“The Summer I Turned Pretty” Season 3 is turning out to be a bit more of a train wreck than anyone could have expected. The shift from the first two seasons, which focused on the relationships between Isabella “Belly” Concklin and her family friends, brothers Conrad and Jeremiah Fisher, to the current focus on the upcoming marriage of Belly and Jeremiah, is a disappointment for many fans.
That's right … get ready to watch a 21-year-old and a 22-year-old (both of who have yet to graduate college and start earning money of their own) whine and groan their way through how they’re ready for this next step, while almost everyone in their lives warns them that this is a bad idea.
Jeremiah has also just gone into $20,000 of debt to support an extra semester of college because, apparently, this frat boy couldn't be bothered to make sure he had all his credits before his last semester of his senior year. Yet he still insists on a $750 wedding cake (which has become a meme) and takes out a line of credit just because he can.
The entire cast seems to have overdosed on a cocktail of stupidity. Their actions are so absurd that it’s hard to take them seriously. Even though they all keep making absurd decisions (such as Belly quitting her waitressing job after three weeks to stay in the beach house after a fight with her mother), everything seems to work out for them. It’s like watching a show where a bunch of attractive characters make poor decisions, but somehow it all works out. If I wanted that, I’d be watching “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.”
Even when Jeremiah and Belly share cute moments, they are often overshadowed by the reasons this relationship seems doomed. When looking for apartments, for example, Jeremiah admits to opening a second credit card and admits to having bad credit. Then there’s an argument about how they can’t possibly live in one place because it sinks, and Belly needs her first apartment to be “perfect.” Truly two people who should be committing to each other for the rest of their natural lives (while Conrad mopes around the beach house like a Byronic hero whose fiancé just died of consumption)!
And as someone who read the books and knows that Belly is ultimately made to end up with older brother Conrad, I really don’t know that she deserves Conrad. She’s flighty and spoiled, though not as much as her fiancé, and she still rushes into a marriage she's not ready for, willing to drop her plans if it means being with a man.
The moment anything goes wrong, she becomes completely overwhelmed. If you can't stand the heat, Belly, maybe get out of the kitchen. This is not someone you want to be in a serious relationship with, Conrad. Go back to California and let these demons be demons.
The show's community has grown to mock it entirely. TikToks that popped up on my feed were all about ridiculing the show’s absurd plot twists and character decisions. It’s like we’re all in on the joke together. We’ve formed a collective understanding of the show’s flaws, and it has become a shared experience.
As we are forced to watch the worst people making the worst decisions of their lives, episode after episode, it’s hard to find any redeeming qualities in the show. I often found myself questioning why I was still watching it. It was never Shakespeare but was nonetheless competently written. Despite the show’s shortcomings, I still hold a deep respect for Jenny Han as a writer.
You might have read this over 700-word rant and wondered why any of it matters. It’s just a stupid teen show, but that’s just the thing: Teenagers are people, and they deserve good romance stories that don’t talk down to them and creators that don’t think that teen girls will watch anything just because it has two hot guys with abs. This show's portrayal of romance does a disservice to its audience, shaping their expectations and understanding of what a healthy relationship looks like.
I started watching this show as a teen because it was good, swoonworthy fun, but now it’s just frustrating. I hold out hope that the show will find its way back to its original charm and regain my goodwill, but I will keep tuning in if only to watch train wreck after train wreck every week.
