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The actress, who won two Emmy Awards for her portrayal of Rue Bennett across three seasons of Euphoria, reacted to the show's gut-wrenching series finale in a behind-the-scenes look at Sunday's episode, confirming what many viewers had already suspected: the season 3 finale is also the show's last.
"I just want to say thank you," Zendaya told the cast and crew in the footage. "I'm incredibly grateful for every single one of you, and many of you have been here from the beginning and watched me grow up. It's been a pleasure and an honor."
Creator Sam Levinson confirmed the finale marks the end of Euphoria entirely, explaining that the decision to kill off Rue, who overdoses after unknowingly taking a Percocet laced with fentanyl, was driven by a desire to tell an honest story about addiction in America.
"People relapse, they mess up, they're not ready to get clean," Levinson said in the post-show segment. "They weren't dying like they are now with the influx of fentanyl into this country. I can say with absolute certainty that if I was going through what I went through when I was younger now, I wouldn't be here either."
He added that there was "no reason to sugarcoat it," and that he wanted to tell the story in part as a tribute to the late Angus Cloud, the actor who played Fezco and died of an accidental overdose in 2023 at age 25. "I wanted to tell this story for Angus, and for people who weren't granted a second chance," Levinson said.
Colman Domingo, whose character Ali avenges Rue's death before finding peace on a remote Texas farm, reflected on the finale's closing image. "I was thinking about how to put light around someone's existence," he said. "Believe in the poetry."
Levinson praised Zendaya as the irreplaceable heart of the show. "We fell in love with this character, this girl who's flawed and has a good heart," he said.