I think the lack of help that Cassie has received, compared to Rue going to rehab etc, is the justification of her not apologising or fighting against her impulses - she hasn't been shown how. Cassi getting some therapy would be a wonderful and empathetic way to show that her problems are real and can have a huge impact.
Right! Good point. Rue has a lot of people around that took action when they saw what was happening. Cassie's mother on the other hand joked that Cassie needed an exorcism. A good parent would say she needed a therapist. It's because her codependency issues aren't as black and white to people as drug addiction. Even though it should be taken seriously as well
I agree. I think it comes down to the fact that drug addiction is becoming more of an "accepted" and ironically less stigmatized mental illness than abandonment. The parallels between Rue and Cassie's hurting are undeniable, but Cassie's issues are not "accepted" or seen as "valid" issues by the public. All people say is "she's pathetic", "she needs to snap out of it" things that have not been said about Rue. Why is that ? Perhaps because abandonment and emotional trauma have yet to be recognized as serious mental illness that deserves compassion and access to therapy. It's not excusing her actions to say this. It's calling out society by saying that, if both characters are flawed and struggling with mental health, why are we forgiving one but condemning the other ? I also like to point out that people are quick to say that Lexie deals with her abandonment issues better than Cassie, when, in fact, there's little that suggests that this is the case. Lexie, much like Gia, are the "background" characters, the one who suffer in silence, in the shadow of an older sibling more outwardly dealing with their mental struggles. That doesn't mean that they don't have serious issues lying under the surface, we're just not shown what they are. They addressed it this season with Gia through Ali and Rue's mom saying that it's time to focus on her more. And I think Lexie's play is actually really telling how *similar* she is to Cassie. Lexie is seeking validation through her play. She wants to be seen and loved by people just as much as Cassie wants to be loved by men ; they just go about it differently in how they achieve that love. It's not so black and white with one sibling doing better than another sibling. I think it's more like which sibling's pain is being put on display over another. Who's pain are we seeing and why ? Why are we empathizing with one character and not another - when they both are struggling and causing havoc in the lives of people around them ? That's what's so great about the show : all these shades of grey and how, essentially, there are no "good", "bad", or "irredeemable" characters, just people suffering.
Cassie deals with very real issues and I think we understand a bit of it when Maddie and her boss kind of skim over it and also when we learn about Cassie's past and realise that a lot of her issues comes from her needing to be loved, and that's pretty much addressed in the show. I think a lot of people are mad because of 2 reasons: 1. The fact that it's Nate. I personally feel that Cassie is a wonderful human, in season 1 she was not the best but she was(is) a teenager trying to navigate life and she was beautiful. She gives her all to the people she loves and respects and cares for them and she has such a beautiful soul. But it's Nate. Nate's not the best. He's manipulative, abusive and I can go on and on but she deserves better and it's not Nate. Nate has his issues and Cassie's the perfect people pleaser and Nate as the narcissist he is, is going to manipulate and use that to his advantage. And also she should know better. Obviously that's quite a tricky thing to say but if it's anyone else that'd be easy to say but it's Cassie and she ALWAYS looks for the good in people and herself. So if someone makes her feel good she's going to subconsciously ignore everything about the person and focus on the good part. 2. Her lack of accountability. Of Cassie slept with Nate and said boldly "I did it". It's a different thing than what she's doing now. She's a mess in this season as we all are but it's the fact that she refuses to take accountability for her actions. Perhaps she was never taught to do so and I understand but she's not a kid. Whatever she's going through does not justify the fact that she hurt her best friend really badly. I'm not saying that Cassie is so bad and deserves persecution, I'm just saying that the least she'd have done is own up to it. Maddie might not be the best friend in the entire world but she loves Cassie and Cassie loves her too. If not for anything for the fact that you've grown up with this girl and you know how much your actions hurt her should prompt you to self reflect. I still love Cassie but she's not a child. She might be really young but this is where she needs to think instead of crying. I just want her to meet someone beautiful that'll treat her right. PS. Cassie's mum...... Is another topic I have a headache on...
What's important about her throwing Rue under the bus for being a drug addict is that a big reason why her father ended up abandoning her is due to drugs. She was abandoned by her father because of drugs, and she doesn't have any sympathy towards anyone addicted to them.
Oh shit, you're right. But... one thing; she'll pretend to, though? Because she was nice to Rue at first ("just take it one day at a time!") until Rue said something she didn't like.
@@onettaviator5396 - as an addict, I can tell you yes, most people in our lives, once they become aware ARE seemingly “supportive” on the surface, even though it’s very obvious they ARE actually judging you, yet they’ll put on these fake “sympathetic” fronts but you can see the judgment in their eyes. These kinds of friends and family members won’t actually always say “I don’t get it, I don’t understand addiction & I have NO sympathy for what you’ve done to yourself” outloud because they KNOW it’s not necessarily socially acceptable/that they’re *supposed* to be sympathetic/help this person in their life (relative, family friend, close friend, etc.) to “get help” even if they secretly think you’re a lost cause who has only themselves to blame. it’s proven that when addiction is treated as an illness/mental health problem and not a criminal one, rehabilitation works!
@@durranofthetower7306 I didn’t mean to imply you have to actually stay friends with or even are obliged to support this person in active addiction is sick. But addiction rewires the brain and causes physical & psychology pain & stress and withdrawal that makes you sick af when you try and stop using, stealing is NEVER okay and a big part of the recovery program is taking inventory of the people in your life you’ve caused pain and if possible, making amends and there is a huge importance placed on service, volunteering, helping other people join the program, etc. like you see with Rue’s sponsor. We feel so fucking shameful when we sober up and realise how much of an asshole we have been, how much pain we’ve caused the people we love and for what we put them through and we carry that shame for life. We know we can’t make up for all the mistakes we made and not everybody is going to want to make amends or want an apology for wronging them while we weren’t in control of ourselves, but the substances were. from your comment, you obviously still hold resentment, which is fair - stealing is wrong and especially hard to be forgive if they haven’t apologised and are in active addiction! I would honestly recommend you cut this person off in a polite way (because there is no need to kick someone while they’re down, just “I can’t be around you while you’re using and I can’t support you”) so you can BOTH move on with your lives and hopefully heal. That’s my point with Cassie and anyone else who didn’t really have the patience or were faking their support, what’s the point in being at Rue’s intervention? She should’ve just stayed home.
Makes total sense, being abandoned by your father is traumatic, the only addict she knew her whole life traumatised her, it would be hard to then be supportive of an addict. If your dad was a violent alcoholic, you would likely be wary around drunk people and alcoholics, too
Likable characters are not always “good” characters. Cassie is fascinating, and it’s because the writers are not trying to make you like her. She’s supposed to spiral. This is a test of empathy and understanding, not an effort to appease fans through fan service.
"This is a test of empathy and understanding" yessss exactly that. 🙌🏼 I feel like all the main characters are written with that in mind even/including Nate.
Yes this is why she is one of my absolute favorite characters on television. I know she’s not a “morally good” character and that’s none of my business- her story and mindset is intricate and fun to watch
@@thegillmachine Probably bc they transitioned her from a protagonist (in the first season) to an antagonist this season, so her fans are probably having trouble reconciling with that. Twitter is filled with people who get overly attached to fictional characters.
it's crazy to me how people are so supportive of lexis play when she basically aired all of her sisters trauma to everyone for laughs - like making fun of nate with the dance sequence was one thing but cassie is her sister. i love lexi but if my sibling did that to me i'd never forgive them
That was crazy to me as well how supportive people were of Lexi’s play. I didn’t understand why Lexi felt the need to showcase her sister’s troubles like that. However, I guess that ties into one of the major points of the show which is that none of the main characters are necessarily through-and-through good people by our society’s standards. They’re teenagers with trauma and exposure to drugs and sex, so naturally things are going to be messy. They’re all in a morally grey area and they can either be viewed as good or bad depending on what the viewers believe.
Omg same I thought I was crazy bc i didn't like that, I have three siblings and one of em is my younger sister and if she ever sis that I would be so pissed and prolly would never forgive her
@Booper Dooper You’re absolutely right. And the fact that a majority of the Euphoria fanbase was cheering Lexi on is kind of fucked up given what we know about Cassie. Lexi and Cassie’s dynamic was endearing and interesting in season 1. Why weren’t we shown how the play affected that relationship? And not to mention the way almost all of Cassie’s character development is thrown out of the window the moment she steps on stage 😭😭 instead of being the character viewers were meant to empathize with in season 1, Cassie is a shell of the person she was and, in the play, a spectacle to be made fun of. Why was her abortion glossed over? Nate is an abusive, manipulative sociopath (who, by the way, faces little to no consequences for his actions but that’s a different conversation by itself) but Cassie was treated more like an antagonist by the other characters than he was. Why is that? What happened between her and McKay? Why was her character derailed the way it was? Sorry for the rambling 😭😭 your comment was thought-provoking. There were a lot of weird writing decisions that were made this season.
I think that the way she's been received and valued by the world is also a very important piece of the puzzle. The formation of her identity is undoubtedly linked with the way she's viewed by men, and has internalized that view of herself. From the lack of a father figure and her clear lack of male friends, I'm guessing that the only male interest that she ever received since the beginning of puberty is sexual, therefore, internalizing her value to men as sexual. You see it with her bf in season one, when he's not feeling well, and she wants to help, she offers sex. Now, that's not what he wanted nor needed but that's what she was taught men wanted and almlst deserved from her. Her fear of abandonment cannot simply explain her behavior, sexism, and maybe more precisely, the male gaze is also at play her.
You were so spot on to this. I also think that in the most recent episode (SPOILERS) When Cassie has that scene with Nate and is telling him that she is his, it is another reference to want you said at the end of your paragraph. It was she was taught. She was taught that her only value to men is sexual. She was also taught to have her whole identity based on how well she can please a man and that scene with Nate just emphasizes that
Cassie has a borderline absent mother who’s always drunk who disregards her. Cassie has gotten NO help. She literally threatened self harm/suicide for help and her mom brushed it off and her sister called her pathetic. Yeah, it was pretty pathetic, but it doesn’t negate the obvious cry for help. Meanwhile Rue has a mom actively fighting for her to get better. I really hope Cassie finds a reliable support system bc that’s really the first thing she really, really needs
It would be interesting to see what would've happened if Cassie had Rue's mom and Rue had Cassie's mom. Rue getting a mom who is more hands off in her life and disconnected and Cassie getting a mom who is always ready to drop everything to get her daughter help.
@@TrabsxWhat wouldve happened is that Rue wouldve spiraled like cassie and cassie wouldve fought back line rue. The core of Cassie not fighting back against her impulse is for the simple reason that she doesnt have a support system, in season one she at least had some people close to her despite them not being stable support system. But what Cassie need is an adult to turn to, a mom who helps her the same way rue’s mom helped her. With this she would overcome her trauma.
That scene of her in the kitchen, Cassie was not expressing genuine suicidal or self harming tendencies. She was desperately trying to garner sympathy from her family because she couldn't stand being told she was completely in the wrong. Her mom and sister recognized this and didn't give in to her. I know it sounds awful but people do this. That's not to say that Cassie doesn't have problems and doesn't need help. She definitely does.
I think this is a really good and humanizing take on Cassie. In “reality” she’s just a broken kid figuring this shit out too tbh. Her and Rue. They clearly have A LOT of pain that they just don’t know what to do with.
@@hachikos But it does highlight the fact that she made an inexcusable decision, all of her chaos is within her control. It’s not ok, she’s not a victim, she’s not having a special experience that nobody else has gone through or circumstances that lessen her accountability. She’s a terrible sister and friend. Hopefully she can redeem herself.
There’s been speculation that Cassie was written to hook up with Nate this season over him messing around with Jules because the actors don’t get along. But I really feel that the rewrites and changes to the arch came through because of Sydney Sweeney’s range and how over the pandemic, we saw more and more of her in other roles. It honestly would be criminal to have her in the cast and keep her as a side character and under utilize her. I really feel that she’s this generations next huge star.
I think so too! It's like it was perfectly written for her to show off her ability. She's deserving of an Emmy for her performance this season. If she picks the right roles 100% she has what it takes to be huge going forward
I rewatched the first season, and nate gives certain looks and have some obsession with Cassie. I think it was planned that they Hook up in this season. It looks like nate is trying to show that he's not like his dad, and one of persons he can use is Cassie because she has what every man desires in his mind.
The strange thing about Euphoria’s fandom is how people seem to side or look for villains and heroes, when in reality the show is scripted in a way that everybody is both these things at different times. If the creators used as much « morality » as the fans the show wouldn’t exist. The reason why it is so big is because it has depth and truth, not like all these « typers » who can’t wait to open their mouth to show that they know what is the right thing to do.
Yea, it gets tiring when 15 years Olds just are like "do you have brain damage" whenever you like something they consider problematic. It's suffocating. Like yeah I do, what you gonna do? Make a hate post on me? Cry? Cancel me?
This is the exact reason why i stay away from media criticism on youtube and online in general (with this video being a once im awhile exception) because mostly the takes are just so bad and don't invite different opinions at all its just so toxic. I much rather enjoy my shows/movies in private and form my own opinions
As someone whose best friend did actually date my abusive ex in high school, I still feel nothing but agony for Cassie. She's a walking tragedy. Watching her lose sleep and scrub herself raw and degrade herself trying to get a moment of attention from a guy she already knows doesn't deserve it is so incredibly sad. And given how that turned out for my own best friend, I'm terrified of where Cassie's story is headed.
Agreed, cassie is a very complex character and hard to comprehend, especially to foreigners watching this drama, not living in the US. The culture is different to ours. But, I was able to understand her character and complexity. A character that I wanted to hate, but pitied.
@@meowm3426 Hey. Care to explain the culture part in your answer? You mean the type of difficulties a teenager has to face in a highschool in U.S. rather than any other place? I'm curious if you actually find all these normal...as a foreigner it seems so surreal to me. Not Cassie's character particularly but their whole reality in general. I know it's a show, but how much accuracy does it contain?
@@x.s.6441 I’m an American in high school and there are definitely some things similar. You’d be surprised at the amount of kids actually getting high already. For me, Euphoria is just an amplified version of my high school. So watching it was not that jarring for me.
@@kingaegonii When I was in highschool there were definitely kids who used to get high so it's not that shocking to me. (I mean a girl in my year also got pregnant and had a kid).But the whole party every weekend, sex everywhere and any time or even the dressing part is so far away from my definition of highschool experience. I know that things work differently in every place of the world so I hope this does not come out as an insult, but I feel like kids in U.S. are exposed too early to that type of actions and tend to normalize it. One of my good friends grew up there and when she used to come back for vacations as a ten year old, she was shocked that we were still playing with board games and toys or whatever because in that age her friends in the U.S. were already talking about sex. I"m pretty sure that things have changed for highschoolers nowadays in my country too, considering the instagram etc. I've seen it, but as an adult I don't have an inside.
as a girl with *HEAVY* _daddy issues_ and a *NEED* to _male validation_ (although i quite don’t like men): *i totally understand* how cassie views herself and the world. especially in the scene where she's crying and hitting nate, but also being hugged by him, i felt like this scene was made to show us how she resents the male figures of her life (dad, boyfriends, etc) but also feels the need to be taken care of by them, because her inner child didn't got this from anyone. i lived practically the *SAME* things she lived, so i'm empathetic, but i don't support her relationship with nate. maddy deserves a better friend.
same..execpt all this stuff didn't happen to me until i met someone off the internet who was and currently is the same age as me at the time we met (14). (we broke up at 16) and since then my parents became more nosey and too demanding
This is a great video that gives grace to Cassie without excusing her actions, which is pretty much where I'm at with her as well after how this season has been. High schoolers make mistakes, some of them pretty bad, especially when they don't have a good confidant or parent to turn to. She's dealing silently with the pain of her experiences in season 1, her dad is gone, her mother drinks constantly, her sister watches her silently and now exposes her life, which is currently brimming with suffering, in her play. She lives in Maddy's shadow for so long. She's practically alone and probably has issues trusting the few friends that she does have. Of course she gravitated to the man willing to give her attention, of course she moved into his house even after not hearing from him for days, she's so desperate. She's wrapped into the alternating love bombing and abuse that Maddy was receiving from Nate. And I think whenever she manages to exit that situation, she is going to eventually reflect on her actions and have a change of heart that she carries with her in adulthood. I don't think that means anyone that she has hurt (especially Maddy) needs to forgive her or let her back into their life, but moving on and learning from your fuckups is a key part of growing up that never stops, and a lot of people don't stay close to most of their high school friends. Cassie will either fall victim to her misery in some fashion, or escape this and live a healthy life after the loss of most of her loved ones due to her actions. I hope we see her rise from the ashes of her mistakes, express regret to those she hurt and build something of herself. Love your videos, dude. My fav essayist on the platform. Always thought provoking, well structured and beautifully phrased.
As aweful as it is I have a feeling that cassie will continue to spiral untill she finds love and acceptance from others which is going to be incredibly difficult when acting this way. This girl is truly broken at the moment with no direction other than affection from nate. She needs support and a smacking from someone she can trust in a world she's no longer trusted in. I wish I could agree with everyone and despise cassie but I completely understand it and why she is the way she is and if I were told and looked at the same way she was, I'd probably end up in the exact same position and mindset as her.
