Euphoria shines by focusing much more on Jules and Rue and keeping the penises at a minimal in its finest hour yet.

The latest episode of Euphoria, titled “Shook Ones Pt. II”, finally got me into this show. In fact, it has me saying that this was one of the better hours of television I have seen this month so far.

Although I’m still not sold on Euphoria as a whole because it sometimes feels like HBO’s version of Riverdale, but this hour showcased a much stronger direction for the series.

“Shook Ones Pt. II” starts with Zendaya’s Rue narrating Jules’ heartbreaking backstory. We find out how she struggled with anxiety and tendencies of OCD and how her parents put her in a mental institution which like most facilities we see onscreen looks unhospitable and is like hell where she tries to kill herself.

We also see a really brief scene where she decides to start transitioning and that was about all the backstory we got on Jules.

That was the first 10 minutes of “Shook Ones Pt. II” and while it was really effective, my only problem with that is they did not show anything about how she recovered from her suicide attempt and we quickly cut to the present timeline. There could have been a lot of story surrounding her transition that could have been shown but instead, they chose to be done with it in a moment.

Anyways, the majority of the episode is set during a carnival, and it picks up with Rue and Jules reuniting after their awkward kiss and making up with each other. Rue is there with her sister Jia who soon goes missing and they both separate to find her.

Meanwhile, Jacob Elordi’s Nate once again comes off as the absolute worst. He is a psychopath in the making whose toxic masculinity is always riding high. In this episode alone, Nate tries to choke Maddy because she embarrassed him and after that, he completely breaks down and went all confused and blames the fact that he has been going through a lot of “shit” lately for his behavior.

Also, Jules finally finds out that the guy she is falling for aka “Tyler” is in fact, Nate. They met near a river and it was all very quiet and scary especially since I expressed my concern that Nate might try to kill her last time. Well thankfully, he doesn’t throw her in a river or anything but instead ends up blackmailing her. His reason is that he is doing this to protect his dad and the scene does feel threatening thanks to Jacob Elordi who does a great job with this character. I still see him as that guy from The Kissing Booth but he is doing a good job reinventing his image by completely portraying this complex role with brilliance.

Meanwhile, Kat and Ethan are finally bonding as they ride the Ferris wheel together but then Kat went out to get ice cream for them and saw him talking to this hot girl who was talking to him about work but she misunderstands, very unique and not at all cliché right? And then she goes to this 20-something boy who has this bad boy reputation, they smoke cigarettes and then they have sex.

Also, McKay refused to call Cassie his girlfriend in front of Nate and then they get into a fight and McKay calls her a slut. And since she is “slutty” and her boyfriend just like Maddy’s boyfriend was being a dick, they both together decided to do Molly and while it didn’t affect Maddy much, Cassie ended up having an orgasm in public.

But most of the scenes in “Shook Ones Pt. II” are thankfully between Jules and Rue, and as I have said previously Euphoria really shines when it is about their friendship, Zendaya and Hunter Schafer really do have brilliant chemistry and they also have the power to make this show very intense, one of the finest moments being when Jules went to confront Nate’s dad so that she can prove it to Rue that he is that Dominant Daddy she had sex with. That moment was both intense and gripping.

Anyways, Rue finds her sister doing weed and then they have this whole guilt session and eventually decided to head home. Jules after her horrific day goes to Rue’s home to find comfort wherein the episode’s last moments and in a beautiful scene they end up kissing each other (FINALLY).

What did you think of this episode of Euphoria? Was it your favorite episode of Euphoria so far too? Comment below and let us know.