Also written by Ava Barbour
*There are some spoilers ahead, so don’t read on unless you have seen Season 3, or are OK with parts of it being spoiled!*
The Summer I Turned Pretty has been the show everyone’s talking about, but what really happened in the series?
The show follows a girl named Isabel “Belly” Conklin, who is with Laurel, her mom, and Steven, her brother. Belly goes to Laurel’s best friend Susannah Fisher’s house in Cousins Beach every year during the summer with Susannah and her sons, Conrad and Jeremiah. As each year passes, Belly begins to have feelings for the brothers. She wrestles with her thoughts of both brothers throughout the show, always changing her mind on who she wants.
In Season 3, it fast-forwards to Belly’s junior year of college. She goes to college with her best friend, Taylor, and Jeremiah, while Conrad moves away to California to attend Stanford University. While still in school, Jeremiah and Belly get engaged. Despite the disapproval of their families, they continued to plan their wedding in Cousins, and planned to get married that summer. After the engagement, Conrad comes back to Cousins and chooses to stay at the summer house and help with preparations. Very soon, he wrecks havoc on what seems to be the perfect relationship between Belly and Jeremiah, revealing the deep feelings that he and Belly still have for each other. This causes a lot of issues in Belly and Jeremiah’s relationship, and soon Belly and Jeremiah find out that being together forever and planning a wedding isn’t as fairytale as it seems.
One of our favorite parts of this season was the Taylor and Steven romance subplot. Taylor and Steven are the only ones that absolutely deserve each other. The relationship had depth, and it didn’t feel childish, like other relationships portrayed on the show. The hair, makeup, and costumes were also amazing this season, and they really fit the vibe of the show, especially Belly’s shorter haircut during the Paris episodes. We also really liked the soundtrack that was picked for this season, as all of the songs matched what was happening in the moment. The soundtrack was very mainstream, and didn’t include a lot of weird covers by unknown artists like in other shows.
One thing we weren’t in favor of were the flashbacks. They felt unnecessary and too long for the contexts of the scenes. If these flashbacks were shorter, or if we were told what happened, the creators would’ve gotten the same message across. The other thing that we didn’t like was that Season 3 felt way overstretched. Some episodes felt unnecessary, and were filler episodes. Compared to the rest of the seasons, the number of episodes and the episode lengths were a huge jump. On top of this, the ending was underwhelming compared to what was expected, with all of the buildup leading to the finale. We also feel that there is no need for a full length feature film to what was the epilogue in the book, which is Belly and Conrad’s wedding. This means that the feature would be a repeat of this season, but include the opposite of what happened, as it will probably show the engagement, all the preparations for the wedding, and the wedding itself, but this time with Belly actually pulling through with Conrad.
Overall, Season 3 of The Summer I Turned Pretty wasn’t really as expected, but it was certainly very interesting to watch. If you are a fan of the show and/or the book, it is definitely worth watching the season, but we wouldn’t recommend just jumping into Season 3 if you are new.