@@hollyrylatt-price2485 samsies. I want Cassie's mother to have a heart to heart with her. Cassie thinking long & hard about what she done. Her apologizing to Maddie(not necessarily maddie forgiving her). Her breaking up with Nate. Her apologizing to Lexi for not being a good sister. Her joining a group for people having their picture & videos leaked online. Her finally studying & becoming a lawyer for young girls with same fate as her & sa victims. And her confronting her father telling what she's been through and then her accepting her half of the fault. And growing content with herself. And adopting a pet ☺
Why does no one include her abortion in the trauma she's gone through. I don't think she's fully processed those emotions either which is a mote recent experience than her father. Hence why she blew up at her sister's play which portrayed her sexual history, that put her in that situation, as something she was escaping into because she liked it. But in reality if you look at all of Cassie's scenes with sex, I don't think she was ever participating as something she wanted to do as opposed to pleasing the boys who were happy to have at her. Alot of people say her scenes with sex is gratuitous but I think its proving a point, that she falls into the situations because she's constantly pleasing others. That is why I can't be mad at her for Nate. She's messed up for not saying something earlier when Maddy was talking about getting back together with Nate. But because she's always trying to please and be in good graces she instead just let the guilt eat her. Nate is the true evil. Cassie and Maddy need to talk and go against him but Cassie has such low self esteem she'll break down and believe what everyone is saying to her about how terrible she is. There is no wide spread rule that swears off exs. That's childish behavior, which is ironic because they are children.
“Cassie is a frustrating character” “Cassie is engaging character” “Cassie is subjected to Nate’s abuse” “Cassie was great. But is frustrating and pathetic now.” “Cassie has been hurt because of her past.” All valid takes that aren’t mutually exclusive. They’re all correct and don’t contrast.
She really is literally each and every one of those things all at once. I want to shake some sense into her while also living for the drama while also wanting to drag her out of Nate's house and into safety while also wanting to see Maddie smack her upside the head while also never wanting to see her character on screen again but also waiting in anticipation to see what batshit thing she does next.
How is Nate tamer this season? He literally held Maddy at gunpoint, also people seem to ignore that he's currently undermining and treating Cassie like utter shit, comparing her to his first victim. It seems like it's a lust thing for him, he literally called her Maddy and has constant daydreams about Jules.
fans love to excuse and justify Nate and Cassie for what they have done to Maddy just because they are "broken" but have no sympathy towards Maddy. You can even see the comparisons in how many videos there are about Cassie or Nate compared to Maddy and her trauma about being in an abusive relationship.
@@whoisthisperson8454 A big part of that, which no one discusses, is the fact that Maddy is Latina. Race plays a big part in how people react to individuals involved in some problem or conflict. Consistently, we can observe less empathy and compassionate for minorities. If Cassie were a Latina and Maddy was a white blond character, we wouldn't see people excusing or justifying Cassie's behaviour as much.
@@senecak1345 Bruh dude its not really about that. It's just that when you see Maddy's backstory it is not as heartbreaking as Cassie's. that's why people don't really like Maddy. But yeah regardless people defending cassie should stop
I was really sympathetic towards Cassie up until I saw her say nothing as Maddy cried not about Nate--but the loss of the friendship. And I think what you stated about watching Rue try to ACTIVELY be a good person even as she struggles to give up her drugs is really what makes the difference.
I know it’s hard to sympathize with Cassie in that case but I have to point out that there’s this tendency to sympathize with Rue when some of her actions are arguably worse The scene you mentioned, Cassie is running away. After failing to justify her actions in any way that makes sense to others (because that’s not really possible), she shut down and ran away. That’s what we’re seeing when Cassie is on the other side of the door and Maddie is almost begging her to just say something. Yes, Rue is actively trying to become a better person. She’s also been through treatment and is much more aware of her issues now than when they first started. And yet, S2E5 happened. Cassie hasn’t had her chance to try, at least in a way that’s comparable to Rue’s experience getting clean, then going back, and then getting clean again. Cassie and Rue are at different stages of addiction. Did you have sympathy for Rue when she was physically violent toward her family (specifically during the intervention of episode 5)? That was part of her struggle with drugs. That wasn’t the beginning, before she was able to step back and truly reflect on the damage she was capable of. That was after she had already gotten treatment. The reason I say this is that it baffles me that people can be so sympathetic toward Rue even when it feels like her recovery is back and forth, and especially when the path she takes hurts other people deeply, but as soon as the question is Cassie, people give up. To then not extend that kind of sympathy to Cassie, someone just starting out on that spiral, destroying relationships and her life, in pursuit of this one thing that she thinks she needs to survive, doesn’t make logical sense. Rue’s choices to say and do horrible things to her loved ones is not excused by her drug use or struggles with mental health, yet she still deserves compassion. I don’t see why Cassie’s situation is different. She doesn’t need to be a likable person who makes the choices that align with our values in order for us to feel basic compassion for her.
@@pineapple20777 I think people can be more sympathetic towards rue because drugs genuinely hijack your brain and your thinking, and on top of that rue has dual diagnosis. Rues brain and body NEED her drugs. They both absolutely deserve sympathy but comparing them especially if you’re talking about rue while she’s in active addiction/withdrawal is like apples to oranges.
I find it way more easy to sympathize with Cassie because everyone jumps on the bandwagon of bullying her while making excuses for Rue and never ever holding Maddy accountable for her God awful actions at all. And don't get me started on Jules and Kat. Every character on this show is as or more problematic than Cassie, she's just an easy target.
@@tarakennedy707 I mean Maddie’s “god awful” actions were made while she was in the midst of an abusive relationship. And people are incredibly hard on her character. People are hard on all of their characters. The worst thing Maddie did (we don’t even know if she made a statement against Tyler I don’t remember seeing that) is something that Nate was influencing. He forced Tyler to confess as well so he had no chance of fighting it in court. He blackmailed Jules to submit a false eyewitness report. Also…. They’re not real: they can’t be bullied! Weird choice of words!
I was disappointed with Cassie's reaction once the affair was actually revealed. On Maddy's birthday in the jacuzzi scene, after she vomits she repeatedly says "I'm sorry Maddy, I ruined everything, I didn't mean it, you're my best friend" - which made it seem like she was at her core, a misguided child, immature but genuinely remorseful. But afterwards, she tries to turn the blame on Rue, doesn't say so much as a sorry to Maddy, and takes no accountability. So I guess there won't be much of a redemption. Edit: for clarification I meant that it doesn't seem like the writers intend to redeem her anytime soon, not that she's completely gone
I think it might be also because she was drunk in the jacuzzi and somewhere very deep down she is sorry, but she still thinks that she loves and needs nate more than maddy
@@cindyh.6011 right, people here in the comments keep saying “redemption only comes after you’ve realized your actions”, but the thing is she DOES realize her wrongdoings, she just doesn’t want to do anything about it.
one thing i think deserves acknowledgement is how traumatizing it is for girls to be continuously sexualized at such a young age. cassie was basically groomed by everyone around her to submit to demands of the patriarchy and establish her self identity through pleasing men at the expense of her own well being. the only form of positive reinforcement she received was through compliments about her appearance and how desirable she was. pair that with the fact that she didn't receive guidance from her parents to nurture and establish her self-worth, it makes sense to me that she behaves the way she does. its a sociocultural issue as much as it is a freudian issue. and i think that external factor explains why lexi's trauma manifested in a much different way than cassie's despite going through the exact same thing. lexi's growth was internal and her dreams/accomplishments reflected that. if cassie was encouraged to explore her self worth outside of her sexuality, she might've dedicated more of her time to ice skating, or even strengthening her female relationships. this doesn't excuse her behavior, as you mentioned, but i think it's one really important detail that i haven't heard anyone talk about yet.
These conversations are so important to be happening and I've actually never watched this show but I've learned of Cassie and even without seeing it have related so much to her that I stopped myself from watching it because of the exact thing you just said. It's almost identical to how I grew up. When the only thing you are rewarded for as a girl is looks, you never have the incentive to go deeper and therefore always struggle with self esteem. We tell women in society that the most valuable thing we have to offer is beauty and sex/sexuality, then we scold women for being vain AND sexual. It's an ultimate tool of control, and "looks" fade, being fully human is denied to us.
SO TRUE BESTIE we need to talk more about this because i know in high school i felt like my worth was pretty much based on how i looked because when i’d be complimented by boys that’s all they’d comment on and nothing outside of that. Makes you think that it’s your only value
I literally have hated her character and her story line. I thought it was really triggering and sexists. Definitely written by a man. I Feel like her character is uninteresting with no depth. And tbh I felt that was a lack of respect to the character and the actress. because she was pigeonholed into being the naked eye candy. and this is the first insight I have read that actually makes me understand it better
@@lauralimon4283 I completely agree, and I felt the same way you did!!! after doing more research about Sam, and seeing how much collaboration and care there is between the creators and the actors, I began to consider that as much purpose and thought goes into every aspect of the show, Cassie's story is ultimately no different. I know there's definitely still details about the show that are problematic when you consume it critically, but ultimately Cassie's character is not at all glamorous... she's quite embarrassing and unlikable; there's so much of her character that isn't "sexy," but still, you can tell shes wounded and I think thats the point yunno?
Exactlyyy Cassie was sexually harrassed by family members and ended up sexualizing herself. I relate to her a lot because i went throught it during my childhood
props to you for never using the misogynistic definition of daddy issues thats only ever weaponized again women when, at it’s core, it’s an experience of emotions that anyone with the struggle of abandon, neglect or abuse by one’s fatherhood figure can deal with
Right? It’s always meant to demean but never to generalize how people suffer from it. It’s like being malicious to someone for showing the common affects of a traumatic experience.
A lot of people interpret her not saying anything to Maddie when she's yelling at cassie outside the bathroom door as her lack of care for Maddie's feelings, but I think it just is an expression of Cassie understanding the gravity of her actions- what could she possibly say to make it ok? If she just apologized it would have felt pathetic at best and wouldn't change the situation. I think we see her guilt and hatred for her actions frequently like in the hot tub scene when she's vomiting and apologizing to Maddie over and over. I mean, she wouldn't have gotten drunk and freaked out and cried so much if maddie werent in the picture. I think she really does love maddie and is just struggling between that love and her insane desperation for male validation - she just picked what was easier. Ofc I'm not happy with her actions tho.
As much as I hate cassie's transgression, I do think it's realistic for her character. People often let their traumatic experiences dictate their ability to make choices, and sometimes they hit rock bottom before they decide to stay there or pick themselves up. So I don't think what happened to her atm is an example of levinson's bad writing at all
also to add character development doesn't always mean the character will develop into a "good" person & I put that in quotes because the aspect of morality in this show isn't black or white so its very loose ya know
@@wpc456cpw i can say all of that because trauma fucked me up too and lead me to make lots of terrible choices haha, but I'm trying my best to turn my life around now haha
@@Kaastengels i can relate :) my teenage years were tumultuous and painful bc of trauma too. Proud of you for turning things around, healing is the bravest journey ever ❤️ sending love
@@wpc456cpw I wish I can say that I'm mostly successful in turning things around because I still slip up every now and then, but until then I'm not going to stop trying. Thank you for the kind words though :) I hope everything is going well with you now ♥
I think Cassie having an abortion also traumatized her. People dont talk about how difficult having an abortion is for some people. Especially when you are young and pressured to get one. Cassie loved Mckay, and seemed to want the baby before Mckay pressured her to get an abortion. She wanted a guy to love her and wanted a family with him. But she got one because she wanted to make Mckay happy. It didnt show it in the show really, but an abortion is a super invasive procedure and bloody. Even super early in the pregnancy. I can totally see how she spiraled and got with Nate.
yessss people who are super pro choice act like it’s no big deal. I’m pro choice too but I think sex ed to prevent abortions in the first place is important
@@ellehasling3456 absolutely! Pro the choice to use protection to prevent pregnancy, too, it’s not all about the the choice to get an abortion. There should be multiple choices done along the way to prevent it. It can be as traumatising as a miscarriage, nobody should have to make that choice.
I may be in the minority but I felt that Lexi’s play was very cruel to her sister. I don’t see how anyone in Cassie’s place wouldn’t have felt deeply humiliated and hurt by their sibling showing the entire school every mistake they ever made and portraying them as a vapid, airheaded cartoon to be laughed at. Especially the carousel scene, that went way too far. I think deep down Lexi wanted to be a little cruel to her sister out of anger that has been pent up over the years. (And I’m a Lexi fan!) Cassie’s reaction was very immature but I don’t think any teen would’ve reacted in a rational way if their sibling did that to them.
I agree! So many viewers supported the play and I totally understand, Cassie betrayed her best friend, she went after her little sister, and it’s entertaining TV. But even knowing that I thought it was still very cruel and humiliating. Lexi was even worried that Cassie would spiral if she saw it and it’s really no shock that it ended up happening.
I agree, but I feel like Lexi has always had to be the mature one, supporting all the broken people in her life -- her dad, her mom, her sister, her best friend. I feel like, despite Lexi's insistence that her intentions were good, the play was her way of lashing out. Comparing Lexi to the show's audience this season, her patience for her sister has worn out.
i agree. the carousel scene and the “i love fu*king everything” was literally slut-shaming. so many women suffer daily because of misogyny and seeing so many people cheering and laughing at that was absolutely disgusting. however i feel like this wasn’t lexi’s intention, maybe in the script she was supposed to show that scene and then talk about all the misogyny cassie had to go through (remember most guys she was with posted online the s*x tapes without her consent) and she was gonna talk about all the nice things her sister has done during their childhood, etc., but cassie interrupted lexi and was having an emotional outburst in front of the whole crowd and it was too late. but again, it’s just my theory because i refuse to believe lexi is that evil.
when maddie said ‘this is just the start’ when cassie said nate broke up with her and it was dead silent, then that one tear went down her face. that was so sinister and telling of what’s to come of caddie’s arc and the dark turns this relationship with nate and cassie will take. it’s going to reveal so much about cassie and her psyche
The scene where She move to nate's and She punch him while crying meant so much. It was like she was with her father. Huging him and being held like a child , while pushing him like a little girl who's trauing a tandrum. Cry and resenting him for always leaving her behind and not loving her as much as She love him. She hate him,but can't live without the idea of love because She had nothing els left and it all She ever wanted, her daddy to love her and stay by her side, loving her enough to stay and fight what in their way to be together. Yet she resent him for what he made her do.but It's herself She hate the most because at the end it was her choice and her insecurity , her need of being loved that Made her ruin her life. while at the same time she is brainwashing herslef that " it is worth it, It is love", to escape the guilt. And to leave the guilt , she put it on other she find excuse and Put herslef again in the little girl role by saying ITS nate fault, and saying She did it for him. And in a way it's true that its her father fault....
Also nobody seems to talk about how when this season starts were seeing her just after she had an abortion that she wasnt really sure about having? pretty traumatic, of course shes gonna be spiralling now. plus all those sex tapes leaked that she didnt even want to do
Yea. People don't really understand that having an abortion, even a very early one, can cause something similar to post-partum because your body goes from being pregnant to not pregnant. It can be pretty severe for a lot of women.
Yet no one seems to mention this and this is what bothers me about how they wrote her character in season 2. We just glossed over the abortion and during the scenes after nobody, not even her mother, is acknowledging the traumatic effects this has on her...but yet now she's this "bad" person, but hey I guess they needed a villian...but to try to reedeem Nate and not Cassie?!!!! ..smh
@@cutieangelpie101 it’s realistic, you think people acknowledge the trauma and vulnerability of abortions in every day life? In the state of Texas?? No. It’s story telling and whether it’s told how you like it or not, it’s the story that’s playing out.
Another dimension of the Rue vs. Cassie paternal trauma is one of closure. It's why I don't completely disagree with Cassie when she addresses how difficult things have been for her and Lexi in the fight with her mom, though she comes off as venomous and unsympathetic. At the end of the day, Rue and Gia know they had a good father, who loved them and made sure they knew they were loved. Cassie (and Lexi) have to move forward with the weight of knowing their father "chose" drugs over the wellbeing of their family, and the ambiguity of what role (if any) he may play in their lives going forward. This is why I think Cassie's journey is particularly complicated.
Right. Also, her feelings of hurt that her dad became an addict and abandoned her for them could also reasonably make her a little irrationally harsh on Rue. After what addiction has done to her family I think that makes some kind of sense.
But they’re still excuses at the end of the day, she acknowledged it to undermine everyone else and make her shitty actions OK, despite knowing the abuse Nate put her best friend through, and that what she was doing was irrational and a product of her trauma, she still did it. It no longer holds true when it’s no longer unconscious.
@@biomutant1468 Maddie doesn't have a fault in this but you need to remember she wanted to get back with Nate even after all the abuse, so yes, he was Maddy's abuser but she still wanted to come back to him. So I can see why Cassie kinda crave for that type of connection, after being at her lowest and drunk, she just decided Nate was the answer, knowing how deeply attached he could be to a person (exactly what she wanted) so she fool herself into believe they weren't nothing at the moment even though she knew Maddy wanted to be with him again, later she also fooled herself to destroy the toxic relationship they had by having a relationship herself with Nate, trying to protect both of them (? Cassie fooled herself in many ways, justifying her actions so she doesn't see the horrid true. You can see how a flawed character she is but exactly understand how everything where were it went. And still I don't see why people keep saying she was with the abuser knowingly when 1 she isn't in a well mental state to completely get that, as you can see I think in episode 4 when she thinks both (Maddy and Nate) were wrong in the relationship and 2 not even Maddy believe that in this whole season until she found out about Nate and Cassie. In any case, Maddy needed to distanced herself from Nate and her relationship with him to finally see him as the shitty person he was, and if the Cassie and Nate stuff didn't happened she would still be with him.
