I don't really get into HBO stuff ever since GoT ended very badly with the network but every now and then the hype around a show gets built up so much that it is impossible to ignore.
I will admit that I nearly turned this show off because of certain aspects of it but I trudged along just because I didn't have anything else on deck as a substitute. Overall I am glad that I have now seen all of season 1 but there are some aspects of the show that a real turnoffs for me and I'll showcase them here.
There will likely be spoilers ahead
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Con 1: Typical TV high school dynamics
I find teenage dramas to be, for the most part, annoying. Maybe I felt differently about this when I was in high school myself but that was a very different time from now. The most risque things we had on TV when I was in high school was probably Beverly Hills 90210. Things have changed a lot since then and it seems as though you can put almost anything you want on TV despite the fact that younger audiences have even better access to explicit material than they did back in those days by a long shot.
In this show we have the usual tropes of all the jocks being arrogant assholes, all the cheerleaders being the hot chick idiots who look down on most of the rest of the school's population, the outcasts who DGAF what people think of them, and the nerdy types who don't really fit in with any other group.
I went to high school and honestly, I don't know where they get this idea from. I realize it is a television program and is not meant to be like real life but these stereotypes are not accurate and I find them annoying in shows more and more as I get older.
Con 2: One completely absurd character
Child actors annoy me in almost anything they are in but there is one particular character in this series that thankfully has a very limited role.
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There is a drug dealing kid in the show who looks like he is around 12 years old. He knows a ton about various drugs, packs a gun, has face tattoos and at one point in the show actually administers tattoos to other people claiming "relax, I've been doing this for years."
I've known some troubled children throughout the years but this one is just too over the top. The fact that the customers and other dealers actually respect the little kid is just as dumb. I think that it also sends a bad message but hell, if you are letting your pre-teen kids watch this show you are a terrible parent and your kid is likely going to end up with a face tattoo at some point in their life as well.
Con 3: Teenagers with adult-like amounts of freedom
Basically, everyone in this show gets to do whatever they want and the adults in their lives issue very little if any control over them. I knew a few kids like this in high school but they were the ones from pretty terrible families but in Euphoria every single person in the show just seems to be allowed to go and do whatever they want. There are constant parties and no one seems to ever get in trouble for coming home late, being drunk or high, and I think that for most people that didn't have terrible upbringings, this was not the case. Again, I realize that this is a show and not real life, but this idea is just ridiculous.
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These kids throw absolutely raging parties with tons of drugs and alcohol and pay zero regard to noise yet nothing ever gets raided. When I went to parties in high school they had to be either in the middle of a field somewhere far from civilization or we had to be extremely quiet. I dunno. Maybe I am over-analyzing the realism of all of this but it bothered me.
Con 4: Kind of excessive nudity
I'm no prude and appreciate when a show tries to push the boundaries of what is allowed on TV. I think just about everything should be allowed on shows and we leave it up to the audience whether or not they consider it to be excessive or not. However, this doesn't mean that I want to have a swinging dick on the screen every 4 minutes.
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If they were going for shock-effect, they accomplished it that's for sure. There is a ton of nudity in this and even though all of the actors are of legal age they are being presented as if they were NOT. This is a fine line they are walking here and at least for me I think the nudity and sexuality was too frequent.
Con 5: Most of the adults are presented as idiots
Fuck boomers, right? Well in this show very few of the adults, whether it is the parents, teachers, police, or any other person who is no a teenager, is presented as being clueless idiots and are easily out maneuvered by their intellectually superior teenage co-stars.
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The few times that we see the principal of the school he is almost immediately outsmarted by the students he is currently dealing with and the students don't even appear to need to try very hard to make this happen. I guess this bothers me because I know a few teenagers and they don't know shit about the world yet in this show they are far more informed about just about anything than their educators are.... and I took that personally
Don't get the wrong idea though. Overall I think this is a great show that you should see but there are a lot of eye-rolling moments for it if you feel like I do. There is a reason why I presented the "Cons" first because there are a enough pros that tip the balance into the "you should watch this" category.
Just be warned, this is not something that I would allow my kids to watch if I had any because a lot of the messages that it sends could encourage teens to head straight towards jail in their near future.
Euphoria is currently available only on the HBO Network but I'm sure you know of the free ways to obtain it as well.