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“ | I have a problem. But the reason I have a problem is this family. That's why. I'm not allowed to form an emotional connection. And I'm an emotional guy. You f--kers backed me into a corner. But you know what? I think you've set me free. So...this is farewell. | „ |
~ Cal abandoning his family. |
Cal Jacobs is the secondary antagonist of the HBO series Euphoria.
He was a wealthy real-estate developer and the strict, demanding father of Nate Jacobs and the husband of Marsha. Behind that facade of a caring father, he is leading a double life hooking up with young men and trans women.
He was portrayed by Eric Dane, who also played Multiple Man in X-Men: The Last Stand, James McGrath in Bad Boys: Ride or Die, and Eddie Davis in American Carange. Elias Kacavas portrayed him as a teenager.
Biography[]
Early Life[]
Cal was born and grew in East Highland. He was really popular at his high school, particularly when participating on the wrestling team alongside his best friend Derek, with whom he spent a quality of time. He met and started dating his future wife, Marsha, when they were both 17. They also had active sex from time to time. Nevertheless, Cal was actually bisexual and had a longtime crush on Derek, who was dating someone else from the opposite gender, which he never had the courage to act upon because of his homophobic father (also because the generation from said time wasn't quite accepting of LGBTQ+).
One night after they graduate, Cal and Derek head to a local bar where they slow dance and share a passionate kiss, later hooking up. However, Cal's world ends up crumbling into pieces when Marsha informs him that she is pregnant. After hearing this, Cal becomes devastated, realizing that he will never be free to show his true self.
He has been since hooking up with young men and trans women to fill the void Derek left. Unbeknownst to him, his son Nate Jacobs, at the age of 11, found out about his sex tapes. The anger at his father at this is what shaped him into the cruel bully he is.
Season 1[]
Cal first appears at a motel meeting Jules Vaughn, a new girl in town, who lies about her age and they hook up. However, Jules is oblivious to the fact that he is the father of Nate, who she crossed paths with at his best friend McKay's party. Nate took his anger out on her after witnessing Maddy having sex on the swimming pool with college student Tyler Clarkson to get back at him. Provoked, Jules pulls out a knife, threatens him and intentionally cuts herself with it. Later on, Cal is present at the carnival, where Jules approaches him after telling Rue that he is the man she had a one-night stand with. Rue initially doesn't believe her until she witnesses their awkward exchange, especially when Cal clumsily gives her a Chili can from his food stand. Cal speaks to Jules privately, begging her not to expose their night together. Jules apologizes to Cal and promises that she won't tell a soul, but Nate who turns out to be the "Tyler" Jules has been chatting with, blackmails her with the nude pictures she sent him for her to keep quiet.
After Nate choked Maddy for publicly insulting his family, the Jacobs family find themselves with pressed charges for assault by Maddy's mother. Cal receives a frantic call from Marsha telling him to come to the school, though not before he takes a moment to vomit on the toilets, initially believing that everyone knows about his clandestine hookups. Maddy covers up Nate's actions, but the principal quizzes various students who give depth to Nate's unjustified behaviour. Despite assuring that this actions are unlike his son and requesting to have a meeting with the Perezes, Cal is told to speak to Nate, who falsely denies having choked Maddy, and tells him to keep his head held high and not make a scene to the people around him before he is escorted to the police station. Nate is interrogated by police about Maddy's assault, with Nate claiming that he grabbed her by the arm but didn't choke her. Although he adds that Maddy was high on MDMA at the time of the incident, this proves not to be enough to stop Nate from being suspended from the school. Going back to his usual hook up spot, he meets with a random gay guy, but then has second thoughts of going through with the act, fearing that his sons will follow into his footsteps while talking to him about the rage they are feeling over his actions, wondering whether or not this is starting to take a toll on them.
Nate's reputation is completely shattered to pieces, his only solace being Maddy, as the people in East Highland are talking about the whole ordeal. When his family go to a restaurant, they are immediately forced out. Cal insists to the owner, who is a friend of his, that Nate is innocent. Although sympathetic and not wanting to cause any drama to the family, he has their dinner to go. Nate tells Cal that it was a stupid idea coming there. To clear his name, Nate goes at great lengths by forcing Tyler, the guy who Maddy hooked up with, to go to the police and confess to choking her, while threatening to put Jules in prison or in a sex offender registry if she doesn't testify as a witness. With no other choice, Jules lies to the police, despite the officer interrogating her reiterating that lying about a serious crime could lead to seven years in prison, but Jules stays firm on her decision. Tyler gets arrested and Nate is officially readmitted to East Highland high school. Nate and Maddy arrive at the Halloween party, met with triumphant applauses from their classmates, save for Lexi, Jules and Rue, who gets suspicious upon noticing Jules' reaction as Jules had been acting weird the whole party, as it turns out that the arrest took place prior to the party and Jules used drinking as a defense mechanism to cope with the guilt of letting an innocent person take the fall for a crime they did not commit. Cal is surprised that Nate got off the hook that easily, but compliments whatever he did to do so, but hoping that it didn't guide him to a wrong path, only for Nate to brush him off. Rue eventually gets all the pieces together about Jules, Cal and Nate and asks her drug dealer and friend Fezco to intimidate Nate. He does, but as revenge, Nate anonymously reports his drug dealing business, forcing Fezco and his "little brother" Ashtray to flush their stash when the police arrive. Rue later confronts Nate at the Winter Formal, threatening to ruin his and Cal's lives, but Nate taunts her with the fact that she doesn't know Jules at all and it will be a matter of time before their relationship comes to an end. Cal has an argument with Nate when he criticizes his leadership at an American football game; the two physically fight each other, Cal managing to overpower Nate, but then freaks out and flees cowardly when Nate ends up hitting himself. He also has a final conversation with Maddy, telling her to end the unhealthy relationship with Nate as it only does more harm than good to them. Despite her clear hatred for Cal and his family, she does take his advice to heart and tells Nate that they are not meant for each other.
