{"id":382941,"date":"2026-04-16T19:06:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T19:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/382941\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T19:06:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T19:06:08","slug":"euphoria-season-3-premiere-draws-8-5-million-viewers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/382941\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Euphoria&#8217; Season 3 Premiere Draws 8.5 Million Viewers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\t<a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/hbo\/\" id=\"auto-tag_hbo\" data-tag=\"hbo\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">HBO<\/a> is no doubt feeling euphoric. The Season 3 premiere of \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/euphoria\/\" id=\"auto-tag_euphoria\" data-tag=\"euphoria\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Euphoria<\/a>\u201d has pulled in 8.5 million U.S. viewers across HBO and HBO Max in its first three days of availability. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tPer HBO, that is a 44% increase over the Season 2 premiere, which aired in January 2022. The four-year hiatus did little to dampen enthusiasm for the series, which saw stars Zendaya, Sydney Sweeney, Jacob Elordi, and more return. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tWhile the first two seasons focused on the characters in high school, the new season takes place five years after the Season 2 finale. Since then, Rue (Zendaya) has begun working as a drug mule for Laurie (Martha Kelly), Nate (Elordi) has taken over his father\u2019s construction business. He is also preparing to marry Cassie (Sweeney), who is launching an OnlyFans account. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tThis season also sees the return of Maude Apatow, Alexa Demie, Hunter Schafer, Colman Domingo, Kelly, and Chloe Cherry among others. New stars this season include Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Darrell Britt-Gibson, Sharon Stone, and Marshawn Lynch. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tThe premiere episode <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\" data-id=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/tv\/news\/euphoria-season-3-tribute-angus-cloud-eric-dane-deaths-1236705573\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-type=\"link\" href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/2026\/tv\/news\/euphoria-season-3-tribute-angus-cloud-eric-dane-deaths-1236705573\/\">also features tributes<\/a> to late series stars Angus Cloud and Eric Dane, as well as executive producer Kevin Turen. Cloud, who played drug dealer Fezco in Seasons 1 and 2, died of a drug overdose in 2023. Dane, meanwhile, died from complications of ALS in early 2026. Turen died on Nov. 12, 2023 from a cardiac emergency while driving.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto  lrv-a-font-body-m   \">\n\tElsewhere on the HBO schedule, the finale of the critically-acclaimed limited series \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/variety.com\/t\/dtf-st-louis\/\" id=\"auto-tag_dtf-st-louis\" data-tag=\"dtf-st-louis\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">DTF St. Louis<\/a>\u201d drew 3.5 million crossplatform viewers in its first three days. The show has seen consistent growth week-to-week, with the finale finishing 40% above the premiere. Per HBO, the show is averaging 6.5 million viewers per episode. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HBO is no doubt feeling euphoric. The Season 3 premiere of \u201cEuphoria\u201d has pulled in 8.5 million U.S.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":233102,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[148580,156,64610,2592,111,139,69,437],"class_list":{"0":"post-382941","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-dtf-st-louis","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-euphoria","11":"tag-hbo","12":"tag-new-zealand","13":"tag-newzealand","14":"tag-nz","15":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382941\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}