Euphoria v.s 13 Reasons Why: Mental Health Awareness

Trigger warning: drugs, abuse, addiction, self harm

Hello everyone! Long time no see. After a very long break, I’m excited to say that I have returned. After a lot of hype surrounding Euphoria was popping up all over my social media accounts, I finally caved in and watched the series. My critiques on the show are irrelevant because today I want to discuss the portrayal of mental health in Euphoria, and how it compares to the controversial netflix series, 13 Reasons Why. I watched 13 Reasons Why at a young age, but at the time that I watched it, I didn’t realize how wrong the show was about the portrayal of mental health, and how they romanticised the idea of blaming people for the cause of one’s passing. After watching Euphoria, I realized that it did what 13 Reasons Why WANTED to do, but couldn’t achieve. Let’s investigate why Euphoria is a cinematic gold mine for generation Z, and how 13 Reasons Why is inaccurate and harmful.

Character Backstories

One element that is consistent in both shows, is the character backstories. Where Euphoria gives it’s audience 7 detailed backstories, 13 Reasons Why gives small flashbacks, but the character’s story HAS to revolve around Hannah Baker. At the beginning of each episode of Euphoria, there is a 10 minute segment about one of the characters, showing their family life, childhood, and people/events that made them the way they are. Some are light-hearted, and some show the dark reality of addiction, abuse, mental health, and self harm. For example, Kat, Maddy and McKay have the more light-hearted stories. Kat grew up being fat, and got her heart broken when she was 11 years old. Where she then started writing fan fictions. Maddy was a confident pageant girl, until a pageant coach was exposed and she was forced to quit, but decided that “doing nothing” was a better use of her time. McKay grew up with a football loving dad, and always faced the pressure of being the best in the game, until he went to college and realized there are people who play better than him. Rue, Jules, Cassie and Nate have the darkest stories in the show. Rue, the protagonist, is a teenage drug addict, who went to rehab over the summer, and is trying to quit for the sake of her family and herself. Jules was sent to a psychiatrist when she was 11 years old, where she self harmed but was eventually released. She transitioned when she was 13, and moved to a different town when her parents got divorced. Cassie grew up with a happy family until her dad slowly started to disappear from her life, eventually never being seen again. The whole in her heart caused by her dad causes Cassie to look for love in any relationship to fill that void, where she gets caught up with the wrong boys. Nate Jacobs, the antagonist of the show, has one of the darkest backstories I’ve ever seen. Shown to be the perfect jock, star quarterback, and the successful son. Nate Jacobs' entire personality changes at a young age when he discovers a dark secret about his dad, warping his ideas about intimacy and love, and turning them violent. The beauty of these backstories is, they’re all different and audiences are able to relate to one or more of these characters. The problem with the backstories in 13 Reasons Why is, they have to relate to Hannah. No character is shown to have any development, and all of their actions are a result of interactions with Hannah. In season 2, they tried to create a subplot for Zach, by showing that he secretly dated Hannah in the past. The issue is, nothing changes about his character after this is revealed. He doesn’t show any emotion regarding her death. The same thing happens with Bryce. He is the antagonist of the show, and does very horrible things to Hannah and Jessica. They don’t provide any reasons as to why his character does the things he does, and why he chose to do those very disgusting things to women.

Blaming Others

The absolute worst part about 13 Reasons Why is the main purpose of the show. Hannah Baker leaving behind 13 cassettes blaming everyone else for the reasons of her suicide. Characters like Bryce are absolutely disgusting and should be blamed for destroying her mental health and violating her, but the other 12 characters are just regular people facing real friendships. Clay Jensen had a huge crush on Hannah, and is blamed for her death because he didn’t make a move on her when she was alive. Yes, that is correct. He was too shy to ask her out, so he became one of her reasons. Jessica was one of Hannah’s first friends, and is blamed because they had a falling out. Growing out of friendships is completely normal and it is so wrong to blame someone for your death because of that. These reasons basically apply to the rest of the characters, except Bryce of course. In the real world, suicide is caused by a number of factors, and it’s never to leave behind a message of revenge.

One Dimensional Characters

One of the biggest differences between these two shows, is the contrast between their characters. One of the great things about the characters in Euphoria is, you almost never have a set feeling about them. Sometimes you love them, and sometimes they do something dumb or wrong and you have negative feelings about them. But that is what makes it so realistic! In real life, no one is ever completely good, or completely bad. Sometimes we don’t like Rue for shutting out the important people in her life, but sometimes we love her because of her strength to become clean, and her genuine love for Jules. We can say the same about Nate Jacobs. Sometimes we absolutely hate him for how he treats Maddy, or the wrong actions made against Jules, but sometimes we find ourselves feeling bad for him because we know why he’s like this, being exposed to such violence at a young age made him angry and abusive. In 13 Reasons Why, I don’t like anyone. It tries to show that in high school, everyone is mean and there is nothing beyond that. No one is likeable, because they have no development, and are mean without reason.

Positive Outcomes

If 13 Reasons Why is a show, with the main purpose to be advocating for mental health, they did a terrible job. All they showed was a graphic death scene, with no positive outcomes for anyone of the characters. Look, I know that in real life, there isn’t always a happy outcome but in a show, it’s important to show an audience that it does get better, especially if the show revolves around the importance of mental health. I believe that it’s more important to show the recovery of a character, than their demise. 13 Reasons Why could have really done something for audiences if they showed Hannah Baker seeking help and recovering, rather than ending her life to escape her trauma. Hannah’s death doesn’t even impact any of the characters who were involved. They could have shown how the tapes affect their mental health, and why it was wrong of Hannah to do that. Instead, they only worry about the tapes being leaked, and their reputations being destroyed. In Euphoria, Rue stays clean for the second half of the season, but we’re left on a cliffhanger as to whether or not she relapses. Maddy realizes that her relationship with Nate is toxic, and they end it.

To conclude, the show with the incredible cinematography wins. 13 Reasons Why is a four season mess that romanticizes the idea of suicide and should not be viewed ever again, thank god it ended this year. As for the winner, Euphoria, I’m excited to see the characters grow and use their backstories to develop stronger personalities.