I lost my father during college and the amount of support, love, affection and reassuring that I received was overwhelming. So her line about how different it is for Rue and Cassie, broke my heart. And it is something that I have noticed in real life, so many fathers abandon their families and the kids live with such shame and felling of rejection. While my feeling toward the lost of my father are of being brave and supported to over come such trauma. So I totally understood where she was coming from
I personally think it’s not “only” daddy issues, I’m pretty sure that Cassie has undiagnosed BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder), which would explain her tendency to get so attached to men so easily and so obsessively and her emotional instability. People with undiagnosed bpd put their fear of being abandoned above anything else and are willing to do anything in their power to stop that from happening. And it just makes so much sense for Cassie, especially combined with her severe daddy issues: seeing her in s1 forcing herself to consent to the s*x tapes so her current partner wouldn’t abandon her, pretending she doesn’t know anything about the rumors about her with McKay so he wouldn’t leave her, considering to have a baby so she and McKay could be together forever, and the list goes on with Nate as well. Cassie has presented other BPD traits in many ways: struggles with identity (dressing up as Jules in 2x03 and as Maddy in 2x03 and 2x07/2x08 to make Nate happy and making sure he doesn’t abandon her, also the “I don’t know if I’m a good person”), has extreme low self-esteem, craves constant validation and attention, has emotional outbursts, impulsive actions and decisions, self-h*rm and/or substance abuse to cope with pain (alcohol in her case), suic*de threats, sees people around her as either good or evil and nothing else in between (for example, she was supportive towards Rue until she told everyone about her and Nate. So Rue = good; after 2x05 Rue = evil) and her opinions change constantly, dissociation, promiscuity, feels love and emotions deeply, obsessive behaviors (in 2x03, when she wakes up at 4 am and dresses up for Nate, her thoughts aren’t “I wanna look cute for Nate”, but more like “Only when Nate acknowledges me I will be worth of existing”). She’s one of the most complex and fascinating characters of Euphoria and I can’t wait to see her in Season 3! (Also loved your video, I completely agree with you)
I agree, I think she fits the bill for BPD, especially bc it usually arises from trauma (being abandoned by her father, entering toxic relationships where she’s being used, being told all she’s good for is her body, and getting into that mess with Nate)
@@opalminx8240 but that's how mental issues are formed. people usually develop mental disorders because of their traumatic experiences, so she could have a disorder or be neurodivergent... who knows
What I find weird is why do we excuse Jules? She did the same thing as Cassie, she cheated on Rue with Elliot when Rue was high on drugs. I know it wasn't on an extreme level as Cassie , but deserves at least 30% of the fire Cassie gets.
Maybe I have to go watch the first few ep again but did they ever actually have a conversation about them having a monomagous relationship? Bc I remember in Rue's special episode, her inreliable narratability was basically called out bc she formed this fantasy in her head that they were together and that Jules cheated on her just bc they started hooking up. Jules is wrong for sneaking around about it tho, so I can definitely see the "cheating" part
@@g.o.a.t8208 I feel like a monogamous relationship was definitely implied for their relationship during the second season unlike in the first season. We see Jules getting hurt over Rue and Elliot's relationship and felt threatened and insecure by the though of Rue having feelings for him. If Jules didn't want Rue being with anyone then the same sentiment should be applied to her.
@@izelfranco55 Yea, on that last part thats why I feel like a lot of ppl criticize her or accuse her of cheating bc of her being a hypocrite there. I really wish the directors/writers would have actually had them have a conversation bc a big reason why their relationship doesnt work is bc they aren't transparent with each other.
she definitely has been getting a lot of hate this season but yeah i agree people pick and choose who to be angry with, i havent seen nearly as much backlash this season with nate as i have jules or cassie
I hope cassie gets a special episode like Jules and rue. I think that would bring a lot more empathy from viewers and really dive into her traumatic past
Something I love about Euphoria (and why its title is perfect), is that it compares the disease of drug addiction to an addiction to validation and infatuation. Both are shortcuts to emotional highs that make it feel like our deeper wounds are healed, even if only for a moment. But while drug addiction is being increasingly recognized as a sickness that needs treatment and not an inherent personality trait, people who keep seeking out destructive and abusive relationships are still seen as inherently broken people, rather than people with serious but treatable mental health issues. Everything about explaining but not excusing still applies here, but I think it's a valuable comparison and really enlightening for my own life as well.
I would love to see a video on Jules. A lot of people hate her this season and said she never loved Rue but I think her character is A lot more complex than that. Well, I wanna see a whole video in the Rue, Jules, and Elliot dynamic.
I think Jules loves Rue, but Rue is lost even her mom gave up at the end, that's why I think Jules getting in a relationship with someone is the best, Rue is in autodestruction mode, asking Jules to stay with her is almost saying go and destroy yourselves together, not good, Jules has to put herself first, we already saw that even when Jules was loving her a lot Rue keep killing herself and that made Jules unhappy all their relationship
I think because a lot of the audience consists of teenagers, or even those in their early 20's- Cassie (among other characters) are judged incredibly harshly. I'm not defending her actions by any means, but as a 27 year old looking back, those years are almost inevitably messy. You're going to make mistakes, you're going to hurt people, and hopefully you grow from it. It's easier to feel more compassion for a character like Cassie when you know she's traumatized, young and dumb. If she carries on for decades, that's another story; but Euphoria is a coming of age, and we all have to forgive ourselves and others for the damage along the way.
You are partly right about this. I'm 25 now and I do believe in change and redemption, I have seen it happen and when I look back in my teenage years I laugh with some situations. You grow up and things don't matter the same anymore. The thing is, situations that take place in our teenage years do shape some of the ideas and values we keep in he future. Here we have Cassie, a troubled girl with a lot of issues who as you say make mistakes and trying to find her way through life. How about the people she hurts in he process though? Maybe they get over it. Maybe not. Don't you think that a situation like that will possibly fuck up Maddy maybe for ever? Getting out of an abusive relationship and then having your best friend betraying you by throughing it in your face? I can give you a 60% possiblity she never trusts a friend the same way again. So what if Cassie grows up and change? The people she hurt maybe traumatized from it forever. The same way a kid who has been bullied maybe never forget it.
@@x.s.6441 Look let's not forget Maddy committed an actual crime that ruined a dudes life I don't think that compares to the impact of having a skanky friend betray you lol she'll be fine 😛
Such a great video! I'd argue though that Cassie is a serial monogamist rather than promiscuous since a lot of her "promiscuity" in season 1 is assumed based on her looks and the revenge porn that was shared of her.
@@ayeilak5 Oh yeah carousel, my bad. Yeah she was on Molly, but that just made her lower her inhibitions, didn't turn her into a completely different person. She is promiscuous, nothing inherently wrong with that, except in her case it is just to get validation.
@@Hugo-G she was embarrassed enough abt that to cry after it happened though. nothing against people who just like to have a lot of sex with a lot of people though, i just feel like people kind of forget some details abt that scene and use it as a way to say cassie "never had class"
I see a lot of myself in Cassie when I was younger. Being ‘comfortable’ with misery looks pathetic but the truth is she probably doesn’t know how to get help. People need role models and Cassie does not have a lot of good ones at all.
I think the idea that the people who have “lost sympathy” for Cassie simply means they never really understood or wanted to understand her to begin with. I find myself deeply empathizing with the things she does because I can see exactly the ways her mind forces her to do things, even when she likely doesn’t understand why she does the things she does herself. I understand she isn’t a good person. Simultaneously I can understand that she is a deeply damaged person.
@@Marcus-iz7vq I totally agree with you, the things I see people say about cassies character online! It’s like they never even watched the show. Or any of her scenes.
people forget that one scene where they literally confirmed how big of a people pleasing problem she has. When in an alternative sequence they showed what would've happened had she said no to things that brought her problems in the end. Cassie has a problem with giving into her in the moment impulses and inability to say no. these are signifiers of severe childhood trauma
I have sympathy and empathy for all the characters. We're all humans making mistakes, learning and making mistakes again. All the characters have daddy and mommy issues not just Cassie. All characters have abandonment issues too.
I think the conversation Maddie had with her boss was foreshadowing Cassie's fate, that she will manage to change but her and Maddie's relationship will always be strained because of what happened
This video explains it so well. I think people forget that mental illness and healing from trauma isn’t beautiful. They tend to ignore and be disgusted when mental illness isn’t just being sad. When people are cruel and even gross. People dismiss the root cause and blame the person. Something that really changed my view was the idea that how someone feels is important and valid but what you do with that feeling isn’t. How Cassie feels is important, but she has a victim state of mind. As in she always sees herself as a victim. She hurts and that’s okay, but her taking it out on other isn’t. People will pity you until you do something bad or mean or gross. Then they think you’re pathetic, but they’ll never see you as a person.
I felt so bad for her when she told Nate “I want to belong to you, everything I do is for you, you can tell me what to do and what to wear and control everything I do etc”. It reminds me of when girls think that putting themselves lower will be seen as a plus and will make the guy want you more. She’s completely reliant on these men to give her any sense of self worth to the point where she lets herself be almost owned by these men. She wants so badly to be taken care of that she makes herself reliant on them. I feel that a lot of people associate being taken care of with being loved and treasured because if I guy did really love you he would want to take care of you like a father would his daughter. Problem is that he didn’t offer to. Making her feel like he has given her this validation when in reality he didn’t. Now she’s entirely reliant on him but the connection isn’t actually strong in real life. He even dumped her very soon after.
One of my favorite part about Cassie’s arc this season is that it’s facilitated such an interesting & dynamic discourse about childhood trauma and hyper sexualization. I hope a lot of people can take away that it’s not about being in the right or wrong, it’s about complexity, and hopefully, sometimes, an ability to improve on ourselves.
Honestly, Cassie is my favorite character. I always had a lot of sympathy for her, mainly because she always struggled alone. Rue has her mother, sister, Lexi and Fez who look out for her and support her through rehab. Maddy has her girls and the mother of the kid she babysits for. Yes, there are other characters with problems, who don't really have people, but Cassie's issues get belittled by her "people". Her mother isn't there for her, her father left them, Lexi puts on a play depicting her as the perfect person in whose shadow she's standing, Nate isn't really sympathetic. She doesn't have anyone, and yes, this might be her fault, but how is she supposed to get better this way. I don't see her as a completely good person, but I do see her struggles. I have nothing against the other characters, just wanted to show that from Cassies standpoint, they aren't helping.
@@gabrielaalves6977 yea but I think their friendship wasn’t portrayed like the deep, trustful friendship. There weren’t many scenes of Maddy actually being there for Cassie and in my memory, they only started to portray them as friends after a lot of stuff already happened to Cassie. It’s been a while since I watched the show tho. Again, it’s not like I think Cassie is perfect or the other ones have it easy, but she’s kinda my favourite character. I think her character is quite tragic and I like those type of stories.
Something I always say when talking about the show is that our trauma can contextualize our actions but it doesn't excuse them. And we can learn to synthesize with any person but doesn't mean we don't hold them accountable.
Do you feel that this is a somewhat American problem? Wanting likeable characters or moral integrity over compexity and good storytelling? I don't see this as much in films and shows from Europe (whether that's UK, Germany, France, Italy, etc). European film also does not seem to value purity as much in female characters. The US also seems very forgiving towards male characters and "burn her at the stake" to anyone not male.
Yeah maybe also an age thing. Nuance is lost on a lot of the teenage Euphoria viewers who are vocal on social media. But you're right American media can stomach unlikeable traits in male characters much more than female ones.
Absolutely agree! I think this is partially because of social media (a place where you can cultivate a likable and perfect life/fake personality). People now expect a cookie-cutter image from every other kind of media or else it’s “problematic”. Also, when you factor the main demographic of young people/teens into the mix, you get a million complaints from older generations of tv “glorifying” harmful things, even when it isn’t. According to them, using a young, attractive actor or actress to portray a flawed character suddenly means it’s being glorified. 🙄 It reminds me of how US media used the “Hayes Code” before the 1960’s. The movies could only portray certain characters if they were punished for their harmful behavior in the end of the plot (especially promiscuous or LGBT characters). Other plots couldn’t be shown at all. This was meant to reinforce morals, even if they were unrealistic. Now, most Americans expect our media to only reinforce good morals instead of telling a strong story. It seems to be a cultural thing AKA ‘moral panic’. Your point about gender definitely seems to be true. I think it’s called the “wh*re/Madonna complex”. I watch a lot of media analysis and this mentality is very common. Even women have it.
Thank you for saying that this so true. People don't like Cassie but there are people cheering for Nate. In the shows Mad men Don Draper was messed up as parent but his ex wife Betty was seen as more messed up. Same in The Sopranos with Tony and his wife, Breaking Bad Walter and his wife. Women and girls are a given more hostilely for there wrong doings then men and boys.
We don't want likeable characters or moral integrity because those don't always make a good show. Hating Cassie doesn't mean that they don't like the storytelling. Edit Reply: You can hate Cassie and her actions and still recognize that she's a well written character and crucial to the complexity of Euphoria. What are you not understanding? People do not HAVE to love her for having sex with Maddies bf just because she is well written.
People can have a trouble past and do terrible things because of it. However, accountability is still there. Having a hard childhood can be an explanation but one still has to reap their consequences in the end. She has what’s coming for her.
This was a really well done video. I haven’t seen euphoria yet, but I know a lot about Cassie thanks to tiktok thinking I’ve seen this show lol. You did a really good job explaining a lot of the videos I’ve been seeing on it
I genuinely see her as someone with severe undiagnosed BPD. as someone with bpd myself I act exactly like this when I spiral, especially when it's with my favorite person. when you're in that mindset all that matters is what you can do to prevent yourself from feeling/being abandoned and getting the attention you need to survive and the attention you lacked as a child. It doesn't matter how it just matters when. I've lost friends, I've been in abusive relationship after abusive relationship and cassies story in season 2 reminds me of a situation I've been in twice down to a T and I cannot describe how disheartening it is to see a character clearly hurting the same way you did, being told that they're being dramatic and even as far as wishing that their scu*cide attempt in episode 6 was successful. Because you've attempted the same thing under the same conditions. it genuinely makes me sick to see sometimes. I 100% agree with you saying that an excuse is an explanation but an explanation isnt always an excuse because in my opinion, cassie needs to be sent to the nearest mental hospital and far away from nate, I'm not sure why they didn't take her in as soon as her mom and sister realized that her fear of abandonment was so great that they had to hide knives in fear that she would harm herself. and I hate the way it was played off for a quick laugh. but that's besides the point, cassie needs serious help.
Casie is the topic that I comment every week after a new episode. I cared for her in season 1 because her situation is similar to some girls that I had know and is not a easy one at all. Season 2 is a conflicting watch coming from that place of empathy but as you said, it's such an fascinating turn for her character. I also think that she can be redeemable and I'm very excited to see what would be her last moment in the last episode and next season. Also the most insufferable thing about this arc is watching Nate more often.
@@Overseer2579 you just chose to pick two extremely sinister people throughout history as examples so it’d create conflict😒 are they redeemable? To the most forgiving people perhaps… but regardless, they’d still have to do the work. Psychological, mental, & emotional work.
It's interesting to see how the characters, and we the audience, treat two different kinds of addiction. Drugs are vilified, and rightfully so, but love addiction has been lauded as "true love" for generations and is just now being recognized as harmful.
I used to have a best friend who I would consider a Cassie, as in she would do absolutely anything to get male validation and attention. I don’t think she’s been single since she was thirteen. She was mean, manipulative, did many horrible things to me and other people she called friends because of the boys she was seeing. It is so fucking sad. I finally had to let her go because I realized I would never be as important to her than her need for male attention. 🤷🏻♀️
@@isabelhawkins8955 I know plenty of girls like this. Ones I grew up with that went on to be forever girlfriends and ones that probably will too someday. I've suggested to these types before that they try to be single and they look at me like an enemy. Their impulse isn't thought of as an addiction, won't be treated like an addiction, and the fallout (rushed marriages, unplanned kids) will be celebrated without question. Imagine if we treated heroin like that.
I think Cassie's family dynamics with her sister and mother are also very complex and interesting - the scene where she stabs her wrist with a corkscrew and says she wants to die and their reactions to it is very emotional and intense, and all three of them just immediately move on in such a realistic but heartbreaking way. I like all three characters and appreciate the nuanced depiction of a dysfunctional family.
First of all, phenomenal video. Second of all, the difference between "explanation" and "excuse" is something I talk about all the time in our trauma-informed, cancel-culture based, gen z world and I'm so happy to hear someone else talk about it to and the clear way it manifests in the context of this show. Such interesting insight, and like I said, freaking phenomenal video.
I think Cassie put it to words herself when she brought up the point to her mom somewhere in season 2 while they were fighting that Rue's father died, but her father left, and Rue gets all this sympathy and shit for this while she doesn't.
3:03 i found it intriguing that nate found his dads collection at 11, but his mom says that he began to get violent around 8-9. if she is correct, this would mean that nate’s anger didn’t stem from his dad, but that it was a part of him the entire time. this contradicts euphoria’s usual way of storytelling and explanation, causing disruption in the viewers’ perception of the characters. we no longer look at what the children were subjected to, but how they subjected themselves to the same things long after they had autonomy over their lives. great video!!!
hmm and tbh I thought it was weird how he went through his dad's collection in such a methodical manner. writing down the way they were color coordinated and even the way they were facing. plus, how young was he when he started working out vigorously?
Because Lexi could go to their mom. Even through the show you can see that she and suze had the same attitude towards their dad or how whenever Cassie is having what could very well be a manic episode they say “we don’t care” and judge her together. Suze always talks about her youth and Cassie’s body while telling her that her body is all anyone could want her for. Then the first few seconds of the play, Lexi talks about how she wants to be wanted buy guys and how her sister is always chosen. They literally hate her and try to portray it as caring about her
Not the same at all, Cassie is the older sister and was mostly aware of everything and had such a profound bond with her father while Lexie was younger when the problems happened and distanced from the whole family to protect herself. And she wasn't that close to her father too, instead she was more happy when he left
@Aurora Borea all women go through sexualization and objectification, thats just living in the patriarchy. Cassie lacks perspective so see herself away from that.
@@jama3997 They care about her, Lexi just felt jealous as all sisters do. Both lexi and her mom were fed up with Cassie’s behavior because it was narcissistic.
All the characters including Cassie are fascinating and interesting; people really don’t seem to understand that you don’t have to condone or agree with their actions/thought processes.
