Euphoria just did its version of the Red Wedding

You can never accuse an HBO wedding of being boring.

In Game of Thrones, wedding episodes almost always come with a body count. Succession's weddings end in everything from vehicular manslaughter to hostile buyouts to game-changing deaths. Now, Euphoria takes its wedding episode as an opportunity to stir up maximum mess by putting Cassie's (Sydney Sweeney) humiliation front and center again.

What happens at Nate and Cassie's wedding?

While no one dies like they do in the Red Wedding or Purple Wedding, the episode is still a stressful reunion for Euphoria's leads, not to mention further proof that Nate (Jacob Elordi) and Cassie's marriage is doomed to fail.

Euphoria Season 3, episode 3 marks the first time that the show's principal cast has been together since Lexi's (Maude Apatow) play, making it a de facto high school reunion. Even fan favorite BB (Sophia Rose Wilson) is back.

Like at any high school reunion, most people are trying to prove that they're doing better than their peers, hence the revenge dresses from Jules (Hunter Schafer) and Maddy (Alexa Demie). Don't get me wrong, they look great, but in no world but Euphoria would you think of wearing these looks to a wedding. I wouldn't have been surprised if Cassie had gone full bridezilla and kicked them out.

Euphoria loves nothing more than a Cassie crash out.

Speaking of Cassie, she's trying the hardest out of everyone to impress. From the $50,000 flower arrangements to an ice sculpture of her and Nate, she's on a mission to construct the ultimate romantic fantasy. Remember how Maddy read her for her lack of "good taste" in the previous episode? This entire wedding is a monument to that.

However, Cassie's fantasy crumbles when Nate's business associate Naz (Jack Topalian) crashes the party, reminding Nate he needs to pay his debts. Once Cassie realizes the truth about Nate's finances — and that their friends know the truth as well — she enters the spiral to end all spirals.

Suddenly, Cassie's a wreck, shambling through her and Nate's bizarrely raunchy first dance and popping a champagne cork right into his eye. Given that Euphoria's audience is primed for mayhem at this wedding, the explosive cork moment reads as a cheeky gunshot fake-out to those who expected bloodshed.

Cassie's wedding crash out continues the humiliation she's endured all through Season 3, although unlike with her controversy-stirring OnlyFans content, this isn't by choice. It's also not entirely effective.

Euphoria has already made a spectacle of Cassie's embarrassment with Lexi's play, shining a literal spotlight on her worst moments and causing her to have a breakdown onstage. With the wedding, Euphoria creator Sam Levinson tries to one-up that moment, but it rings hollow. Cassie becomes a whining caricature, while Naz's involvement continues Euphoria's backslide into crime drama. (This episode also features Rue's (Zendaya) forays into arms dealing.) Plus, the episode's attempts at comedy, like Suze (Alanna Ubach) jamming out to the wedding band's uncensored rendition of "Get Low," are far too broad.

The hollowness continues even after the wedding. When the newlyweds finally make it home (in a hideous stretch Hummer no less, proving the bad taste allegations yet again), they're greeted by Naz, who gives Nate a serious beating and chops off his toe. The scene, like much of Season 3 so far, feels like Levinson trying to prove how sick and twisted Euphoria can get now that the teens we got to know are full-grown adults with adult problems. (Like being in debt to funeral parlor owners at the ripe old age of 23.)

Cassie's whining continues throughout, as she makes Nate's physical torment all about her. "What is happening right now?" she blubbers while he struggles to crawl up the staircase behind her.

The mash-up of comedy and gritty gangster drama still doesn't quite land. Cassie's meltdown here lacks the dimension and buildup of Season 2's, but at least it has more depth than Nate's half-baked debt plot, which plays second fiddle to Rue's own debt plot.

And while Sweeney goes all out, the scene ultimately feels reverse engineered to reach meme status akin to Cassie's sobbing "I have never, ever been happier" speech in Season 2. It's proof that when Euphoria wants a talked-about moment, it turns to Cassie's downfall.

The rest of the episode features some juicy character morsels, especially when it comes to Jules. The episode begins with a flashback to how she became a sugar baby, before giving us her reunions (and reconciliations) with both Nate and his father, Cal (Eric Dane). But these, like Rue's run-in with DEA agents, are overshadowed by the absolute disaster of Nate and Cassie's wedding. Given the show's outsize focus on Cassie in the lead-up to this episode, it's clear Euphoria wouldn't have it any other way.

New episodes of Euphoria Season 3 premiere Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO and HBO Max.