The sun sets over Cousins Beach, casting a golden haze across the sand as waves lap lazily at the shore. It’s the kind of dreamy, picture-perfect backdrop that The Summer I Turned Pretty has always promised: endless summer nights, teenage romance, and the bittersweet glow of growing up. Season Three recently wrapped up the series, igniting yet another round of internet debates over “Team Jeremiah” versus “Team Conrad.”

Jenny Han’s The Summer I Turned Pretty follows Belly Conklin, whose yearly summers at Cousins Beach with the Fisher family suddenly take on new meaning as she comes of age. No longer seen as the little girl she once was, Belly becomes the center of attention for brothers Conrad and Jeremiah, forcing her to navigate the excitement and heartbreak of young love. 

Despite constant online mockery, Season Three still nails its atmosphere. The show captures hazy summer nostalgia with sun-drenched cinematography, sweeping beach shots, and a soundtrack that seamlessly blends indie tracks with pop ballads. Stuffed with Taylor Swift songs alongside other chart favorites, The Summer I Turned Pretty knows its target audience and leans hard into that emotional pull. 

At the heart of the story is Lola Tung’s portrayal of Belly, serving as the show’s anchor. Even when the script hands her questionable choices, Tung delivers disarming vulnerability and charm. Sean Kaufman as Steven Conklin provides much-needed comic relief without veering into caricature, and Jackie Chung as Laurel Conklin makes every limited scene land with grounded warmth. The cast consistently outshines the writing, elevating weak material and reminding viewers why they fell in love with the Fisher-Conklin world in the first place.

Beneath the glossy surface, cracks show. The pacing drags, and episodes are stretched thin and bogged down by filler scenes. Rather than building intensity, the narrative circles the same conflicts until they lose impact. The love triangle between Belly, Jeremiah, and Conrad dominates nearly every episode, yet refuses to evolve. Episode Four alone spends nearly 20 minutes on Belly and Jeremiah rehashing whether he truly loves her, only for Belly to pivot back to Conrad in the very next episode. Arguments blur together, and scenes meant to feel charged collapse into repetition. The emotional payoff that once drove the series all but evaporates. 

Equally frustrating is the character development. Belly, who seemed poised for growth following Season Two, often backslides into selfishness. Jeremiah remains defined more by longing stares and forced declarations than genuine development. Conrad’s brooding, once layered, is reduced to recycled angst. What once felt like a complex coming-of-age arcs now flatten into one-dimensional tropes, leaving the characters adrift in their own story.

The weakest link by far is the writing. Dialogue frequently slips into clichés or lands as unintentional comedy. Jeremiah’s infamous “Cacao is the bean” speech circulated the internet as  Willy Wonka memes for how bizarrely stilted the script sounded. His Episode Seven plea of “I’ve always been here, waiting for you to see me” plays less like heartfelt confession and more like a parody of young adult melodrama. These awkward lines yank viewers out of the story and expose how unnatural much of the dialogue feels. Even big reconciliations like Belly and Conrad’s rooftop scene in Episode Eight resolve years of tension with whiplash speed, skipping over complicated history for a perfunctory “I’ve always loved you.” Only Laurel’s cutting remarks, such as in Episode Five, cut through sentimentality with any sense of grounded realism.

Jenny Han’s novels balanced romance with themes of grief, friendship, and transition into adulthood — the heart that made the first two resonate. In Season Three, those elements are sidelined almost entirely. Belly and Taylor’s friendship is left to wither, Laurel is reduced to brief cameos, and the narrative follows a relentless triangle. The result is a shallower story that feels less emotionally rich and undercuts what made the series resonate in the first place.

The Summer I Turned Pretty originally ends with the third book, We’ll Always Have Summer, but Han drags and reworks her storylines beyond recognition in the show. Key moments are milked for more drama. The books had a clear arc and emotional resolution, and stretching it into endless circles only waters down the impact. The decision to tack on a future movie is baffling, leaving viewers with fatigue rather than bittersweet closure.

The Summer I Turned Pretty Season Three isn’t a total loss. It’s undeniably stunning, anchored by a strong cast and effective soundtrack. But the over reliance on recycled conflicts, deviations from the source material, and the refusal to end where the story naturally does leaves the season feeling like regression. Loyal fans may cling to the nostalgia and aesthetics, but for a show built on the promise of fleeting summer magic, this season delivers more frustration than fulfillment.