Finally someone sharing my opinion! Let's not forget she's manipulated by Nate who's directly feeding into her needs and cravings of male validation and attention :(
@@basiatomaszewska9269 Because we're all used to his bs by now. It's not shocking that's he's trying to control another girl the problem is Cassie feeds into that the same way Nate does. He wants a woman who's perfect and does what she's told and Cassie literally went as far as saying "you can control what I EAT!" Like girl what?
as someone who relates to this character to damn near a T, this analysis is really validating, i love me a nuanced villain. ppl so often hear an explanation and get upset that someone in the wrong would even dare to have an explanation for their actions and double on the blame bc it doesnt hold up as an excuse. it should never have been an excuse in the first place and it sucks to see this narrative that cassie is “showing her true colors” when rlly no one showed up for each other in the sea of red flags (s1) and this is where it brought them. there’s truth to it obviously but the phrase “true colors” is so unsympathetic in light of what we know abt her, like she’s been plotting for ages to ruin everyone’s life or something idk. You can usually see when a character’s negative actions are a cry for help, but then instead of getting help they are either demonized with no sympathy or what they do is excused bc of trauma and we pretend that being forgiven will solve their problems. it wont, in cassie’s case therapy will solve her problems, working until she genuinely feels like she’s worthy of forgiveness will solve her problems, and i hope she gets that redemption in the end.
I'm so glad you made this video. Your earlier Euphoria video "Teen Melodrama: How Euphoria Gets It Right" is what initially got me into this show and it quickly became one of my favourites of the past few years. It was such a welcome surprise to see Cassie's growth this season, Sydney Sweeney really stepped up her game as an actress. Whenever she's on screen now I'm definitely paying attention. Especially her outburst against Nate in ep. 4 was such a great performance. Honestly there's few characters this season that *didn't* improve in some way, much to the credit of both the creators and actors of the show. I'm so excited (and a bit scared too, honestly) for the season finale this sunday...
we often forget that we can sympathise with someone without agreeing that theyre not exactly a good character even if their pasts could justify their behaviours. many of us are swayed by the glamorisation of some depictions in movies. we see people rooting for joker, harley and wanda for the same reason some try to justify cassie and defending her. there are real people out there who would use their childhood trauma to justify their lack of accountability in their actions. a lot of characters are perceived as tolerated or excusable when they’re too broken to fix and have these amazing trauma stories. i think every victim in movies(and irl)has a potential to become the antagonist and inflict pain on others. it’s understandable but its just inexcusable.
here's an important point: every human being deserves our compassion. still, that does not mean we should absolve anyone of responsibility for his or her own actions
She reminds me a lot of Effy from Skins, Effy hurt so many people and used her pain as an excuse and everyone LOVES Effy, I don’t really love either of theses characters honestly but it’s so weird how so many people idolize Effy and hate Cassie when they’re actually very similar characters
because effy's character and her personality flaws/mental illnesses have been glamorized and presented as something to vouch for as young girls. Whereas on the contrary, Cassie's character flaws/mental health problems have been demonized and presented as comical. They used the entire "broken beautiful sad girl with mental issues" trope as a fetishization of the character. Whereas the same trope has been used to really portray the horrible effects it can have on someone through Cassie. Both of them are poorly written characters. Cassie's is just more grounded in reality
If Cassie does finally come to her senses and finally gets help she’d actually be one of my favorite characters. I would like to see her apologize to the people she’s hurt and I wanna see her finally comfortable without a man in her life.
If you’re into anime, you’ll know that excusing a character and thinking they did “nothing wrong” is a thing that many fans to do many characters (that are terrible people) specifically that are attractive
I don’t watch Euphoria but I’ve seen enough of it, but Cassie definitely gets a lot of flack [online] basically maddy=good and cassie=bad. This sentiment coming from 14-19yr olds probably. Truth is a lot of teens are actually pretty similar to Cassie and it’s easier to just place the villain label on her. I wonder how people who viewed euphoria would think about Cassie as an older version of themselves
Actually no, a lot of teens aren't similar to Cassie which is why she has a lack of sympathy. Cassie's situation is a rare tragedy which is not common in today's teens.
How much do u think the trauma of Cassie having to get an abortion plays into her actions and emotions this season? I feel like it's part of her story that hasn't rly been addressed enough I believe it to be an important justification for her actions this season.
Explanation vs excuse - pretty relevant when it comes to apologies too - when you try to explain yourself during an apology, everyone always sees it as an excuse, when rly, you're just trying to explain your side
Honestly the main thing for me is just that Sydney Sweeney is such a phenomenal actress that I am glad she was given such a complex and emotionally disturbed storyline so we got to see her full talents
She grew up only being valued by her looks, she was given compliments for being pretty and adorable, no one complimented her being smart and having an intelligent thought, so she grew up valuing looks over brains, which led to mistake after mistake, guy after guy, who told her she was pretty, who valued her looks, so she went so far to look for someone to love her for who she is, this gave her a narcissistic complex aswell as insane insecurity, she values herself and was valued by her looks, so she thinks she is very pretty, but all of her relationships keep failing, so maybe she's not pretty enough. Add all of this aswell with her abandonment issues from her dad leaving, it is easy to feel unloved, her insecurities and abandonment issues is what makes her manic but her narcissism and growing up being told she was beautiful and that she did everything right by being beautiful, led to her making excuses for her behaviour, so she is simultaneously blaming herself for everything she's done while not blaming herself at all. This leads to a stressful back and forth with her subconscious creating a hostile environment, something she doesn't want to deal with because she wasn't raised to think she was raised to look pretty, so she clings on to the nearest guy and falls in love
As someone with many of the same issues as Cassie I completely agree and am trying to heal. Even though growing up I read books all the time, had AP and honors classes, all A’s & went to college I never thought guys were with me because of anything other than looks or $3x bc much like Cassie I had an absent father and an alcoholic mother, who was fairly abusive & always focused on how I looked. Never was I congratulated for my grades and academic accomplishments just how I looked that day, sexualized very early, shamed for not wanting to dress certain ways. I blame my mom for so much & I’ve been lashing out toward her & my family for years now, stopped wanting to listen to anyone, just full of rage. Led to many failed relationships and friendships and only now am I realizing it at 27. A f’n doozy.
Some of Cassie’s scenes make me almost cry because she’s so relatable. I’m sure a lot of girls feel this way who have had an abandoned father and have followed down a similar destructive path. I felt like someone is finally recognizing the girl whose pretty and seems to have it all because she smiles and has friends. But he father abandoned her and her mom is an alcoholic. There’s a pressure to be perfect because you don’t want to be abandoned by anyone else and you become a people pleaser. Really it results it borderline personality disorder at least for me. Which comes from a fear of abandonment. The only difference is my family didn’t have money were were poor so it was even worse. I wish I could’ve dealt with my child hood trauma at some unicorn birthday party but really I never got a birthday party at all.
This was an excellent video! I think Cassie is redeemable. Now that Nate has tossed her to the side, and even Maddie looked at her with compassion in the bathroom, she needs to see, acknowledge, and understand how her actions have affected those around her. Her need for male validation is just as addictive as alcohol… I hope she is better in S3.
Loveeee the way this analysis is formatted. Also, Prince of Egypt is my favorite animated movie of all time and definitely see the Freudian parallels there as well.
cassie had an abortion in s2, was confrimed to be sexually assaulted my male relatives in her childhood, nate was confirmed to bully/make fun of cassie in s1 (lexi confirms this in s2), cassie's mother had to hide knives from cassie in s2 bc she kept saying she wanted to die, cassie's father left her family due to his drinking addiction, yet most of the fandom has no sympathy for her
Tbh, from what i’ve seen on tiktok and twitter, most people have completely missed the mark on who cassie is and why she acts the way she does (i saw someone with a million likes say she only befriended maddy to study and copy her because she is “perfect” and “loved” like cassie wants to be, it made no sense and was a huge reach) she doesn’t get with nate to spite maddy out of jealousy and start some petty high school drama, it’s not that surface level (i mean, nothing in euphoria is) this video explains her character perfectly, “explanation may not be an excuse but it matters” are the keywords to understand her
Is funny how everybody hate her so much. I feel like everything that comes out her mouth it must be on the other end of the spectrum of what she is saying. I love him, I hate him. Most of all, she is acting like her mom. Her mom is self harming herself but with alcohol. She never accepted to herself her wrong doing in her failed marriage. I feel like Cassie hates herself more than everybody else. She says “I don’t know if I am a good person.” At some point. So unconsciously Cassie knows she do bad things that should not be done. The thing is that she pretty much haven’t figure out how to deal with her issues. I don’t know if in some level I felt that when I was a teenager. She has been emotionally neglected, with pleasing personality at some degree, not knowing how to say no. Is really complex to just hate her, people forget she is actually a teenager that knows shit about anything. Most of all that, at some point we all had that attitude of no accepting mistakes and that nobody is perfect.
Interesting distinction to draw between explanations and excuses. Tbh I've always held the cynical view that people who say "that's not an excuse" will never care for an explanation.
@@alyshahkinsella Well, I had the feeling that no matter what, if you try to explain someone's behaviour that group of people will view you as trying to excuse it and dismiss it. I didn't watch the show but perhaps like how they might view people trying to explain Cassie's behaviour in the first season (how she's emotionally distant yet dependent(?)) via her past as "not an excuse" for burdening her friends.
but we understand why she did what she did but thatś not n excuse to do a bad thing. You can feel bad for someone and still see that their actions aren't perfect
The idea of excuse vs. explanation is HUGE to me. In the few scenarios where I have been witness to someone trying to explain or apologize for something, or I’ve been the one trying to myself, I’ve always been upset by people who stop someone with “I don’t care what your excuse is.” I see the “excuse” as the starting point- what you do after that is much more important and helps us see if it’s an excuse or an explanation. Someone who is explaining will continue to do things to make it right. Someone leaning on an excuse stops right then and there.
This vid is super interesting to me because it makes me think a lot of how Lexi has unfolded too. She had a great play but also included hurtful things (like the carousel scene). I see way too many thoughtless posts just saying the bad things these girls have done but not actually unpacking their trauma. Like you said, it's not meant to excuse their actions but understand why they do the things they do.
You can sympathize with someones plight while still acknowledging that they've done wrong. Cassie is damaged and needs help, but she also hurt someone who really cared about her. Now shes lost the secret boyfriend and her best friend.
YES YES YES YES. Touching on Cal and his backstory, I saw many people on twitter saying they shouldn’t have put that in because it would cause the audience to side with him (which some did). But it wasn’t intended to make you side with him, it was intended as an explanation as to how he ended up where he is now. Unfortunately, many don’t have the ability to differentiate an excuse from an explanation.
So happy you're back! This was such a great video and you really put into words my exact feelings about Cassie this season. I think a video on Nate would be so interesting, since he's probably one of, if not the most complex character on the show
I think the living room argument was interesting with cassie because to me, it really showed that whatever going on with nate is *her* addiction. she needs male validation, even though we know nate’s words as empty promises (aka repeating the same things he’s said to maddy.) nevertheless, we’d seen signs of it in the first season when she was cheating on mckay and overall just taking mckay’s bs. It just hasn’t been as drastic until one of her biggest life events happened… but it’s always been there. it’s just unfortunate for her that people take cheating worse that murder 😭
Oh my God yes people do treat it worse than murder, they gotta grow up. If they were married you'd understand it but it's still not the most evil thing in the world that some people seem to think it is, people cheat because they are cowards and can't tell their partners it's over or they're not happy that doesn't make you evil. In ten years Maddy will barely remember Nate or how she felt about him and people do not always stay friends after High School. She won't feel as heartbroken about Cassie either that's just life. Cassie shouldn't have done it obviously but technically her and Nate did not cheat, 3 weeks of a break up is not an excuse she still shouldn't have done that to a friend at all. This time at least it wasn't technically cheating in the traditional sense.
@@ActuallyDoubleGuitars yeah it wasn’t cheating, but it still is betrayal from two people she loved immensely. I think her confrontations with both nate and cassie show how much maddy cared for them + even understood their actions as things they couldn’t help; aka asking nate if /he/ felt loved by her (because she knows his family dynamic), and then asking cassie why does /nate/ constantly hurt her (even if she was explosive at first, she doesn’t fault cassie as much as people make it out to be). but like the mom said, it’s about principle, so technicality doesn’t matter. however, my last sentence is just a generalization from what I’ve seen with popular media + fan responses 😭 no one hates the villain or the killer as much as they hate the betrayer. but hopefully we do see cassie working on her issues in the next season, because personally, she’s a great character + there’s a lot of healing for her to be had once she can distinguish real love from temporary fixes.
@@michellejoy1921 "No one hates the killer as much as the betrayer" was glaringly obvious with people's reactions to Joe and Love in YOU. Yeah I really hope she tries to be better next season and even gets some therapy.
I read somewhere that the show is called Euphoria bc all of them are chasing something that gives them this feeling. Rues being the most obvious (drugs). Cassie love, male validation, acceptance. Maddy, power. Etc.
It's kinda funny tho how everyone talk like Cassie was the big villain of the show, like she had killed someone, abused someone, when actually she just broke a girl code 😭😭 people act like she was the worst when, if we only look at the fact, she's the most innocent character of the show
I think the lack of help that Cassie has received, compared to Rue going to rehab etc, is the justification of her not apologising or fighting against her impulses - she hasn't been shown how. Cassi getting some therapy would be a wonderful and empathetic way to show that her problems are real and can have a huge impact.
Right! Good point. Rue has a lot of people around that took action when they saw what was happening. Cassie's mother on the other hand joked that Cassie needed an exorcism. A good parent would say she needed a therapist. It's because her codependency issues aren't as black and white to people as drug addiction. Even though it should be taken seriously as well
I agree! No one helps her, they just insult her.
I agree. I think it comes down to the fact that drug addiction is becoming more of an "accepted" and ironically less stigmatized mental illness than abandonment. The parallels between Rue and Cassie's hurting are undeniable, but Cassie's issues are not "accepted" or seen as "valid" issues by the public. All people say is "she's pathetic", "she needs to snap out of it" things that have not been said about Rue. Why is that ? Perhaps because abandonment and emotional trauma have yet to be recognized as serious mental illness that deserves compassion and access to therapy. It's not excusing her actions to say this. It's calling out society by saying that, if both characters are flawed and struggling with mental health, why are we forgiving one but condemning the other ?
I also like to point out that people are quick to say that Lexie deals with her abandonment issues better than Cassie, when, in fact, there's little that suggests that this is the case. Lexie, much like Gia, are the "background" characters, the one who suffer in silence, in the shadow of an older sibling more outwardly dealing with their mental struggles. That doesn't mean that they don't have serious issues lying under the surface, we're just not shown what they are. They addressed it this season with Gia through Ali and Rue's mom saying that it's time to focus on her more. And I think Lexie's play is actually really telling how *similar* she is to Cassie. Lexie is seeking validation through her play. She wants to be seen and loved by people just as much as Cassie wants to be loved by men ; they just go about it differently in how they achieve that love.
It's not so black and white with one sibling doing better than another sibling. I think it's more like which sibling's pain is being put on display over another. Who's pain are we seeing and why ? Why are we empathizing with one character and not another - when they both are struggling and causing havoc in the lives of people around them ? That's what's so great about the show : all these shades of grey and how, essentially, there are no "good", "bad", or "irredeemable" characters, just people suffering.
o.o
Cassie deals with very real issues and I think we understand a bit of it when Maddie and her boss kind of skim over it and also when we learn about Cassie's past and realise that a lot of her issues comes from her needing to be loved, and that's pretty much addressed in the show.
I think a lot of people are mad because of 2 reasons:
1. The fact that it's Nate. I personally feel that Cassie is a wonderful human, in season 1 she was not the best but she was(is) a teenager trying to navigate life and she was beautiful. She gives her all to the people she loves and respects and cares for them and she has such a beautiful soul.
But it's Nate. Nate's not the best.
He's manipulative, abusive and I can go on and on but she deserves better and it's not Nate. Nate has his issues and Cassie's the perfect people pleaser and Nate as the narcissist he is, is going to manipulate and use that to his advantage.
And also she should know better. Obviously that's quite a tricky thing to say but if it's anyone else that'd be easy to say but it's Cassie and she ALWAYS looks for the good in people and herself. So if someone makes her feel good she's going to subconsciously ignore everything about the person and focus on the good part.
2. Her lack of accountability.
Of Cassie slept with Nate and said boldly "I did it".
It's a different thing than what she's doing now. She's a mess in this season as we all are but it's the fact that she refuses to take accountability for her actions. Perhaps she was never taught to do so and I understand but she's not a kid. Whatever she's going through does not justify the fact that she hurt her best friend really badly.
I'm not saying that Cassie is so bad and deserves persecution, I'm just saying that the least she'd have done is own up to it.
Maddie might not be the best friend in the entire world but she loves Cassie and Cassie loves her too. If not for anything for the fact that you've grown up with this girl and you know how much your actions hurt her should prompt you to self reflect.
I still love Cassie but she's not a child. She might be really young but this is where she needs to think instead of crying. I just want her to meet someone beautiful that'll treat her right.
PS. Cassie's mum...... Is another topic I have a headache on...
What's important about her throwing Rue under the bus for being a drug addict is that a big reason why her father ended up abandoning her is due to drugs. She was abandoned by her father because of drugs, and she doesn't have any sympathy towards anyone addicted to them.
Oh shit, you're right. But... one thing; she'll pretend to, though? Because she was nice to Rue at first ("just take it one day at a time!") until Rue said something she didn't like.
@@onettaviator5396 - as an addict, I can tell you yes, most people in our lives, once they become aware ARE seemingly “supportive” on the surface, even though it’s very obvious they ARE actually judging you, yet they’ll put on these fake “sympathetic” fronts but you can see the judgment in their eyes. These kinds of friends and family members won’t actually always say “I don’t get it, I don’t understand addiction & I have NO sympathy for what you’ve done to yourself” outloud because they KNOW it’s not necessarily socially acceptable/that they’re *supposed* to be sympathetic/help this person in their life (relative, family friend, close friend, etc.) to “get help” even if they secretly think you’re a lost cause who has only themselves to blame.
it’s proven that when addiction is treated as an illness/mental health problem and not a criminal one, rehabilitation works!
