

with Amos, I was like, well, we're going into some dark, dark waters. I'm curious about the reaction too to us talking about it this way because I would imagine that people who are euphoria fans are going to have much stronger feelings about this season because it does seem like such a dramatic break from the show that they fell in love with. that said, what I'm enjoying about it is not the visual pyrotechnics of it. It's something that you've been alluding to constantly through this conversation,

which is that, I mean, there are two kinds of visually expressive directors. One type is just so in love with the images that they make that I find it a little bit airless, and it chokes the life out of the thing to make the perfect picture. And then there's a type of director who just, I just fucking love actors, man. and knows actors and as you said can bring out aspects of actors that they see,

not that necessarily they alone see, but that they have some unique perspective on. And that was what I was picking up on in this episode. It's just like, I'm going to put these people on the screen

and I'm going to enjoy giving them a chance to enjoy it. Yeah. And if I had invested multiple years of emotional and intellectual sweat equity in Rue's sobriety journey,

only for it to be this, I might be a little bit ticked or I might be a little bit impatient with it but I didn't so I'm having a good time Yeah and I also think that it's become a little bit less grounded in TV reality and is now going into almost like a kind of California

dream scape reality I think I always appreciate directors who understand a region so natively that like the they can do a crane shot

of a back lot, even though the back lot, they're shooting like, you know, they're shooting like just like a nighttime soap or whatever. But he can make that feel like La La Land. And then he can also shoot the desert and he can shoot Calabasas and he can shoot a rundown apartment building. But like he loves it. Like I can see in his, through his eye,

the everyday things that he has always kind of been like, no, it's like these courtyard apartment buildings are beautiful. And the washing machine that's in the separate laundry room is beautiful. It's a good point because I think that among the many, many, many criticisms that I had about the idol, one of the loudest was I felt deeply that the show just absolutely couldn't decide if it was satire or celebration, if it was like scabrous and judgmental or it was somehow credulous of like stardom and the power of superstardom and artist. history. And at least through this episode, through my completely pure eyes here, this felt affectionate. So maybe that's why there's a little bit of, I would, weirdly, harmony between

filmmaker making his show passionately about things that I don't know if I even care about that much, which is backlot shenanigans and expensive real estate opportunities. But doing it in a way that is pretty, pretty inspired. The playoffs are here, and you can predict the action all the way to the finals with Fandul predicts. Follow all the playoff dishes, swishes, wishes, wishes, and misses. Predict the spread, the total points, and even the game winner. Sign up for Fandual Predicts and predict it from the couch. Offered by Fandual Prediction Markets LLC, a registered futures commission merchant,

18 plus. Trading derivatives involve significant risk and may not be suitable for all investors, manage your activity with our consumer protection tools. This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Ever have a plan come together out of nowhere and realize you're missing something? Like a last minute beach day, a spontaneous hike or an outdoor movie night you didn't plan for, that's when Prime's same-day delivery as you're back.

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Earn unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases with it, big or small. So whether it's buying tickets at the game or grabbing a coffee, it earns unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases. Say it with me, the Active Cash Credit Card from Wells Fargo, be a 2%er. Learn more at Wells Fargo.com forward slash ActiveCase. Cash, terms apply. This show is, I wonder if it's the last of its kind. How would you categorize it?

Well, to me, what it's become is it backdoored its way from going from like, what if teens, but really fucked up, you know, to the last vestige of the, like, we'll give Nicholas Wending Ref in a 10-episode show. Good, yeah, I get it. David Lynch, you want to make the return? Cool. like, Carrie Fukenaga, you want to shoot all of True Detective? Cool.

Director Park Chanwuk. Go off, King. Well, even he, not on Little Drummer Girl, but on the Sympathizer, it seemed like that got like a little bit taken away from him midway through or they're, like it did not feel like totally a vision. All his.

TV is coming home. TV is coming back to being TV. Like, every once in a while you'll have somebody who's like, I directed all of this or whatever, but like the idea of television as, this grand playground for directors specifically to flaunt in. And I'll say this too. I have been generally pretty underwhelmed by what people who I thought were movie stars

have decided to come back to television for or dip down into television for to do. I would like to believe that, you know, the opportunities to do long-form storytelling and to play challenging roles and you know like as the middle class or the sort of mid-tier genre movie disappears you get to go do Merri-Vistown on HBO I think that's like what you should do. When I see people

who are like, say you just wanted to be on a fucking TV show like you were beautiful man like what are you doing? Like you're Harrison Ford like what are you doing? Like that stuff like kind of I understand it's like maybe the hours and the location are better

but it's uninspiring to me. To Cizendaya and Sweeney and Allordie Be like, we're kind of like At the top of our game right now In terms of like what we can get made And what we, you know, Wuthering Heights and Housemade And drama all like recent obvious successes Whether they were contractually obligated

Or psychologically terrorized into returning to this show I have no idea But they seem to be like Invested in doing it. Allurty I can't quite tell yet. Well, and I reprimand I respect the fact that they're like, now this is good, this is different. And we're going to leave our mark on this.

