Euphoria: The Cassie Complex

Viewers of the HBO show, Euphoria, have been chomping at the bit for new content as the series finale gears up to premier on Sunday, February 27. The season itself has been riddled with drama, from cheating and sex tapes, to drug abuse and human trafficking; a lot, we know. With the popularity of Euphoria comes an extremely large fanbase – and with that fanbase, the power to critique and analyze the show and its characters on a mass scale.  

One character who has received a lot of heat from fans of the show this season has been Cassie Howard. Though she was a favorite for many during the show’s initial run in 2019, things took a turn for the worst during Season Two. For those of you who haven’t been clued in, Cassie sleeps with the abusive ex-boyfriend (Nate Jacobs) of her best friend, Maddy Perez. The two continue this affair in secret, having begun it shortly after Maddie and Nate broke up. Cassie wakes up as early as 4:00 AM to get ready for school and impress Nate. She imitates Maddy’s fashion looks. She consistently vies for his attention and puts her relationship with him before her relationship with her best friend.  

To someone scraping the surface, Cassie’s character seems desperate and thoughtless. We pin her for being selfish and having no respect for her friend. Even as the season comes to a close, many viewers express that they’re still waiting for Maddy to “beat Cassie up.” All these critiques are fair, of course – many women resonate with the feeling of having a manipulative or abusive ex-boyfriend. The idea of their closest friend sleeping with that man is reason enough to fuel their hatred for Cassie. However, few people take into consideration the incidents occurring over the course of Cassie’s life that may have driven her to such an act.  

I’m not a Cassie apologist. There is never truly an excuse for sleeping with your best friend’s ex-boyfriend. That being said, when we look back at what we know about Cassie, we may be able to discern why this happened.  

We’ve learned a lot about Cassie Howard over the course of the show. In fact, her story is one that – for many women – is painfully relatable. Her childhood primed her for an addiction to male validation and ‘love’ – whether that ‘love’ was truly adoration or just mere sexual attraction. At a young age, she was already being consistently sexualized by older men for her body and abandoned by an absentee father. Her nudes are circulated around her high school, her boyfriend tells her he wants her to get an abortion, and who could forget the cruel speech given to her after she refuses to have sex with someone at a party: “I’m going to be honest with you because no one else will. Any guy who says he’s interested in you beyond just f—ing you is full of sh–.”  

Why is it so difficult for viewers of Euphoria to take these items into account when wondering ‘how could she?’ Was it right to further victimize Maddy in the way Cassie did? Absolutely not. But if not Maddy, it would’ve been someone else.  

Some theorists and critics have suggested that, in a way, Cassie is a foil for Rue. Both of them are older sisters who experienced life without a father and from a young age were made ready for addictions. Rue to drugs and Cassie to validation. Both of them are extremely destructive of their friends’ and families’ lives because of it – but because Rue’s is something tangible, and something deadly, we struggle less to grant her sympathy for her actions. The other difference? Rue gets an intervention. Cassie does not. In the grand scheme of things, sleeping with your friend’s ex-boyfriend isn’t the worst thing to happen on the show. And yet, Cassie is the most hated character (other than Nate).  

It’s almost as if Euphoria’s audiences forget just how manipulative Nate Jacobs can be. Assuming that he could get Maddy to frame an innocent man for a crime he didn’t commit, why is it so out of left field to think he could manipulate Cassie into treating him with unwavering loyalty. Cassie tells him in Episode seven of Season two that he has complete control over her. What she wears, what she eats, who she talks to. This is clearly some kind of illness, some kind of craving to hold on to the one man who seems to care about her. And yet, we brush it off as ‘seriously, Cassie?’ 

When I think of Cassie, I’m drawn back to Frued’s Madonna-Whore complex. Though the initial theory presents itself as ‘men’s inability to maintain arousal in a committed, loving relationship,’ the roots stem a bit deeper. The entire ideology surrounding the Madonna-Whore complex is based on the notion that we, as a collective, can observe women as one of two classes: a Madonna – the picture of innocence, sweetness, and purity – or a whore. A woman like Cassie will be viewed by the men in her life as a Madonna at first – she’s an innocent child, yet she’s a nurturing mother. She’s pure, and beautiful, and simple. The moment she acts out in a way that doesn’t fit this mold, however, we must categorize her as a whore.  

The point I’m making here is not that we should revere Cassie as a Madonna – none of the characters in this show ought to be observed that way. However, why is there no happy medium? No in-between? Why must Cassie be labeled as one over the other? This hatred for her as a character has grown so intensely that characters are genuinely either rooting for her to be with Nate, spitefully saying ‘they deserve each other,’ – or rooting for Maddy and Nate to get back together to ‘rub it in Cassie’s face.’  

Let’s try to remember here that Nate is abusive. In Episode six of Season two, he quite literally threatens Maddy at gunpoint. Why would any viewer in their right mind root for a 17-year-old girl (whether that be Maddy or Cassie) to be with him? This seems to place us back inside a never-ending media cycle of punishing women for the actions of men.  

At the end of the day, I don’t condone what Cassie did. It was a testament to her lack of willpower and her value of her addiction over the important people to her in her life. However, when we consider her need for validation, and the fact that she is now locked in a manipulative relationship, we can discern why that desperate need to prove her worth exists pretty consistently. Cassie will continue behaving in outlandish and crazy ways until she, too, has an intervention. Ultimately, we cannot cast blame on Cassie without understanding her – and once again, there is no excuse for what she’s done, but there is reasoning.