@sappj7 What exactly are they supposed to be supportive of though? I'm curious cause the only addict I ever met stole from me.
@@durranofthetower7306 I didn’t mean to imply you have to actually stay friends with or even are obliged to support this person in active addiction is sick. But addiction rewires the brain and causes physical & psychology pain & stress and withdrawal that makes you sick af when you try and stop using, stealing is NEVER okay and a big part of the recovery program is taking inventory of the people in your life you’ve caused pain and if possible, making amends and there is a huge importance placed on service, volunteering, helping other people join the program, etc. like you see with Rue’s sponsor. We feel so fucking shameful when we sober up and realise how much of an asshole we have been, how much pain we’ve caused the people we love and for what we put them through and we carry that shame for life. We know we can’t make up for all the mistakes we made and not everybody is going to want to make amends or want an apology for wronging them while we weren’t in control of ourselves, but the substances were.
from your comment, you obviously still hold resentment, which is fair - stealing is wrong and especially hard to be forgive if they haven’t apologised and are in active addiction! I would honestly recommend you cut this person off in a polite way (because there is no need to kick someone while they’re down, just “I can’t be around you while you’re using and I can’t support you”) so you can BOTH move on with your lives and hopefully heal.
That’s my point with Cassie and anyone else who didn’t really have the patience or were faking their support, what’s the point in being at Rue’s intervention? She should’ve just stayed home.
Makes total sense, being abandoned by your father is traumatic, the only addict she knew her whole life traumatised her, it would be hard to then be supportive of an addict. If your dad was a violent alcoholic, you would likely be wary around drunk people and alcoholics, too
Likable characters are not always “good” characters. Cassie is fascinating, and it’s because the writers are not trying to make you like her. She’s supposed to spiral. This is a test of empathy and understanding, not an effort to appease fans through fan service.
THANK YOU.
"This is a test of empathy and understanding" yessss exactly that. 🙌🏼 I feel like all the main characters are written with that in mind even/including Nate.
Yes this is why she is one of my absolute favorite characters on television. I know she’s not a “morally good” character and that’s none of my business- her story and mindset is intricate and fun to watch
No shit, everyone likes the Joker but he ain't a morally good character
@@thegillmachine Probably bc they transitioned her from a protagonist (in the first season) to an antagonist this season, so her fans are probably having trouble reconciling with that. Twitter is filled with people who get overly attached to fictional characters.
it's crazy to me how people are so supportive of lexis play when she basically aired all of her sisters trauma to everyone for laughs - like making fun of nate with the dance sequence was one thing but cassie is her sister. i love lexi but if my sibling did that to me i'd never forgive them
That was crazy to me as well how supportive people were of Lexi’s play. I didn’t understand why Lexi felt the need to showcase her sister’s troubles like that.
However, I guess that ties into one of the major points of the show which is that none of the main characters are necessarily through-and-through good people by our society’s standards. They’re teenagers with trauma and exposure to drugs and sex, so naturally things are going to be messy. They’re all in a morally grey area and they can either be viewed as good or bad depending on what the viewers believe.
Omg same I thought I was crazy bc i didn't like that, I have three siblings and one of em is my younger sister and if she ever sis that I would be so pissed and prolly would never forgive her
@Booper Dooper You’re absolutely right. And the fact that a majority of the Euphoria fanbase was cheering Lexi on is kind of fucked up given what we know about Cassie. Lexi and Cassie’s dynamic was endearing and interesting in season 1. Why weren’t we shown how the play affected that relationship?
And not to mention the way almost all of Cassie’s character development is thrown out of the window the moment she steps on stage 😭😭 instead of being the character viewers were meant to empathize with in season 1, Cassie is a shell of the person she was and, in the play, a spectacle to be made fun of. Why was her abortion glossed over? Nate is an abusive, manipulative sociopath (who, by the way, faces little to no consequences for his actions but that’s a different conversation by itself) but Cassie was treated more like an antagonist by the other characters than he was. Why is that? What happened between her and McKay? Why was her character derailed the way it was?
Sorry for the rambling 😭😭 your comment was thought-provoking. There were a lot of weird writing decisions that were made this season.
It was her dad too and her pain that she felt unseen
It just opened up for a shit ton of slutshaming too lmao
I think that the way she's been received and valued by the world is also a very important piece of the puzzle. The formation of her identity is undoubtedly linked with the way she's viewed by men, and has internalized that view of herself. From the lack of a father figure and her clear lack of male friends, I'm guessing that the only male interest that she ever received since the beginning of puberty is sexual, therefore, internalizing her value to men as sexual. You see it with her bf in season one, when he's not feeling well, and she wants to help, she offers sex. Now, that's not what he wanted nor needed but that's what she was taught men wanted and almlst deserved from her. Her fear of abandonment cannot simply explain her behavior, sexism, and maybe more precisely, the male gaze is also at play her.
100% spot on 👍
Wholeheartedly agree
my exact same thoughts
You were so spot on to this. I also think that in the most recent episode (SPOILERS)
When Cassie has that scene with Nate and is telling him that she is his, it is another reference to want you said at the end of your paragraph. It was she was taught. She was taught that her only value to men is sexual. She was also taught to have her whole identity based on how well she can please a man and that scene with Nate just emphasizes that
Hey Hey
Cassie has a borderline absent mother who’s always drunk who disregards her. Cassie has gotten NO help. She literally threatened self harm/suicide for help and her mom brushed it off and her sister called her pathetic. Yeah, it was pretty pathetic, but it doesn’t negate the obvious cry for help. Meanwhile Rue has a mom actively fighting for her to get better. I really hope Cassie finds a reliable support system bc that’s really the first thing she really, really needs
It would be interesting to see what would've happened if Cassie had Rue's mom and Rue had Cassie's mom. Rue getting a mom who is more hands off in her life and disconnected and Cassie getting a mom who is always ready to drop everything to get her daughter help.
She craves a support system, specially affter getting an abortion
@@TrabsxWhat wouldve happened is that Rue wouldve spiraled like cassie and cassie wouldve fought back line rue. The core of Cassie not fighting back against her impulse is for the simple reason that she doesnt have a support system, in season one she at least had some people close to her despite them not being stable support system. But what Cassie need is an adult to turn to, a mom who helps her the same way rue’s mom helped her. With this she would overcome her trauma.
That scene of her in the kitchen, Cassie was not expressing genuine suicidal or self harming tendencies. She was desperately trying to garner sympathy from her family because she couldn't stand being told she was completely in the wrong. Her mom and sister recognized this and didn't give in to her. I know it sounds awful but people do this. That's not to say that Cassie doesn't have problems and doesn't need help. She definitely does.
Borderline??
I think this is a really good and humanizing take on Cassie. In “reality” she’s just a broken kid figuring this shit out too tbh. Her and Rue. They clearly have A LOT of pain that they just don’t know what to do with.
hurt people tend to hurt people
That's almost every character. That's the whole point. They went thru some shit and came out messed up
Her sister also lost her father
@@bascoaful yeah, and so did rue's sister. that doesn't invalidate what she or cassie have gone through
@@hachikos But it does highlight the fact that she made an inexcusable decision, all of her chaos is within her control. It’s not ok, she’s not a victim, she’s not having a special experience that nobody else has gone through or circumstances that lessen her accountability. She’s a terrible sister and friend. Hopefully she can redeem herself.
There’s been speculation that Cassie was written to hook up with Nate this season over him messing around with Jules because the actors don’t get along. But I really feel that the rewrites and changes to the arch came through because of Sydney Sweeney’s range and how over the pandemic, we saw more and more of her in other roles. It honestly would be criminal to have her in the cast and keep her as a side character and under utilize her. I really feel that she’s this generations next huge star.
I think so too! It's like it was perfectly written for her to show off her ability. She's deserving of an Emmy for her performance this season. If she picks the right roles 100% she has what it takes to be huge going forward
I knew I felt something about Nate's character and Jules character but this totally makes sense
I rewatched the first season, and nate gives certain looks and have some obsession with Cassie. I think it was planned that they Hook up in this season.
It looks like nate is trying to show that he's not like his dad, and one of persons he can use is Cassie because she has what every man desires in his mind.
it's fake
wait which actors don’t get on?
The strange thing about Euphoria’s fandom is how people seem to side or look for villains and heroes, when in reality the show is scripted in a way that everybody is both these things at different times. If the creators used as much « morality » as the fans the show wouldn’t exist. The reason why it is so big is because it has depth and truth, not like all these « typers » who can’t wait to open their mouth to show that they know what is the right thing to do.
Exactly 💯
@@timesup2812 they view real life like this too though. Either a perfect person, or youre cancelled. Its frustrating
Yea, it gets tiring when 15 years Olds just are like "do you have brain damage" whenever you like something they consider problematic. It's suffocating. Like yeah I do, what you gonna do? Make a hate post on me? Cry? Cancel me?
This is the exact reason why i stay away from media criticism on youtube and online in general (with this video being a once im awhile exception) because mostly the takes are just so bad and don't invite different opinions at all its just so toxic. I much rather enjoy my shows/movies in private and form my own opinions
@@HJ-ju4ui that sounds like a healthy place to be 🙏
As someone whose best friend did actually date my abusive ex in high school, I still feel nothing but agony for Cassie. She's a walking tragedy. Watching her lose sleep and scrub herself raw and degrade herself trying to get a moment of attention from a guy she already knows doesn't deserve it is so incredibly sad. And given how that turned out for my own best friend, I'm terrified of where Cassie's story is headed.
How did it turn out for your best friend, if you feel comfortable sharing
@@yasmeensaleh9243I want to know too!
it just shows how little she feels about herself. it’s heartbreaking 💔
My take too. I felt for Cassie in both seasons. I could understand why she acted the way she did, it was so sad.
Sydney sweeney needs an emmy, best supporting actress in the show by a mile
Everyone else is great but she was next level this season
Absolutely
Agreed, cassie is a very complex character and hard to comprehend, especially to foreigners watching this drama, not living in the US. The culture is different to ours. But, I was able to understand her character and complexity. A character that I wanted to hate, but pitied.
@@meowm3426 Hey. Care to explain the culture part in your answer? You mean the type of difficulties a teenager has to face in a highschool in U.S. rather than any other place? I'm curious if you actually find all these normal...as a foreigner it seems so surreal to me. Not Cassie's character particularly but their whole reality in general. I know it's a show, but how much accuracy does it contain?
@@x.s.6441 I’m an American in high school and there are definitely some things similar. You’d be surprised at the amount of kids actually getting high already. For me, Euphoria is just an amplified version of my high school. So watching it was not that jarring for me.
@@kingaegonii When I was in highschool there were definitely kids who used to get high so it's not that shocking to me. (I mean a girl in my year also got pregnant and had a kid).But the whole party every weekend, sex everywhere and any time or even the dressing part is so far away from my definition of highschool experience. I know that things work differently in every place of the world so I hope this does not come out as an insult, but I feel like kids in U.S. are exposed too early to that type of actions and tend to normalize it. One of my good friends grew up there and when she used to come back for vacations as a ten year old, she was shocked that we were still playing with board games and toys or whatever because in that age her friends in the U.S. were already talking about sex. I"m pretty sure that things have changed for highschoolers nowadays in my country too, considering the instagram etc. I've seen it, but as an adult I don't have an inside.
as a girl with *HEAVY* _daddy issues_ and a *NEED* to _male validation_ (although i quite don’t like men): *i totally understand* how cassie views herself and the world. especially in the scene where she's crying and hitting nate, but also being hugged by him, i felt like this scene was made to show us how she resents the male figures of her life (dad, boyfriends, etc) but also feels the need to be taken care of by them, because her inner child didn't got this from anyone. i lived practically the *SAME* things she lived, so i'm empathetic, but i don't support her relationship with nate. maddy deserves a better friend.
I hope youre doing better tho💗
me too. i don’t think what cassie’s doing is good but I understand how she’s feeling/how deeply troubled she is
same i don't consider her actions good or even okay but i deeply understand
same here
same..execpt all this stuff didn't happen to me until i met someone off the internet who was and currently is the same age as me at the time we met (14). (we broke up at 16) and since then my parents became more nosey and too demanding
This is a great video that gives grace to Cassie without excusing her actions, which is pretty much where I'm at with her as well after how this season has been. High schoolers make mistakes, some of them pretty bad, especially when they don't have a good confidant or parent to turn to. She's dealing silently with the pain of her experiences in season 1, her dad is gone, her mother drinks constantly, her sister watches her silently and now exposes her life, which is currently brimming with suffering, in her play. She lives in Maddy's shadow for so long. She's practically alone and probably has issues trusting the few friends that she does have. Of course she gravitated to the man willing to give her attention, of course she moved into his house even after not hearing from him for days, she's so desperate.
She's wrapped into the alternating love bombing and abuse that Maddy was receiving from Nate. And I think whenever she manages to exit that situation, she is going to eventually reflect on her actions and have a change of heart that she carries with her in adulthood. I don't think that means anyone that she has hurt (especially Maddy) needs to forgive her or let her back into their life, but moving on and learning from your fuckups is a key part of growing up that never stops, and a lot of people don't stay close to most of their high school friends. Cassie will either fall victim to her misery in some fashion, or escape this and live a healthy life after the loss of most of her loved ones due to her actions. I hope we see her rise from the ashes of her mistakes, express regret to those she hurt and build something of herself.
Love your videos, dude. My fav essayist on the platform. Always thought provoking, well structured and beautifully phrased.
💙
As aweful as it is I have a feeling that cassie will continue to spiral untill she finds love and acceptance from others which is going to be incredibly difficult when acting this way. This girl is truly broken at the moment with no direction other than affection from nate. She needs support and a smacking from someone she can trust in a world she's no longer trusted in. I wish I could agree with everyone and despise cassie but I completely understand it and why she is the way she is and if I were told and looked at the same way she was, I'd probably end up in the exact same position and mindset as her.
@@hollyrylatt-price2485 samsies. I want Cassie's mother to have a heart to heart with her. Cassie thinking long & hard about what she done. Her apologizing to Maddie(not necessarily maddie forgiving her). Her breaking up with Nate. Her apologizing to Lexi for not being a good sister. Her joining a group for people having their picture & videos leaked online. Her finally studying & becoming a lawyer for young girls with same fate as her & sa victims. And her confronting her father telling what she's been through and then her accepting her half of the fault. And growing content with herself. And adopting a pet ☺
Why does no one include her abortion in the trauma she's gone through. I don't think she's fully processed those emotions either which is a mote recent experience than her father. Hence why she blew up at her sister's play which portrayed her sexual history, that put her in that situation, as something she was escaping into because she liked it. But in reality if you look at all of Cassie's scenes with sex, I don't think she was ever participating as something she wanted to do as opposed to pleasing the boys who were happy to have at her. Alot of people say her scenes with sex is gratuitous but I think its proving a point, that she falls into the situations because she's constantly pleasing others. That is why I can't be mad at her for Nate. She's messed up for not saying something earlier when Maddy was talking about getting back together with Nate. But because she's always trying to please and be in good graces she instead just let the guilt eat her. Nate is the true evil. Cassie and Maddy need to talk and go against him but Cassie has such low self esteem she'll break down and believe what everyone is saying to her about how terrible she is. There is no wide spread rule that swears off exs. That's childish behavior, which is ironic because they are children.
her mother mothered Rue more than her own daughters throughout this show and people laugh with her and describe her as 'iconic'
“Cassie is a frustrating character”
“Cassie is engaging character”
“Cassie is subjected to Nate’s abuse”
“Cassie was great. But is frustrating and pathetic now.”
“Cassie has been hurt because of her past.”
All valid takes that aren’t mutually exclusive. They’re all correct and don’t contrast.
Yes exactly I feel all of these
I feel everything besides her being engaging.
THANK YOU
She really is literally each and every one of those things all at once. I want to shake some sense into her while also living for the drama while also wanting to drag her out of Nate's house and into safety while also wanting to see Maddie smack her upside the head while also never wanting to see her character on screen again but also waiting in anticipation to see what batshit thing she does next.
Chad "cassie did nouthing wrong"
How is Nate tamer this season? He literally held Maddy at gunpoint, also people seem to ignore that he's currently undermining and treating Cassie like utter shit, comparing her to his first victim. It seems like it's a lust thing for him, he literally called her Maddy and has constant daydreams about Jules.
When did he call her maddy??
@@alyshahkinsella during the argument scene where Cassie says ‘I’m crazier’
fans love to excuse and justify Nate and Cassie for what they have done to Maddy just because they are "broken" but have no sympathy towards Maddy. You can even see the comparisons in how many videos there are about Cassie or Nate compared to Maddy and her trauma about being in an abusive relationship.
@@whoisthisperson8454 A big part of that, which no one discusses, is the fact that Maddy is Latina. Race plays a big part in how people react to individuals involved in some problem or conflict. Consistently, we can observe less empathy and compassionate for minorities. If Cassie were a Latina and Maddy was a white blond character, we wouldn't see people excusing or justifying Cassie's behaviour as much.
@@senecak1345 Bruh dude its not really about that. It's just that when you see Maddy's backstory it is not as heartbreaking as Cassie's. that's why people don't really like Maddy. But yeah regardless people defending cassie should stop
I was really sympathetic towards Cassie up until I saw her say nothing as Maddy cried not about Nate--but the loss of the friendship. And I think what you stated about watching Rue try to ACTIVELY be a good person even as she struggles to give up her drugs is really what makes the difference.
yes exactly
I know it’s hard to sympathize with Cassie in that case but I have to point out that there’s this tendency to sympathize with Rue when some of her actions are arguably worse
The scene you mentioned, Cassie is running away. After failing to justify her actions in any way that makes sense to others (because that’s not really possible), she shut down and ran away. That’s what we’re seeing when Cassie is on the other side of the door and Maddie is almost begging her to just say something.
