Zendaya Hypes The Return Of HBO’s Euphoria With Trippy New Image

Zendaya as Rue in Euphoria
(Image credit: (HBO))

CinemaBlend participates in affiliate programs with various companies. We may earn a commission when you click on or make purchases via links.

HBO’s Euphoria is a challenging and imaginative recount of a group of high-schoolers’ lives. Therefore, it's not exactly the first show one might expect to venture back to for a holiday episode. Nevertheless, Sam Levinson’s series is one of the best television had to offer back in 2019, and fans are being gifted an early return for Zendaya’s Rue with a Christmas-set episode called “Trouble Don’t Last Always.”

It will be one of two special Euphoria episodes announced to be coming out in between the events of Season 1 and next year’s Seaosn 2 premiere. With “Trouble Don’t Last Always” coming in a little under two weeks, Zendaya posted a trippy new image of Rue to her Instagram to remind fans of Euphoria’s brief encore. Check it out:

A photo posted by on

Zendaya capped off the announcement with a simple caption echoing the poster that reads “Part 1: Rue.” The poster features a blurry Rue laying in a bed, perhaps to symbolize her state back on drugs after the sad Season 1 finale. The image makes it clear to fans that “This Is Not Season 2” and it will be coming to HBO and HBO Max the first weekend of December. You can use this link to sign up for HBO Max ahead of the episode’s air date if you’d like to stream it there. The service is also home to the eight-episode first season.

The new image doesn’t give fans a ton to go on except that it will focus heavily on Zendaya’s Rue. So far, we do know that the episode was written and directed by the show’s creator, Sam Levinson, and filmed under safety guidelines during COVID-19 this year, along with a movie starring Zendaya and John David Washington coming to Netflix called Malcolm & Marie. It will follow Rue celebrating Christmas and also feature Fear the Walking Dead’s Colman Domingo reprising his role of Ali, a man recovering from substance abuse disorder. Right after Zendaya’s Instagram update, the Dune actress also posted this second poster to her story:

Zendaya and Hunter Schafer in Euphoria special episode poster

(Image credit: (HBO / Zendaya))

It looks like Hunter Schafer’s Jules will also be a part of this upcoming Euphoria episode too in some context. The second poster has Jules and Rue smiling together while laying in a bed. Fans of the show know Jules and Rue come at a crossroads at the end of the season. Jules makes a run for it, originally with Rue in mind to join her, but she backs out at the last minute. We’ll have to see if the pair reunites for Part I. Or maybe the first episode will be about Rue and the second part will focus on Jules?

Euphoria is coming off some love at the Emmys, where it won for Outstanding Contemporary Makeup and Original Music and Lyrics, and Zendaya nabbed the award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series. The new Euphoria episode comes out on Sunday, December 6.

Sarah El-Mahmoud
Staff Writer

Sarah El-Mahmoud has been with CinemaBlend since 2018 after graduating from Cal State Fullerton with a degree in Journalism. In college, she was the Managing Editor of the award-winning college paper, The Daily Titan, where she specialized in writing/editing long-form features, profiles and arts & entertainment coverage, including her first run-in with movie reporting, with a phone interview with Guillermo del Toro for Best Picture winner, The Shape of Water. Now she's into covering YA television and movies, and plenty of horror. Word webslinger. All her writing should be read in Sarah Connor’s Terminator 2 voice over.