And I don't really know how many more of these we're going to get. So I'm going to enjoy it. What's the all righty quote that's going around about this season where he's just like, maybe we did something good, maybe, I don't know. Like some version of that. Yes. I mean, he is not the most like, chatty. Yeah, I think he is a pretty stoic, like, interview subject.

I mean, I seems like a charming guy. But, like, I don't know necessarily he gives great quote. Yeah. but I also wonder whether he's just like, I feel like this character really had a conclusion in season two. And so now he's just kind of like a ghost living out there. But also, to your point, like one of the things that marks, one of the things that marks a successful movie career these days

in the eyes of people like us, not necessarily like the people who actually hire anyone, because to them it's like how many animated video game characters can you voice this year. But in terms of the people that Sean would be tracking and put on this list of big stars, you know, under 35 stars, it does seem to be actors who are constantly challenging themselves by working with idiosyncratic directors and the willingness to play in other people's worlds. And the best of the best, and this is sort of the DiCaprio method, you know, are following that. Salome and Zendaya are probably chief among them. And so if in that regard, and I'm not pulling a full 180 here, I'm not putting Sam Levinson, who did make the idol in the same category as any of the great ascendant filmmakers of our time yet necessarily.

But I do think that this felt less like George Clooney having to go back for season six of ER because he was under contract and more like, I'm going to go do what, where for how long? Okay, we'll see. I am going to approach this with the same playful spirit that I brought to what was, I mean there was the drama he did last year

about the North, the Great, some, we talked about it. Oh, the Great Walk North. God, we're terrible about this. But that, you know, to that or to Wuthering Heights or to Frankenstein. The narrow road to the deep north.

The narrow road or Priscilla. Of words in there, yeah. You can squint and make that makes sense. This is not having to go back and pretend to be in high school even though you've aged out

and careered out of the role that you had that broke you in the first place. Buckle up for Jules. I assume we're going to get her next episode. So Jules is the last remaining major character from the show who is who we have yet to see. This season.

So far this season. It's Hunter Schaefer playing and she's a sugar baby in New York. Is that a spoiler? Or that was referenced, wasn't it? It's referenced, yeah. It's in the trailer. Oh, can I mention the one, my favorite scene of the entire episode?

Please. I really, really liked Rue as an Uber driver. And I really liked the Batman scene. I thought that was a moment when I could see the purity of the vision of like, we're making fun of L.A., but we love L.A., but we're also not being too heavy-handed about, like, rebuilding the Palisades in the right way, L.A., like Batman being like this city, someone in the backseat doing a Batman voice being like,

the city has changed and then going out to like fist bump Wonder Woman. I also like your listening to the audiobook of the Bible. That was sick. I think I've been in that Uber, actually. And it really changed my mind about some stuff. Okay, so a shorter Monday episode for us because we just wanted to do a euphoria one. And you're going to be on the road again.

And I am on the road again. Actually, this has already happened at this point, right? No, I will be en route to Denver when you hear this episode, probably. So shout me out if you see me. Do you think... When is the show in Denver? Monday night.

Okay, so people could still potential... If it's not sold out yet, people could maybe show up for the Zachlo show. Yes, it's myself and Zachlo and Tim Hardaway Jr. That's my dream blunt rotation. Adam Morris, yeah. Can I ask you, a lot of athletes, Chris, make excuses when they play in altitude. And they say that, you know. I've been thinking about this constantly.

Okay, so do you think you will be affected? Do you think your performance should be judged differently with an asterisk? I don't like altitude. Yeah. When I visited New Mexico, I took note of its effect on me. I would say, as someone who worked in altitude in New Mexico, it's no joke. Does it take a while for the altitude to kick in? Like if I'm only there for 36 hours, is it going to matter?

I think the main thing, you just need to hydrate more than you think you do. And that if you, like, let's say you'll have a good show and you'll be like, ah, fellows well met, let's have a course. Yeah. the mead of the Rocky Mountains, you will have one and you will touch God. You will be super fucked up from like one late beer. And that is a really weird feeling.

How do you do see the girl in Denver right now? Just being like, what is this guy talking about? I think that every podcast we do. I actually have just like a model listener in an REI coat drinking a chorus and like shoveling snow being like this fucking Nancy. Thanks for going on this euphoria journey with me. I think it's going to be exciting six weeks for us. I think it's going to be fun.

This is, we should do this more because it is very freeing to just engage with television this way. Thanks to Kai Kai and Sarah. We will be back on Thursday with the mega show. It's the finale of the pit. We'll have some Top Chef. We'll have some other TV kicking around.

Beef is coming up. So a lot of stuff. Take care.