Yes, Rue is actively trying to become a better person. She’s also been through treatment and is much more aware of her issues now than when they first started. And yet, S2E5 happened.
Cassie hasn’t had her chance to try, at least in a way that’s comparable to Rue’s experience getting clean, then going back, and then getting clean again. Cassie and Rue are at different stages of addiction.
Did you have sympathy for Rue when she was physically violent toward her family (specifically during the intervention of episode 5)? That was part of her struggle with drugs. That wasn’t the beginning, before she was able to step back and truly reflect on the damage she was capable of. That was after she had already gotten treatment.
The reason I say this is that it baffles me that people can be so sympathetic toward Rue even when it feels like her recovery is back and forth, and especially when the path she takes hurts other people deeply, but as soon as the question is Cassie, people give up.
To then not extend that kind of sympathy to Cassie, someone just starting out on that spiral, destroying relationships and her life, in pursuit of this one thing that she thinks she needs to survive, doesn’t make logical sense. Rue’s choices to say and do horrible things to her loved ones is not excused by her drug use or struggles with mental health, yet she still deserves compassion. I don’t see why Cassie’s situation is different. She doesn’t need to be a likable person who makes the choices that align with our values in order for us to feel basic compassion for her.
@@pineapple20777 I think people can be more sympathetic towards rue because drugs genuinely hijack your brain and your thinking, and on top of that rue has dual diagnosis. Rues brain and body NEED her drugs.
They both absolutely deserve sympathy but comparing them especially if you’re talking about rue while she’s in active addiction/withdrawal is like apples to oranges.
I find it way more easy to sympathize with Cassie because everyone jumps on the bandwagon of bullying her while making excuses for Rue and never ever holding Maddy accountable for her God awful actions at all. And don't get me started on Jules and Kat. Every character on this show is as or more problematic than Cassie, she's just an easy target.
@@tarakennedy707 I mean Maddie’s “god awful” actions were made while she was in the midst of an abusive relationship. And people are incredibly hard on her character. People are hard on all of their characters. The worst thing Maddie did (we don’t even know if she made a statement against Tyler I don’t remember seeing that) is something that Nate was influencing. He forced Tyler to confess as well so he had no chance of fighting it in court. He blackmailed Jules to submit a false eyewitness report.
Also…. They’re not real: they can’t be bullied! Weird choice of words!
okay but real thing .... if people hate your charecter at certain level you did a great job legit playing it
fr Sydney Sweeny's acting is so good this season
Yes but sometimes that hate turns into harassment so be careful
@@NA-kz5po Lmao not with real adults
Remember 13 reasons why?
I was disappointed with Cassie's reaction once the affair was actually revealed. On Maddy's birthday in the jacuzzi scene, after she vomits she repeatedly says "I'm sorry Maddy, I ruined everything, I didn't mean it, you're my best friend" - which made it seem like she was at her core, a misguided child, immature but genuinely remorseful.
But afterwards, she tries to turn the blame on Rue, doesn't say so much as a sorry to Maddy, and takes no accountability. So I guess there won't be much of a redemption.
Edit: for clarification I meant that it doesn't seem like the writers intend to redeem her anytime soon, not that she's completely gone
I think it might be also because she was drunk in the jacuzzi and somewhere very deep down she is sorry, but she still thinks that she loves and needs nate more than maddy
@@bluskies444 i think the sad part comes in when you realize she loves nate more than she loves herself. but this is also the pathetic part.
redemptions usually happen after they recognize their actions. shes just a broken teen, she still has time. look at Samantha.
@@Sweethearts4969 I agree, I actually meant past redemption for the writers. I'm not sure they really intend to redeem her character anymore.
@@cindyh.6011 right, people here in the comments keep saying “redemption only comes after you’ve realized your actions”, but the thing is she DOES realize her wrongdoings, she just doesn’t want to do anything about it.
one thing i think deserves acknowledgement is how traumatizing it is for girls to be continuously sexualized at such a young age. cassie was basically groomed by everyone around her to submit to demands of the patriarchy and establish her self identity through pleasing men at the expense of her own well being. the only form of positive reinforcement she received was through compliments about her appearance and how desirable she was. pair that with the fact that she didn't receive guidance from her parents to nurture and establish her self-worth, it makes sense to me that she behaves the way she does. its a sociocultural issue as much as it is a freudian issue. and i think that external factor explains why lexi's trauma manifested in a much different way than cassie's despite going through the exact same thing. lexi's growth was internal and her dreams/accomplishments reflected that. if cassie was encouraged to explore her self worth outside of her sexuality, she might've dedicated more of her time to ice skating, or even strengthening her female relationships.
this doesn't excuse her behavior, as you mentioned, but i think it's one really important detail that i haven't heard anyone talk about yet.
These conversations are so important to be happening and I've actually never watched this show but I've learned of Cassie and even without seeing it have related so much to her that I stopped myself from watching it because of the exact thing you just said. It's almost identical to how I grew up. When the only thing you are rewarded for as a girl is looks, you never have the incentive to go deeper and therefore always struggle with self esteem. We tell women in society that the most valuable thing we have to offer is beauty and sex/sexuality, then we scold women for being vain AND sexual. It's an ultimate tool of control, and "looks" fade, being fully human is denied to us.
SO TRUE BESTIE we need to talk more about this because i know in high school i felt like my worth was pretty much based on how i looked because when i’d be complimented by boys that’s all they’d comment on and nothing outside of that. Makes you think that it’s your only value
I literally have hated her character and her story line. I thought it was really triggering and sexists. Definitely written by a man. I Feel like her character is uninteresting with no depth. And tbh I felt that was a lack of respect to the character and the actress. because she was pigeonholed into being the naked eye candy. and this is the first insight I have read that actually makes me understand it better
@@lauralimon4283 I completely agree, and I felt the same way you did!!! after doing more research about Sam, and seeing how much collaboration and care there is between the creators and the actors, I began to consider that as much purpose and thought goes into every aspect of the show, Cassie's story is ultimately no different. I know there's definitely still details about the show that are problematic when you consume it critically, but ultimately Cassie's character is not at all glamorous... she's quite embarrassing and unlikable; there's so much of her character that isn't "sexy," but still, you can tell shes wounded and I think thats the point yunno?
Exactlyyy Cassie was sexually harrassed by family members and ended up sexualizing herself. I relate to her a lot because i went throught it during my childhood
props to you for never using the misogynistic definition of daddy issues thats only ever weaponized again women when, at it’s core, it’s an experience of emotions that anyone with the struggle of abandon, neglect or abuse by one’s fatherhood figure can deal with
@Weyland Punani what
Right? It’s always meant to demean but never to generalize how people suffer from it. It’s like being malicious to someone for showing the common affects of a traumatic experience.
That same energy better be kept advocating for men, and their mommy issues.
A lot of people interpret her not saying anything to Maddie when she's yelling at cassie outside the bathroom door as her lack of care for Maddie's feelings, but I think it just is an expression of Cassie understanding the gravity of her actions- what could she possibly say to make it ok? If she just apologized it would have felt pathetic at best and wouldn't change the situation. I think we see her guilt and hatred for her actions frequently like in the hot tub scene when she's vomiting and apologizing to Maddie over and over. I mean, she wouldn't have gotten drunk and freaked out and cried so much if maddie werent in the picture. I think she really does love maddie and is just struggling between that love and her insane desperation for male validation - she just picked what was easier. Ofc I'm not happy with her actions tho.
Yess! Good point!!
I apologizing is definitely better than nothing though, cassie was super disappointing in this scene
If Cassie apologizes, she has to give Nate up to mean it. She’d rather have Nate than make amends with Maddy.
@@victoriavictoriac6011 This!!
@@giafiorari4483 nah didn’t happen I do think she’s crazy tho
I think its interesting how euphoria explores over sexualization and objectifcation can really destroys a person selfs worth.
Yess exactly
i dont think so , because why would they add a play where lexi is shaming her own sister , nate etc they getting praised for it .
As much as I hate cassie's transgression, I do think it's realistic for her character. People often let their traumatic experiences dictate their ability to make choices, and sometimes they hit rock bottom before they decide to stay there or pick themselves up. So I don't think what happened to her atm is an example of levinson's bad writing at all
also to add character development doesn't always mean the character will develop into a "good" person & I put that in quotes because the aspect of morality in this show isn't black or white so its very loose ya know
Yes, trauma over a long time for a teenager leads to a lot of fucked up stuff :/
@@wpc456cpw i can say all of that because trauma fucked me up too and lead me to make lots of terrible choices haha, but I'm trying my best to turn my life around now haha
@@Kaastengels i can relate :) my teenage years were tumultuous and painful bc of trauma too. Proud of you for turning things around, healing is the bravest journey ever ❤️ sending love
@@wpc456cpw I wish I can say that I'm mostly successful in turning things around because I still slip up every now and then, but until then I'm not going to stop trying. Thank you for the kind words though :) I hope everything is going well with you now ♥
I think Cassie having an abortion also traumatized her. People dont talk about how difficult having an abortion is for some people. Especially when you are young and pressured to get one. Cassie loved Mckay, and seemed to want the baby before Mckay pressured her to get an abortion. She wanted a guy to love her and wanted a family with him. But she got one because she wanted to make Mckay happy. It didnt show it in the show really, but an abortion is a super invasive procedure and bloody. Even super early in the pregnancy. I can totally see how she spiraled and got with Nate.
And nate kept telling her that he wants her to be a mother
yeah i hate how her abortion was just ignored and swept under the rug
yessss people who are super pro choice act like it’s no big deal. I’m pro choice too but I think sex ed to prevent abortions in the first place is important
@@ellehasling3456 absolutely! Pro the choice to use protection to prevent pregnancy, too, it’s not all about the the choice to get an abortion. There should be multiple choices done along the way to prevent it. It can be as traumatising as a miscarriage, nobody should have to make that choice.
@@ellehasling3456 yeah actually abortion sucks to have to go through and it'd be nice if less people wound up there without wanting to be there.
I may be in the minority but I felt that Lexi’s play was very cruel to her sister. I don’t see how anyone in Cassie’s place wouldn’t have felt deeply humiliated and hurt by their sibling showing the entire school every mistake they ever made and portraying them as a vapid, airheaded cartoon to be laughed at. Especially the carousel scene, that went way too far. I think deep down Lexi wanted to be a little cruel to her sister out of anger that has been pent up over the years. (And I’m a Lexi fan!)
Cassie’s reaction was very immature but I don’t think any teen would’ve reacted in a rational way if their sibling did that to them.
I agree, but also think she needed to see herself the way the rest of the ppl look at her. But yes, it was cruel.
I agree! So many viewers supported the play and I totally understand, Cassie betrayed her best friend, she went after her little sister, and it’s entertaining TV. But even knowing that I thought it was still very cruel and humiliating. Lexi was even worried that Cassie would spiral if she saw it and it’s really no shock that it ended up happening.
I agree, but I feel like Lexi has always had to be the mature one, supporting all the broken people in her life -- her dad, her mom, her sister, her best friend. I feel like, despite Lexi's insistence that her intentions were good, the play was her way of lashing out. Comparing Lexi to the show's audience this season, her patience for her sister has worn out.
i agree. the carousel scene and the “i love fu*king everything” was literally slut-shaming. so many women suffer daily because of misogyny and seeing so many people cheering and laughing at that was absolutely disgusting.
however i feel like this wasn’t lexi’s intention, maybe in the script she was supposed to show that scene and then talk about all the misogyny cassie had to go through (remember most guys she was with posted online the s*x tapes without her consent) and she was gonna talk about all the nice things her sister has done during their childhood, etc., but cassie interrupted lexi and was having an emotional outburst in front of the whole crowd and it was too late.
but again, it’s just my theory because i refuse to believe lexi is that evil.
Yes, I felt physically ill when Lexi recreated the carousel. That was so not cool
when maddie said ‘this is just the start’ when cassie said nate broke up with her and it was dead silent, then that one tear went down her face. that was so sinister and telling of what’s to come of caddie’s arc and the dark turns this relationship with nate and cassie will take. it’s going to reveal so much about cassie and her psyche
The scene where She move to nate's and She punch him while crying meant so much. It was like she was with her father. Huging him and being held like a child , while pushing him like a little girl who's trauing a tandrum. Cry and resenting him for always leaving her behind and not loving her as much as She love him. She hate him,but can't live without the idea of love because She had nothing els left and it all She ever wanted, her daddy to love her and stay by her side, loving her enough to stay and fight what in their way to be together. Yet she resent him for what he made her do.but It's herself She hate the most because at the end it was her choice and her insecurity , her need of being loved that Made her ruin her life. while at the same time she is brainwashing herslef that " it is worth it, It is love", to escape the guilt. And to leave the guilt , she put it on other she find excuse and Put herslef again in the little girl role by saying ITS nate fault, and saying She did it for him. And in a way it's true that its her father fault....
I sounded like Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally while reading this.
@@OhanaLulu is it good or bad ? I never watched it..…
@@sophietessier8998 it's good. I sounded like I was having an orgasm because I so agreed with you.
Also nobody seems to talk about how when this season starts were seeing her just after she had an abortion that she wasnt really sure about having? pretty traumatic, of course shes gonna be spiralling now. plus all those sex tapes leaked that she didnt even want to do
Yea. People don't really understand that having an abortion, even a very early one, can cause something similar to post-partum because your body goes from being pregnant to not pregnant. It can be pretty severe for a lot of women.
Literally two MASSIVELY traumatic things to go through, ESPECIALLY for a high school kid.
Yet no one seems to mention this and this is what bothers me about how they wrote her character in season 2. We just glossed over the abortion and during the scenes after nobody, not even her mother, is acknowledging the traumatic effects this has on her...but yet now she's this "bad" person, but hey I guess they needed a villian...but to try to reedeem Nate and not Cassie?!!!! ..smh
@@cutieangelpie101 it’s realistic, you think people acknowledge the trauma and vulnerability of abortions in every day life? In the state of Texas?? No. It’s story telling and whether it’s told how you like it or not, it’s the story that’s playing out.
@@EllieStrums thanks for "checkin me" 🙄
Another dimension of the Rue vs. Cassie paternal trauma is one of closure. It's why I don't completely disagree with Cassie when she addresses how difficult things have been for her and Lexi in the fight with her mom, though she comes off as venomous and unsympathetic. At the end of the day, Rue and Gia know they had a good father, who loved them and made sure they knew they were loved. Cassie (and Lexi) have to move forward with the weight of knowing their father "chose" drugs over the wellbeing of their family, and the ambiguity of what role (if any) he may play in their lives going forward. This is why I think Cassie's journey is particularly complicated.
Right. Also, her feelings of hurt that her dad became an addict and abandoned her for them could also reasonably make her a little irrationally harsh on Rue. After what addiction has done to her family I think that makes some kind of sense.
But they’re still excuses at the end of the day, she acknowledged it to undermine everyone else and make her shitty actions OK, despite knowing the abuse Nate put her best friend through, and that what she was doing was irrational and a product of her trauma, she still did it. It no longer holds true when it’s no longer unconscious.
@@biomutant1468 Maddie doesn't have a fault in this but you need to remember she wanted to get back with Nate even after all the abuse, so yes, he was Maddy's abuser but she still wanted to come back to him. So I can see why Cassie kinda crave for that type of connection, after being at her lowest and drunk, she just decided Nate was the answer, knowing how deeply attached he could be to a person (exactly what she wanted) so she fool herself into believe they weren't nothing at the moment even though she knew Maddy wanted to be with him again, later she also fooled herself to destroy the toxic relationship they had by having a relationship herself with Nate, trying to protect both of them (? Cassie fooled herself in many ways, justifying her actions so she doesn't see the horrid true. You can see how a flawed character she is but exactly understand how everything where were it went. And still I don't see why people keep saying she was with the abuser knowingly when 1 she isn't in a well mental state to completely get that, as you can see I think in episode 4 when she thinks both (Maddy and Nate) were wrong in the relationship and 2 not even Maddy believe that in this whole season until she found out about Nate and Cassie. In any case, Maddy needed to distanced herself from Nate and her relationship with him to finally see him as the shitty person he was, and if the Cassie and Nate stuff didn't happened she would still be with him.
I lost my father during college and the amount of support, love, affection and reassuring that I received was overwhelming. So her line about how different it is for Rue and Cassie, broke my heart. And it is something that I have noticed in real life, so many fathers abandon their families and the kids live with such shame and felling of rejection. While my feeling toward the lost of my father are of being brave and supported to over come such trauma. So I totally understood where she was coming from
@@meiisintheuni8153 Yeah because that's literally how abused victims work, many abused victims go back to their abuser, it's called trauma bonding
I personally think it’s not “only” daddy issues, I’m pretty sure that Cassie has undiagnosed BPD (Borderline Personality Disorder), which would explain her tendency to get so attached to men so easily and so obsessively and her emotional instability.
People with undiagnosed bpd put their fear of being abandoned above anything else and are willing to do anything in their power to stop that from happening. And it just makes so much sense for Cassie, especially combined with her severe daddy issues: seeing her in s1 forcing herself to consent to the s*x tapes so her current partner wouldn’t abandon her, pretending she doesn’t know anything about the rumors about her with McKay so he wouldn’t leave her, considering to have a baby so she and McKay could be together forever, and the list goes on with Nate as well.
Cassie has presented other BPD traits in many ways: struggles with identity (dressing up as Jules in 2x03 and as Maddy in 2x03 and 2x07/2x08 to make Nate happy and making sure he doesn’t abandon her, also the “I don’t know if I’m a good person”), has extreme low self-esteem, craves constant validation and attention, has emotional outbursts, impulsive actions and decisions, self-h*rm and/or substance abuse to cope with pain (alcohol in her case), suic*de threats, sees people around her as either good or evil and nothing else in between (for example, she was supportive towards Rue until she told everyone about her and Nate. So Rue = good; after 2x05 Rue = evil) and her opinions change constantly, dissociation, promiscuity, feels love and emotions deeply, obsessive behaviors (in 2x03, when she wakes up at 4 am and dresses up for Nate, her thoughts aren’t “I wanna look cute for Nate”, but more like “Only when Nate acknowledges me I will be worth of existing”).
