‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’ Season 1 Ending and What’s Next in Season 2
Amazon’s new coming-of-age TV series, The Summer I Turned Pretty, is here and offering up idyllic beach scenes, love triangles, and a stellar tracklist. The seven-episode Season 1 is already renewed for a second installment and is based on bestselling author Jenny Han’s trilogy of the same name.
Newcomer Lola Tung plays Isabel “Belly” Conklin, who blossoms the summer she turns 16 as she spends the summer in Cousins Beach. She’s there with her family, along with her mother’s best friend and her two sons. Belly has had a crush on the older Conrad Fisher (Christopher Briney) for years and is best friends with Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno). Both brothers notice Belly isn’t a kid anymore, and a love triangle forms.
Belly tries to decide which brother actually has her heart, as the audience also watches Belly’s mother Laurel (Jackie Chung) support her best friend Susannah (Rachel Blanchard) as she relapses from a likely-fatal form of cancer. Ahead, we have how Season 1 wraps up, how it’s different than the book series, and what we might expect from future seasons of the show.
Editor’s note: This article contains spoilers for Season 1 of The Summer I Turned Pretty and the entire trilogy of the same name by Jenny Han.
Season 1 ends with major changes for many of its main characters
The Summer I Turned Pretty’s final episode is an emotional roller coaster, as we see Belly finally attend the debutante ball, escorted by Jeremiah. However, he abandons Belly on the dance floor when he realizes his mother’s cancer has returned. Conrad steps in to take his place, and it’s safe to say that Belly and Jeremiah are done — for now.
Back at the house, however, the mood is significantly less triumphant as Jeremiah and Conrad confront their mother about her diagnosis and her initial decision not to participate in a clinical trial. Though she says she wants to forgo more treatments, her boys convince her to try one more time.
The final scene includes Belly and Conrad sitting on the beach, where Conrad apologizes for being distant all summer. He admits his feelings for Belly, and the two finally kiss — with Taylor Swift’s “This Love (Taylor’s Version)” playing in the background.
Season 2 will likely follow at least some of the major plot points from the second book
In the Season 1 finale, we hear Belly in a voiceover before the screen cuts to black: “In this moment I realized if this can happen, maybe anything can.” The line is one of hope for a future between her and Conrad. It might also be alluding to optimism for Susannah’s cancer treatment.
It’s important to note that in the book series, Susannah dies between the first and second books. However, Han has already changed many things from the books to the series. (Case in point: Belly is never together with Jeremiah in the first book.)
That said, it certainly seems that the TV series is giving viewers hope that Susannah will live — or at least be around long enough to give her boys some time to adjust to the gravity of her illness. The second book, It’s Not Summer Without You, has Belly and Conrad together briefly, but they fizzle out when Conrad becomes distant again.
Much of the second book surrounds Belly’s new relationship with Jeremiah, according to a fan page, as they seek to help Conrad secure ownership of the beach house after he runs away from college. However, it will be interesting to see how Han chooses to adapt the plot for TV since Belly and Jeremiah were already together in Season 1. Perhaps they rekindle something, or perhaps their relationship develops a new facet as they support Conrad.
Jenny Han’s trilogy gives us some clues about who Belly ends up with
In the third book, We’ll Always Have Summer, readers follow Jeremiah’s transformation from golden boy to unlikeable semi-villain. He cheats on Belly at a frat party, then apologizes by way of a marriage proposal to prove how serious he is about her.
By the end of the book, which takes place over multiple years, he leaves Belly on the day of their would-be wedding after learning Conrad confessed his love for Belly. Conrad follows Jeremiah in an attempt to convince him to return, but it ends in an argument and a potentially irreparable rift between the brothers.
Belly and Conrad fall out of touch for multiple years after this, until Conrad begins writing Belly a series of letters while she studies abroad during college. She eventually begins writing back, and the two mend the breaks in their relationship. In the epilogue of the series, the pair finally get married — with Jeremiah in attendance.
How true to the books will Han stay? It’s unclear right now, but it’s a safe bet that we’re in for more heartrending moments for future seasons.
