Female Sexuality in Season 3 of Euphoria

Euphoria Series Part 1

Lola Rue

Jun 20, 2026

“That thing between your legs, got a mystic power. So, I figured I’d stand me right by some pussy with my cash register.” This is what Alamo Brown says to Rue in the very first episode of season 3 of Euphoria. This singular line highlights the show’s shift in its depiction of sex. In Season 1, the characters’ sexual experiences were varied and revelatory of their psychological orientations. For instance, Kat pursues camming and has a string of flings with random boys as she tries to navigate desirability and body image as a plus-sized girl. Another example of this is how Jules pursues risky sexual encounters both as a form of self-harm and as a way to reaffirm her femininity through male attention (“conquer femininity by conquering men” as she tells a female friend in one episode). In the final season, the function of sex is increasingly narrowed to financial gain.

Although the major female characters have competing vocational opportunities, they are pushed towards sex work. For instance, Jules outright quits art school to become a full-time sugar baby. Even when she gains an opportunity to be compensated for her creative work, it quickly falls through, and sex work remains her primary source of income. Secondary female characters that are significant to the show’s major conflict (Angel, Kitty, and Magick) are presented in this way, as well. Each of these women is a stripper who works at Alamo’s club. Because we don’t spend as much time with them, we are not privy to the other dimensions of their lives. As a result, the women exist mainly within the role of stripper in the show. Kitty and Magick branch out of this role, but only to be managed by Maddy’s as OF girls. This pattern of the characters being repeatedly reoriented towards sex work by the narrative suggests that female sexuality exists largely as a commodity.

Magick

Lexi is the only major female character that deviates from this pattern. At Cassie’s wedding, she declares that she doesn’t believe in marriage. She says, “100 years ago I would have been sold for three healthy cows and a parcel of land.” Lexi criticizes heteronormative marriage as an economic institution that objectifies women and weds their sexuality to financial outcomes. Although Lexi and Alamo evaluate this with different lenses — one feminist, the other opportunistic — their remarks suggest the presence of sexual commodification in their society — from the seedy underworld of crime to the internet to the wedding altar.

Another way the show reinforces this theme is that there are hardly any sex scenes in the season that do not have some financial incentive attached to it. For instance, Rue and Jules’s relationship has been a prominent aspect of the show’s emotional core. In the previous seasons, they are frequently shown cuddling, holding hands, kissing, and being sexually intimate with one another after they confirm their relationship. In Season 3, they don’t even share an on-screen kiss. In contrast, we see explicit scenes of Angel entertaining a customer and Jules sleeping with her sugar daddy. The result is that the show constructs a world in which intimacy for the sake of connection is secondary to its function for material gain.

If sex in Season 1 can be described as dynamic and psychological, the sexF in Season 3 can be described as cynical and functional. The female characters in Season 1 seemed to be asking the question, “What does sex mean to me?” In Season 3, the characters answer the question: currency. Alamo attributes a mystic power to female sexuality, and it appears to be the power to change one’s fortune. As we watch our characters maneuver through their society (and ours by extension) using sex to fulfill their economic ambitions, the show invites us to consider whether or not he is correct.