She’s one of the most complex and fascinating characters of Euphoria and I can’t wait to see her in Season 3!
(Also loved your video, I completely agree with you)
That isn't neurodivergency, it is an emotional disorder not a developmental disorder. Otherwise agree
Tbh daddy issues aren't that complex. Coming from somebody with bpd and daddy issues.
@@shroomshroom5945 as someone who also has daddy issues, yes it is. yours might not be but there are people whose lives are severely damaged by it.
I agree, I think she fits the bill for BPD, especially bc it usually arises from trauma (being abandoned by her father, entering toxic relationships where she’s being used, being told all she’s good for is her body, and getting into that mess with Nate)
@@opalminx8240 but that's how mental issues are formed. people usually develop mental disorders because of their traumatic experiences, so she could have a disorder or be neurodivergent... who knows
What I find weird is why do we excuse Jules? She did the same thing as Cassie, she cheated on Rue with Elliot when Rue was high on drugs. I know it wasn't on an extreme level as Cassie , but deserves at least 30% of the fire Cassie gets.
Maybe I have to go watch the first few ep again but did they ever actually have a conversation about them having a monomagous relationship? Bc I remember in Rue's special episode, her inreliable narratability was basically called out bc she formed this fantasy in her head that they were together and that Jules cheated on her just bc they started hooking up. Jules is wrong for sneaking around about it tho, so I can definitely see the "cheating" part
@@g.o.a.t8208 I feel like a monogamous relationship was definitely implied for their relationship during the second season unlike in the first season. We see Jules getting hurt over Rue and Elliot's relationship and felt threatened and insecure by the though of Rue having feelings for him. If Jules didn't want Rue being with anyone then the same sentiment should be applied to her.
Uhm? I see a lot of people hating on Jules wtf, she literally never catches a break
@@izelfranco55 Yea, on that last part thats why I feel like a lot of ppl criticize her or accuse her of cheating bc of her being a hypocrite there. I really wish the directors/writers would have actually had them have a conversation bc a big reason why their relationship doesnt work is bc they aren't transparent with each other.
she definitely has been getting a lot of hate this season but yeah i agree people pick and choose who to be angry with, i havent seen nearly as much backlash this season with nate as i have jules or cassie
I hope cassie gets a special episode like Jules and rue. I think that would bring a lot more empathy from viewers and really dive into her traumatic past
Something I love about Euphoria (and why its title is perfect), is that it compares the disease of drug addiction to an addiction to validation and infatuation. Both are shortcuts to emotional highs that make it feel like our deeper wounds are healed, even if only for a moment. But while drug addiction is being increasingly recognized as a sickness that needs treatment and not an inherent personality trait, people who keep seeking out destructive and abusive relationships are still seen as inherently broken people, rather than people with serious but treatable mental health issues. Everything about explaining but not excusing still applies here, but I think it's a valuable comparison and really enlightening for my own life as well.
I would love to see a video on Jules. A lot of people hate her this season and said she never loved Rue but I think her character is A lot more complex than that. Well, I wanna see a whole video in the Rue, Jules, and Elliot dynamic.
ppl who say that abt jules def didn’t watch her special episode 😭 yeah she’s a cheater but i wouldn’t say she never loved her
@@uhohvampireism9795 what special?
@@jadeharley7190 rue and jules each have a special episode abt them. both r on hbo max !
I think Jules loves Rue, but Rue is lost even her mom gave up at the end, that's why I think Jules getting in a relationship with someone is the best, Rue is in autodestruction mode, asking Jules to stay with her is almost saying go and destroy yourselves together, not good, Jules has to put herself first, we already saw that even when Jules was loving her a lot Rue keep killing herself and that made Jules unhappy all their relationship
Jules is def not onedimensional, but i personally cant stand her. I hate cheaters.
I think because a lot of the audience consists of teenagers, or even those in their early 20's- Cassie (among other characters) are judged incredibly harshly. I'm not defending her actions by any means, but as a 27 year old looking back, those years are almost inevitably messy. You're going to make mistakes, you're going to hurt people, and hopefully you grow from it. It's easier to feel more compassion for a character like Cassie when you know she's traumatized, young and dumb. If she carries on for decades, that's another story; but Euphoria is a coming of age, and we all have to forgive ourselves and others for the damage along the way.
You are partly right about this. I'm 25 now and I do believe in change and redemption, I have seen it happen and when I look back in my teenage years I laugh with some situations. You grow up and things don't matter the same anymore. The thing is, situations that take place in our teenage years do shape some of the ideas and values we keep in he future. Here we have Cassie, a troubled girl with a lot of issues who as you say make mistakes and trying to find her way through life. How about the people she hurts in he process though? Maybe they get over it. Maybe not. Don't you think that a situation like that will possibly fuck up Maddy maybe for ever? Getting out of an abusive relationship and then having your best friend betraying you by throughing it in your face? I can give you a 60% possiblity she never trusts a friend the same way again. So what if Cassie grows up and change? The people she hurt maybe traumatized from it forever. The same way a kid who has been bullied maybe never forget it.
@@x.s.6441 So what is your solution? Put her out of her misery?
Cassie did nouthing wrong
@@x.s.6441 Look let's not forget Maddy committed an actual crime that ruined a dudes life I don't think that compares to the impact of having a skanky friend betray you lol she'll be fine 😛
@@horsepuncher95 lol. thiiiss
Such a great video! I'd argue though that Cassie is a serial monogamist rather than promiscuous since a lot of her "promiscuity" in season 1 is assumed based on her looks and the revenge porn that was shared of her.
She’s both though.
@@drfifteenmd7561 There was that Ferris Wheel scene. lol
@@Hugo-G She was on a carousel🎠 not a ferries wheel 🎡. Also she had taken the Molly drug.
@@ayeilak5 Oh yeah carousel, my bad. Yeah she was on Molly, but that just made her lower her inhibitions, didn't turn her into a completely different person. She is promiscuous, nothing inherently wrong with that, except in her case it is just to get validation.
@@Hugo-G she was embarrassed enough abt that to cry after it happened though. nothing against people who just like to have a lot of sex with a lot of people though, i just feel like people kind of forget some details abt that scene and use it as a way to say cassie "never had class"
I see a lot of myself in Cassie when I was younger. Being ‘comfortable’ with misery looks pathetic but the truth is she probably doesn’t know how to get help. People need role models and Cassie does not have a lot of good ones at all.
Truth. And she clearly used Maddy as one, which is where she learns to fake her confidence.
I think the idea that the people who have “lost sympathy” for Cassie simply means they never really understood or wanted to understand her to begin with. I find myself deeply empathizing with the things she does because I can see exactly the ways her mind forces her to do things, even when she likely doesn’t understand why she does the things she does herself. I understand she isn’t a good person. Simultaneously I can understand that she is a deeply damaged person.
I love this reply. This vid and the comments are such a better understanding of cassie than twitter and tiktok
@@Marcus-iz7vq I totally agree with you, the things I see people say about cassies character online! It’s like they never even watched the show. Or any of her scenes.
people forget that one scene where they literally confirmed how big of a people pleasing problem she has. When in an alternative sequence they showed what would've happened had she said no to things that brought her problems in the end. Cassie has a problem with giving into her in the moment impulses and inability to say no. these are signifiers of severe childhood trauma
Im exactly like this! I feel that way abt her too
This. This is 100% correct.
I have sympathy and empathy for all the characters. We're all humans making mistakes, learning and making mistakes again. All the characters have daddy and mommy issues not just Cassie. All characters have abandonment issues too.
I think the conversation Maddie had with her boss was foreshadowing Cassie's fate, that she will manage to change but her and Maddie's relationship will always be strained because of what happened
I mean you really can't come back from that
This video explains it so well. I think people forget that mental illness and healing from trauma isn’t beautiful. They tend to ignore and be disgusted when mental illness isn’t just being sad. When people are cruel and even gross. People dismiss the root cause and blame the person. Something that really changed my view was the idea that how someone feels is important and valid but what you do with that feeling isn’t. How Cassie feels is important, but she has a victim state of mind. As in she always sees herself as a victim. She hurts and that’s okay, but her taking it out on other isn’t. People will pity you until you do something bad or mean or gross. Then they think you’re pathetic, but they’ll never see you as a person.
I felt so bad for her when she told Nate “I want to belong to you, everything I do is for you, you can tell me what to do and what to wear and control everything I do etc”. It reminds me of when girls think that putting themselves lower will be seen as a plus and will make the guy want you more. She’s completely reliant on these men to give her any sense of self worth to the point where she lets herself be almost owned by these men. She wants so badly to be taken care of that she makes herself reliant on them. I feel that a lot of people associate being taken care of with being loved and treasured because if I guy did really love you he would want to take care of you like a father would his daughter. Problem is that he didn’t offer to. Making her feel like he has given her this validation when in reality he didn’t. Now she’s entirely reliant on him but the connection isn’t actually strong in real life. He even dumped her very soon after.
One of my favorite part about Cassie’s arc this season is that it’s facilitated such an interesting & dynamic discourse about childhood trauma and hyper sexualization. I hope a lot of people can take away that it’s not about being in the right or wrong, it’s about complexity, and hopefully, sometimes, an ability to improve on ourselves.
Honestly, Cassie is my favorite character. I always had a lot of sympathy for her, mainly because she always struggled alone. Rue has her mother, sister, Lexi and Fez who look out for her and support her through rehab. Maddy has her girls and the mother of the kid she babysits for. Yes, there are other characters with problems, who don't really have people, but Cassie's issues get belittled by her "people". Her mother isn't there for her, her father left them, Lexi puts on a play depicting her as the perfect person in whose shadow she's standing, Nate isn't really sympathetic. She doesn't have anyone, and yes, this might be her fault, but how is she supposed to get better this way. I don't see her as a completely good person, but I do see her struggles.
I have nothing against the other characters, just wanted to show that from Cassies standpoint, they aren't helping.
But she had Maddy :(
@@gabrielaalves6977 yea but I think their friendship wasn’t portrayed like the deep, trustful friendship. There weren’t many scenes of Maddy actually being there for Cassie and in my memory, they only started to portray them as friends after a lot of stuff already happened to Cassie. It’s been a while since I watched the show tho.
Again, it’s not like I think Cassie is perfect or the other ones have it easy, but she’s kinda my favourite character. I think her character is quite tragic and I like those type of stories.
@@july3817 yeah, I agree, Cassie's been through a lot
me too! She was super exhausted in the second season but that's real life. Some people are exhausted and insufferable.
Something I always say when talking about the show is that our trauma can contextualize our actions but it doesn't excuse them. And we can learn to synthesize with any person but doesn't mean we don't hold them accountable.
Do you feel that this is a somewhat American problem? Wanting likeable characters or moral integrity over compexity and good storytelling? I don't see this as much in films and shows from Europe (whether that's UK, Germany, France, Italy, etc). European film also does not seem to value purity as much in female characters.
The US also seems very forgiving towards male characters and "burn her at the stake" to anyone not male.
Yeah maybe also an age thing. Nuance is lost on a lot of the teenage Euphoria viewers who are vocal on social media. But you're right American media can stomach unlikeable traits in male characters much more than female ones.
Absolutely agree! I think this is partially because of social media (a place where you can cultivate a likable and perfect life/fake personality). People now expect a cookie-cutter image from every other kind of media or else it’s “problematic”.
Also, when you factor the main demographic of young people/teens into the mix, you get a million complaints from older generations of tv “glorifying” harmful things, even when it isn’t. According to them, using a young, attractive actor or actress to portray a flawed character suddenly means it’s being glorified. 🙄 It reminds me of how US media used the “Hayes Code” before the 1960’s. The movies could only portray certain characters if they were punished for their harmful behavior in the end of the plot (especially promiscuous or LGBT characters). Other plots couldn’t be shown at all. This was meant to reinforce morals, even if they were unrealistic. Now, most Americans expect our media to only reinforce good morals instead of telling a strong story. It seems to be a cultural thing AKA ‘moral panic’.
Your point about gender definitely seems to be true. I think it’s called the “wh*re/Madonna complex”. I watch a lot of media analysis and this mentality is very common. Even women have it.
Thank you for saying that this so true. People don't like Cassie but there are people cheering for Nate. In the shows Mad men Don Draper was messed up as parent but his ex wife Betty was seen as more messed up. Same in The Sopranos with Tony and his wife, Breaking Bad Walter and his wife. Women and girls are a given more hostilely for there wrong doings then men and boys.
We don't want likeable characters or moral integrity because those don't always make a good show.
Hating Cassie doesn't mean that they don't like the storytelling.
Edit Reply: You can hate Cassie and her actions and still recognize that she's a well written character and crucial to the complexity of Euphoria.
What are you not understanding? People do not HAVE to love her for having sex with Maddies bf just because she is well written.
@@cz538 No. That's exactly what it means. Stop trying to justify yourself.
" An excuse always has an explanation but an explanation isn't always an excuse." I wrote that down, thank you.
I think Sydney would benefit from doing some weird psychological dramas or dark comedies. She really shines in highly emotional roles.
Sydney Sweeney is an incredible actress. She was fantastic in The Handmaid’s Tale, and she’s even better in Euphoria.
People can have a trouble past and do terrible things because of it. However, accountability is still there. Having a hard childhood can be an explanation but one still has to reap their consequences in the end. She has what’s coming for her.
This was a really well done video. I haven’t seen euphoria yet, but I know a lot about Cassie thanks to tiktok thinking I’ve seen this show lol. You did a really good job explaining a lot of the videos I’ve been seeing on it
I genuinely see her as someone with severe undiagnosed BPD. as someone with bpd myself I act exactly like this when I spiral, especially when it's with my favorite person. when you're in that mindset all that matters is what you can do to prevent yourself from feeling/being abandoned and getting the attention you need to survive and the attention you lacked as a child. It doesn't matter how it just matters when. I've lost friends, I've been in abusive relationship after abusive relationship and cassies story in season 2 reminds me of a situation I've been in twice down to a T and I cannot describe how disheartening it is to see a character clearly hurting the same way you did, being told that they're being dramatic and even as far as wishing that their scu*cide attempt in episode 6 was successful. Because you've attempted the same thing under the same conditions. it genuinely makes me sick to see sometimes. I 100% agree with you saying that an excuse is an explanation but an explanation isnt always an excuse because in my opinion, cassie needs to be sent to the nearest mental hospital and far away from nate, I'm not sure why they didn't take her in as soon as her mom and sister realized that her fear of abandonment was so great that they had to hide knives in fear that she would harm herself. and I hate the way it was played off for a quick laugh. but that's besides the point, cassie needs serious help.
So you slept with your best friends ex? Cause that would be shitty
Casie is the topic that I comment every week after a new episode. I cared for her in season 1 because her situation is similar to some girls that I had know and is not a easy one at all. Season 2 is a conflicting watch coming from that place of empathy but as you said, it's such an fascinating turn for her character. I also think that she can be redeemable and I'm very excited to see what would be her last moment in the last episode and next season.
Also the most insufferable thing about this arc is watching Nate more often.
Everyone in life is redeemable. That’s what Ali stated in the Rue special.
Osama Bin Laden was not redeemable. Neither was Jeffrey Epstein
@@Overseer2579 you just chose to pick two extremely sinister people throughout history as examples so it’d create conflict😒 are they redeemable? To the most forgiving people perhaps… but regardless, they’d still have to do the work. Psychological, mental, & emotional work.
@@Overseer2579 and show proof in action! Not just talk!
Cassie is also the definition of Hurt people hurt people. She uses the trauma she suffered to hurt others.
Thank you! Im so tired of reading posts arguing whether she's a bad person or a victim when that's not the point!
I wish we got a glimpse of how different Mckay reacted to his best friend getting with his ex and how Maddie reacted to it
I think he wouldn’t care anymore at this stage, since Cassie already kinda implied in their break up that she cheated on him.
@@diamondcentury21 I thought that was about the a-------
Why? They’re two completely different situations. Mckay wasn’t abused by Cassie.
Maddie and Nate were still on and off. Cassie and McKay were 100% done since a while
I don’t think it would move him
It's interesting to see how the characters, and we the audience, treat two different kinds of addiction. Drugs are vilified, and rightfully so, but love addiction has been lauded as "true love" for generations and is just now being recognized as harmful.
I used to have a best friend who I would consider a Cassie, as in she would do absolutely anything to get male validation and attention. I don’t think she’s been single since she was thirteen. She was mean, manipulative, did many horrible things to me and other people she called friends because of the boys she was seeing. It is so fucking sad. I finally had to let her go because I realized I would never be as important to her than her need for male attention. 🤷🏻♀️
@@isabelhawkins8955 I know plenty of girls like this. Ones I grew up with that went on to be forever girlfriends and ones that probably will too someday.
I've suggested to these types before that they try to be single and they look at me like an enemy. Their impulse isn't thought of as an addiction, won't be treated like an addiction, and the fallout (rushed marriages, unplanned kids) will be celebrated without question. Imagine if we treated heroin like that.
I feel that love is the strongest drug, because what have people done for crack that they have _not_ done for love? 😟😟
I think Cassie's family dynamics with her sister and mother are also very complex and interesting - the scene where she stabs her wrist with a corkscrew and says she wants to die and their reactions to it is very emotional and intense, and all three of them just immediately move on in such a realistic but heartbreaking way. I like all three characters and appreciate the nuanced depiction of a dysfunctional family.