Season 2[]
Cal visits Nate at the hospital and stays by his side after he got brutally beaten up, almost to death, by Fezco during the New Year's party; Nate is discharged from the hospital moments later; as they ride back home, Cal doesn't hesistate to show curiosity about who did this to Nate, who refuses to give up Fezco's name when he asked him and just tells Cal to drop it. Days later, Cal payed a visit to the Howards, believing that Cassie saw who attacked Nate and interrogates her, threatening to call the cops to carry out the investigation themselves if she didn't comply, despite Lexi repeatedly insisting that Cassie didn't see anything. Of course, her submissive nature and newfound love for Nate leaves her with no choice but to rat Fezco out. Lexi, who had just bonded with Fezco and is aware of the Jacobs' infamous reputation, calls Cassie out for ruining Fezco's life and also for her stupidity in falling for Cal's bluff. With this information, Cal goes to the grocery store Fezco works at to confirm this in person, coincidentally running into him, Lexi, Faye and Ash. After a tense stand-off, Cal leaves, introducing himself as "just a concerned father" when Faye questioned if he was a cop. Arriving home, Nate walks into the office, where Cal confronts him, demanding to know why Fezco beat him up. Nate tells Cal about Jules hooking up with him, adding that she had told Rue, who then told Fezco, and they kept threatening to turn Cal in to the police for pedophilia, so he thought that he was sticking up for Cal. Apalled, Cal apologizes to Nate, who dismisses this, because he did not know that Jules was his classmate nor her real age, with Nate adding that Jules is unaware that he recorded their sexual encounter. Cal asked Nate if he had the disk (which, unbeknownst to him, is currently in Maddy's possesion, having stolen it prior to their final confrontation), but does not answer. Determined to protect his reputation, a desperate Cal heads over to Fezco's, he attempts to get the disk back, only to receive shotgun held up to his face. Ash forcefully takes him inside and angrily bashes him numerous times across the forehead, goading him into calling the police, which he doesn't. Fezco demanded to know what was Cal's deal with him, to which Cal responded that he knows about him and Rue threatening Nate for what he did to Jules. Fezco is shocked and disgusted to hear that Cal had sex with Jules, but also doesn't have the disk in his possession, something the truthfully denies to knowing about. Cal gives his word to Fezco not to let Nate mess with him, Rue or Jules in the future before walking away.
With a bandage on his head, a giddily drunken Cal goes out a ride during nightfall, though not before sharing a quite funny yet awkward conversation with Nate. He happens to stumble across the bar he used to frequent as a student, reminiscing on the on the precious moments with Derek from his teenage years. He slow dances with a random man, who he imagines as Derek. However, Cal ends up being kicked out of the bar for attempting to wrestle the patrons, gets back to his car and drives home. Once he arrives, Cal laughs hysterically and urinates all over the floor, with Marsha watching in total disgust, before being joined by Nate and Aaron. Cal then goes on to reveal that he had sex with Derek the day before Marsha announced that she was pregnant with Aaron and ranting about how his entire life has been a lie, not being allowed to form an emotional connection and, to put a nail in the coffin, admitting that he enjoys his double life, calling it, "not my biggest regret, you are", as well as his family (each of them having secrets), whom he shamelessly blames for making him hide his true self. Cal then leaves the house for good and decides not to return, taking the family portrait with him. He is notably absent for the rest of the season, only being given several mentions by Nate, who is content with finally having him out of the house, and Marsha when the two argue over him, mostly Marsha accusing Nate of inheriting the negative traits from his father, even bringing up that he used to be a sweet kid until he darkened at the age of 11, which Nate dispels. Nate retrieves the disk from Maddy by threatening her at gunpoint (although there were no bullets in it), then handing it over to Jules while apologizing to her for his previous actions and telling her to do with the disk whatever she thinks it's right.
Nate eventually finds Cal on an abandoned warehouse partying with a bunch of kids, taking the opportunity to reveal how traumatised he was about the sex tapes he made, even having a recurring nightmare of his father doing the same to him. After Cal tells them to leave, Nate calls his father out for hating him his entire life trying to protect him. Cal admits not to be proud of the person he's been and that he made a lot of mistakes that he deeply regrets, but tells Nate that he still loves him and that he should've protected him and kept him safe. Nevertheless, Nate wishes for nothing more than revenge. He then pulls out a gun and points it at Cal, but rather than shooting him, he puts it back and shows a pendrive, which Nate claims contains "everything" (possibly all of the sex tapes). It is then revealed that Nate called the police on his father as cars are heard approaching. Cal begs Nate to reconsider, only for Nate to decide to stop protecting his father and condemn him to a life behind bars. Cal was then arrested and taken away by police for all of his crimes.
Relationships[]
Family[]
- Bud Jacobs - Father
- Unnamed mother
- Unnamed sister
- Marsha Jacobs - Wife (separated)
- Aaron Jacobs - Son (estranged)
- Nate Jacobs - Son (estranged)
- Sean Jacobs - Son (estranged)
Allies[]
- Derek - Best Friend and Former Love Interest
Enemies[]
- Jules Vaughn
- Fezco
- Cassie Howard
- Lexi Howard
- Maddy Perez
- Nate Jacobs - Abusee and Archenemy