Euphoria Season 2's Most Controversial Scene Was Almost Even More Cringe-Worthy

According to star Dominic Fike, this unpopular, cringe-inducing scene from Season 2 of "Euphoria" was almost a lot, lot worse.

We know what you're thinking — when it comes to cringey scenes on "Euphoria," there are plenty to choose from, whether Sydney Sweeney's Cassie is puking on herself in a hot tub or Cal Jacobs (Eric Dane) is peeing on the floor in front of his confused family. (Yes, a lot of these moments involve untoward bodily functions.) That's not the one Fike is talking about, though. He's referencing the scene in the Season 2 finale, "All My Life, My Heart Has Yearned for a Thing I Cannot Name," where his character Elliot plays a song for Zendaya's lead character, Rue.

"You know that scene that everybody f***ing made f***ing fun of me for?" Fike said while speaking to Nardwuar the Human Serviette, a Canadian journalist. "That was supposed to be me playing a trumpet, so imagine that."

The scene in question feels seriously out of place in the finale; the song goes on for an interminably long time while Zendaya just sits there, which left fans ... baffled, to say the least. Still, it's fascinating to know that it actually could have been worse.

When the episode initially aired in February 2022, fans made no secret of the fact that they really hated Elliot's musical number. Mostly, they just felt like it brought the rest of the episode to a screeching halt. 

Here's a perfect example from @kobychill, referencing a huge conflict between Cassie and Maddy (Alexia Demie) that took up another large part of the finale. "imagine what we could've done had there not been a ten minute intermission where some guy played guitar for too long," they wrote on X (formerly known as Twitter). Another fan, @KaylarWill, agreed, writing, "All the questions left unanswered bc Euphoria writers wrote in Elliot singing for 27 minutes. Ok." One viewer arrived at that point much more directly: "We got 4 minutes of Elliot's stupid song rather than Maddy beating Cassie's ass."

None of these viewers are wrong, and none of them are directly insulting the song itself (which would have been lovely in different circumstances). The bigger problem is, obviously, that the finale wasted a baffling amount of time on this musical interlude while showing other things off-screen — like a scuffle between Cassie and Maddy, which is only referenced by the former's bloody nose in a short throwaway scene.

With Euphoria Season 3 delayed until 2025 as of this writing, fans will have to wait even longer to get answers about their favorite show — so it's understandable that some are still blaming Elliot's song. You can stream the trumpet-free version, as well as the rest of "Euphoria," on Max now.