you know, i’ve been thinking about the most common criticism of euphoria (that it sexualizes teenagers in a romanticized way)  and i feel like the school setting kinda works for the story the creator is trying to tell?  these characters do not have ANYTHING going on in their lives except for their personal relationships and troubles even a character like Lexi who's the most ‘normal’ of the group isn’t really shown doing any studying or thinking about colleges or anything like that, her arc is about getting sidelined all the time while also living a pretty boring life   at best McKay had his football troubles and these troubles amount to not knowing how to quit without his father becoming disappointed with no other plans for the future and Jules is apparently going into fashion later which she constantly shows with her daring costume and make up choices, but like, this isn’t a part of her story arc at all these kids have no aspirations and no real school life! we don’t really get to see any lessons, there are no substantial teacher characters, the school set is just an ambiguous background which doesn’t really matter and i think that’s the only way this could work in a non-scifi setting, really in college kids are adult enough to make better choices and if they still focus on self-destruction they don’t really evoke as much pity, plus there’s bigger separation from their families while in euphoria relationships with parents play a larger role adults just don’t tend to have as much silly drama so, if you want to explore characters in a close-knit group who make stupid decisions with dramatic consequences pertaining to drug abuse and sexual misadventures without anything else like work/studying getting in the way, then high school is the way tbh i still think this could be a truly outstanding show if they did go more in-depth about the pressures of school and future career, hobbies and other motivations, even Skins had more of that, but well, that... isn’t the story Euphoria is trying to tell I guess glamour, naked bodies, provocative outfits, music - all of it is supposed to evoke the feeling of being young and stupid, focused on other young and stupid people, same as the original israeli series it’s too beautiful, too artistic for real life, which is why there’re also some pretty gross scenes and plot turns like getting high and then coming down from it, or at least that’s what the creator is trying to do here, i suppose   then again from what ive seen the creator insists that he’s exploring his own experiences and that’s the whole reason they’re minors which uh... plus it’s super weird to make the main plot about a shitty cheater who sexually abused a minor and filmed her without her consent (ehh Jules lied about her age and wanted to sleep with him, but that scene was obviously NOT what she thought she was agreeing to) when the minor on-screen is portrayed by a 23 y/o actress im just saying, the actor who played Jules as a child is 14, closer to Jules age (17) than her adult actress, i think that alone is... oof, telling  so im not too keen on trying to justify these choices, after all im only watching for the cool sound mixing and pretty pictures god knows we have more than enough of those drug&sex high school shows, best we can hope is that euphoria will pave the way for something more thoughtful but with the same level of sound/visual design