First of all, phenomenal video. Second of all, the difference between "explanation" and "excuse" is something I talk about all the time in our trauma-informed, cancel-culture based, gen z world and I'm so happy to hear someone else talk about it to and the clear way it manifests in the context of this show. Such interesting insight, and like I said, freaking phenomenal video.
thank you! keep talking about that. i’m so tired of the blind villainizing that this generation is so eager to jump into.
I think Cassie put it to words herself when she brought up the point to her mom somewhere in season 2 while they were fighting that Rue's father died, but her father left, and Rue gets all this sympathy and shit for this while she doesn't.
Yeah her father is basically dead and her mom is a train wreck too but she isn't shown even an ounce of the sympathy or attention that rue is
3:03 i found it intriguing that nate found his dads collection at 11, but his mom says that he began to get violent around 8-9. if she is correct, this would mean that nate’s anger didn’t stem from his dad, but that it was a part of him the entire time. this contradicts euphoria’s usual way of storytelling and explanation, causing disruption in the viewers’ perception of the characters. we no longer look at what the children were subjected to, but how they subjected themselves to the same things long after they had autonomy over their lives. great video!!!
hmm and tbh I thought it was weird how he went through his dad's collection in such a methodical manner. writing down the way they were color coordinated and even the way they were facing. plus, how young was he when he started working out vigorously?
@@ooin_otaku4282 that’s a good observation and it is extremely weird for a kid his age 😭
I root for her. She's beautifully constructed
It’s crazy to think about the fact that cassie and Lexi have the same childhood experiences but are so different
It's almost like they're two different ppl. Are all siblings you know the same?
Because Lexi could go to their mom. Even through the show you can see that she and suze had the same attitude towards their dad or how whenever Cassie is having what could very well be a manic episode they say “we don’t care” and judge her together. Suze always talks about her youth and Cassie’s body while telling her that her body is all anyone could want her for. Then the first few seconds of the play, Lexi talks about how she wants to be wanted buy guys and how her sister is always chosen. They literally hate her and try to portray it as caring about her
Not the same at all, Cassie is the older sister and was mostly aware of everything and had such a profound bond with her father while Lexie was younger when the problems happened and distanced from the whole family to protect herself. And she wasn't that close to her father too, instead she was more happy when he left
@Aurora Borea all women go through sexualization and objectification, thats just living in the patriarchy. Cassie lacks perspective so see herself away from that.
@@jama3997 They care about her, Lexi just felt jealous as all sisters do. Both lexi and her mom were fed up with Cassie’s behavior because it was narcissistic.
All the characters including Cassie are fascinating and interesting; people really don’t seem to understand that you don’t have to condone or agree with their actions/thought processes.
Finally someone sharing my opinion! Let's not forget she's manipulated by Nate who's directly feeding into her needs and cravings of male validation and attention :(
I mean he just broke up with her, so I'm hyped to see how it plays out
To be fair she didn’t need to be manipulated by Nate in the beginning. But at this point he absolutely is manipulating her.
She's as toxic with him as he is with her
Exactly! I feel like no one is talking about Nate when it's him who's more at fault than Cassie
@@basiatomaszewska9269 Because we're all used to his bs by now. It's not shocking that's he's trying to control another girl the problem is Cassie feeds into that the same way Nate does. He wants a woman who's perfect and does what she's told and Cassie literally went as far as saying "you can control what I EAT!" Like girl what?
as someone who relates to this character to damn near a T, this analysis is really validating, i love me a nuanced villain. ppl so often hear an explanation and get upset that someone in the wrong would even dare to have an explanation for their actions and double on the blame bc it doesnt hold up as an excuse. it should never have been an excuse in the first place and it sucks to see this narrative that cassie is “showing her true colors” when rlly no one showed up for each other in the sea of red flags (s1) and this is where it brought them. there’s truth to it obviously but the phrase “true colors” is so unsympathetic in light of what we know abt her, like she’s been plotting for ages to ruin everyone’s life or something idk.
You can usually see when a character’s negative actions are a cry for help, but then instead of getting help they are either demonized with no sympathy or what they do is excused bc of trauma and we pretend that being forgiven will solve their problems. it wont, in cassie’s case therapy will solve her problems, working until she genuinely feels like she’s worthy of forgiveness will solve her problems, and i hope she gets that redemption in the end.
How tf is she a villain? Explain that to me. She literally is one of the least shitty people on the show.
I'm so glad you made this video. Your earlier Euphoria video "Teen Melodrama: How Euphoria Gets It Right" is what initially got me into this show and it quickly became one of my favourites of the past few years. It was such a welcome surprise to see Cassie's growth this season, Sydney Sweeney really stepped up her game as an actress. Whenever she's on screen now I'm definitely paying attention. Especially her outburst against Nate in ep. 4 was such a great performance. Honestly there's few characters this season that *didn't* improve in some way, much to the credit of both the creators and actors of the show. I'm so excited (and a bit scared too, honestly) for the season finale this sunday...
we often forget that we can sympathise with someone without agreeing that theyre not exactly a good character even if their pasts could justify their behaviours. many of us are swayed by the glamorisation of some depictions in movies. we see people rooting for joker, harley and wanda for the same reason some try to justify cassie and defending her. there are real people out there who would use their childhood trauma to justify their lack of accountability in their actions. a lot of characters are perceived as tolerated or excusable when they’re too broken to fix and have these amazing trauma stories. i think every victim in movies(and irl)has a potential to become the antagonist and inflict pain on others. it’s understandable but its just inexcusable.
"Excuses are explanations, but explanations aren't always excuses" Love this
here's an important point: every human being deserves our compassion. still, that does not mean we should absolve anyone of responsibility for his or her own actions
Does a serial rap¡st or murderer deserve compassion? Absolutely not.
She reminds me a lot of Effy from Skins, Effy hurt so many people and used her pain as an excuse and everyone LOVES Effy, I don’t really love either of theses characters honestly but it’s so weird how so many people idolize Effy and hate Cassie when they’re actually very similar characters
because effy's character and her personality flaws/mental illnesses have been glamorized and presented as something to vouch for as young girls. Whereas on the contrary, Cassie's character flaws/mental health problems have been demonized and presented as comical. They used the entire "broken beautiful sad girl with mental issues" trope as a fetishization of the character. Whereas the same trope has been used to really portray the horrible effects it can have on someone through Cassie. Both of them are poorly written characters. Cassie's is just more grounded in reality
you are so right! They share similarities like self-destruction and sabotaging relationships
This video perfectly captures my conflicting emotions concerning Cassie so succinctly. An amazing watch!👏🏾
Thank you!
If Cassie does finally come to her senses and finally gets help she’d actually be one of my favorite characters. I would like to see her apologize to the people she’s hurt and I wanna see her finally comfortable without a man in her life.
If you’re into anime, you’ll know that excusing a character and thinking they did “nothing wrong” is a thing that many fans to do many characters (that are terrible people) specifically that are attractive
I don’t watch Euphoria but I’ve seen enough of it, but Cassie definitely gets a lot of flack [online] basically maddy=good and cassie=bad. This sentiment coming from 14-19yr olds probably. Truth is a lot of teens are actually pretty similar to Cassie and it’s easier to just place the villain label on her. I wonder how people who viewed euphoria would think about Cassie as an older version of themselves
Nah Im older and Cassie really sucks. I would never dump my BFF for a boy.
@@leavemeal0ne378 there’s more to it than just that. If you actually were older you’d see it’s not just that
My mother 45 also disliked Cassie
Actually no, a lot of teens aren't similar to Cassie which is why she has a lack of sympathy. Cassie's situation is a rare tragedy which is not common in today's teens.
Also, Cassie called herself the villain so that's not a label just slapped onto her by angry teens.
How much do u think the trauma of Cassie having to get an abortion plays into her actions and emotions this season? I feel like it's part of her story that hasn't rly been addressed enough I believe it to be an important justification for her actions this season.
def doesn’t justify it but I understand how that would effect her mentally
I was just thinking about that, it wasnt adressed at all in the 2nd season
Yo feels like they just forgot about it in the 2nd season, kinda like how they forgot about rue owing money and shit
@@Frosting1000 they didn't forget about that, she was already trafficked but escaped. I think it'll come back next season again tbh
Explanation vs excuse - pretty relevant when it comes to apologies too - when you try to explain yourself during an apology, everyone always sees it as an excuse, when rly, you're just trying to explain your side
Honestly the main thing for me is just that Sydney Sweeney is such a phenomenal actress that I am glad she was given such a complex and emotionally disturbed storyline so we got to see her full talents
The way so many people on Twitter need to watch this
I do think that Cassie deserves sympathy, it's just that the characters she has hurt deserve more (and also an apology. Or lots of apologies)
Agreed
Apology for what? The fuck did Cassie do? Literally nothing.
She grew up only being valued by her looks, she was given compliments for being pretty and adorable, no one complimented her being smart and having an intelligent thought, so she grew up valuing looks over brains, which led to mistake after mistake, guy after guy, who told her she was pretty, who valued her looks, so she went so far to look for someone to love her for who she is, this gave her a narcissistic complex aswell as insane insecurity, she values herself and was valued by her looks, so she thinks she is very pretty, but all of her relationships keep failing, so maybe she's not pretty enough. Add all of this aswell with her abandonment issues from her dad leaving, it is easy to feel unloved, her insecurities and abandonment issues is what makes her manic but her narcissism and growing up being told she was beautiful and that she did everything right by being beautiful, led to her making excuses for her behaviour, so she is simultaneously blaming herself for everything she's done while not blaming herself at all. This leads to a stressful back and forth with her subconscious creating a hostile environment, something she doesn't want to deal with because she wasn't raised to think she was raised to look pretty, so she clings on to the nearest guy and falls in love
As someone with many of the same issues as Cassie I completely agree and am trying to heal. Even though growing up I read books all the time, had AP and honors classes, all A’s & went to college I never thought guys were with me because of anything other than looks or $3x bc much like Cassie I had an absent father and an alcoholic mother, who was fairly abusive & always focused on how I looked. Never was I congratulated for my grades and academic accomplishments just how I looked that day, sexualized very early, shamed for not wanting to dress certain ways.
I blame my mom for so much & I’ve been lashing out toward her & my family for years now, stopped wanting to listen to anyone, just full of rage.
Led to many failed relationships and friendships and only now am I realizing it at 27. A f’n doozy.
I literally love cassie character, I could talk about her for hours without getting bored
Some of Cassie’s scenes make me almost cry because she’s so relatable. I’m sure a lot of girls feel this way who have had an abandoned father and have followed down a similar destructive path. I felt like someone is finally recognizing the girl whose pretty and seems to have it all because she smiles and has friends. But he father abandoned her and her mom is an alcoholic. There’s a pressure to be perfect because you don’t want to be abandoned by anyone else and you become a people pleaser. Really it results it borderline personality disorder at least for me. Which comes from a fear of abandonment. The only difference is my family didn’t have money were were poor so it was even worse. I wish I could’ve dealt with my child hood trauma at some unicorn birthday party but really I never got a birthday party at all.
This was an excellent video! I think Cassie is redeemable. Now that Nate has tossed her to the side, and even Maddie looked at her with compassion in the bathroom, she needs to see, acknowledge, and understand how her actions have affected those around her. Her need for male validation is just as addictive as alcohol… I hope she is better in S3.
Loveeee the way this analysis is formatted. Also, Prince of Egypt is my favorite animated movie of all time and definitely see the Freudian parallels there as well.
cassie had an abortion in s2, was confrimed to be sexually assaulted my male relatives in her childhood, nate was confirmed to bully/make fun of cassie in s1 (lexi confirms this in s2), cassie's mother had to hide knives from cassie in s2 bc she kept saying she wanted to die, cassie's father left her family due to his drinking addiction, yet most of the fandom has no sympathy for her
When did they say Cassie was SA’d by male relatives? I’m just curious I don’t remember seeing this
@@concepcion1117It was a flashback. Not sure what specific episode but definitely a flashback in season 2
Honestly, I'm really glad I clicked this. Cassie was honestly my favorite character this season, and I'm glad someone understands why.
Tbh, from what i’ve seen on tiktok and twitter, most people have completely missed the mark on who cassie is and why she acts the way she does (i saw someone with a million likes say she only befriended maddy to study and copy her because she is “perfect” and “loved” like cassie wants to be, it made no sense and was a huge reach)
she doesn’t get with nate to spite maddy out of jealousy and start some petty high school drama, it’s not that surface level (i mean, nothing in euphoria is)
this video explains her character perfectly, “explanation may not be an excuse but it matters” are the keywords to understand her
It was not a reach whatsoever they wore the same outfit. Tried to stand out just like maddie was.
Thank you for making this, you said everything that needed to be said
Is funny how everybody hate her so much. I feel like everything that comes out her mouth it must be on the other end of the spectrum of what she is saying. I love him, I hate him. Most of all, she is acting like her mom. Her mom is self harming herself but with alcohol. She never accepted to herself her wrong doing in her failed marriage. I feel like Cassie hates herself more than everybody else. She says “I don’t know if I am a good person.” At some point. So unconsciously Cassie knows she do bad things that should not be done. The thing is that she pretty much haven’t figure out how to deal with her issues. I don’t know if in some level I felt that when I was a teenager. She has been emotionally neglected, with pleasing personality at some degree, not knowing how to say no. Is really complex to just hate her, people forget she is actually a teenager that knows shit about anything. Most of all that, at some point we all had that attitude of no accepting mistakes and that nobody is perfect.
Interesting distinction to draw between explanations and excuses. Tbh I've always held the cynical view that people who say "that's not an excuse" will never care for an explanation.
Elaborate
I agree 100%
@@alyshahkinsella Well, I had the feeling that no matter what, if you try to explain someone's behaviour that group of people will view you as trying to excuse it and dismiss it.
I didn't watch the show but perhaps like how they might view people trying to explain Cassie's behaviour in the first season (how she's emotionally distant yet dependent(?)) via her past as "not an excuse" for burdening her friends.
but we understand why she did what she did but thatś not n excuse to do a bad thing. You can feel bad for someone and still see that their actions aren't perfect
@@fatoumatacisse3796 Exactly, what is and isn't "excusable" is arbitrary. Based entirely on extremely fickle value systems.
The idea of excuse vs. explanation is HUGE to me. In the few scenarios where I have been witness to someone trying to explain or apologize for something, or I’ve been the one trying to myself, I’ve always been upset by people who stop someone with “I don’t care what your excuse is.”
I see the “excuse” as the starting point- what you do after that is much more important and helps us see if it’s an excuse or an explanation. Someone who is explaining will continue to do things to make it right. Someone leaning on an excuse stops right then and there.
This vid is super interesting to me because it makes me think a lot of how Lexi has unfolded too. She had a great play but also included hurtful things (like the carousel scene). I see way too many thoughtless posts just saying the bad things these girls have done but not actually unpacking their trauma. Like you said, it's not meant to excuse their actions but understand why they do the things they do.
Honestly I just really wanted to give a Cassie a hug all season
You can sympathize with someones plight while still acknowledging that they've done wrong.
Cassie is damaged and needs help, but she also hurt someone who really cared about her.
Now shes lost the secret boyfriend and her best friend.
YES YES YES YES. Touching on Cal and his backstory, I saw many people on twitter saying they shouldn’t have put that in because it would cause the audience to side with him (which some did). But it wasn’t intended to make you side with him, it was intended as an explanation as to how he ended up where he is now. Unfortunately, many don’t have the ability to differentiate an excuse from an explanation.
So happy you're back! This was such a great video and you really put into words my exact feelings about Cassie this season. I think a video on Nate would be so interesting, since he's probably one of, if not the most complex character on the show
I think the living room argument was interesting with cassie because to me, it really showed that whatever going on with nate is *her* addiction. she needs male validation, even though we know nate’s words as empty promises (aka repeating the same things he’s said to maddy.) nevertheless, we’d seen signs of it in the first season when she was cheating on mckay and overall just taking mckay’s bs. It just hasn’t been as drastic until one of her biggest life events happened… but it’s always been there. it’s just unfortunate for her that people take cheating worse that murder 😭
Oh my God yes people do treat it worse than murder, they gotta grow up. If they were married you'd understand it but it's still not the most evil thing in the world that some people seem to think it is, people cheat because they are cowards and can't tell their partners it's over or they're not happy that doesn't make you evil. In ten years Maddy will barely remember Nate or how she felt about him and people do not always stay friends after High School. She won't feel as heartbroken about Cassie either that's just life. Cassie shouldn't have done it obviously but technically her and Nate did not cheat, 3 weeks of a break up is not an excuse she still shouldn't have done that to a friend at all. This time at least it wasn't technically cheating in the traditional sense.
@@ActuallyDoubleGuitars yeah it wasn’t cheating, but it still is betrayal from two people she loved immensely. I think her confrontations with both nate and cassie show how much maddy cared for them + even understood their actions as things they couldn’t help; aka asking nate if /he/ felt loved by her (because she knows his family dynamic), and then asking cassie why does /nate/ constantly hurt her (even if she was explosive at first, she doesn’t fault cassie as much as people make it out to be). but like the mom said, it’s about principle, so technicality doesn’t matter. however, my last sentence is just a generalization from what I’ve seen with popular media + fan responses 😭 no one hates the villain or the killer as much as they hate the betrayer. but hopefully we do see cassie working on her issues in the next season, because personally, she’s a great character + there’s a lot of healing for her to be had once she can distinguish real love from temporary fixes.
@@michellejoy1921 "No one hates the killer as much as the betrayer" was glaringly obvious with people's reactions to Joe and Love in YOU. Yeah I really hope she tries to be better next season and even gets some therapy.
I read somewhere that the show is called Euphoria bc all of them are chasing something that gives them this feeling. Rues being the most obvious (drugs). Cassie love, male validation, acceptance. Maddy, power. Etc.
It's kinda funny tho how everyone talk like Cassie was the big villain of the show, like she had killed someone, abused someone, when actually she just broke a girl code 😭😭 people act like she was the worst when, if we only look at the fact, she's the most innocent character of the show