The third and final season of The Summer I Turned Pretty is determined to keep everyone guessing about how the love triangle ends — and even book fans might now know the actual conclusion ahead of time.
Creator Jenny Han teased that changes were coming, telling Entertainment Weekly on Monday, March 31, “There are going to be surprises. There are the things that [book fans] know and then there are things they think they know, and then there’s going to be, hopefully, things that surprise them.”
In a separate interview, Lola Tung showed support for onscreen shakeups.
“The one thing I’ve always admired about Jenny is that every season and every decision about what’s coming next is purely to serve the story,” the actress, 22, who plays Belly, explained. “She’s never going to do anything that doesn’t make sense for the story.”
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Tung continued: “It’s all about this beautiful world she’s created and giving the fans something really, really special and giving us something really special to work with.”
The Summer I Turned, which debuted in June 2022, is based on a book series of the same name by Han that focuses on Belly (Tung) who gets caught up in a love triangle where after exploring her feelings for Conrad (Christopher Briney), she starts to reconsider whether his brother, Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno), is her perfect match.
In the original book trilogy, Belly made her final choice in We’ll Always Have Summer, which will presumably inspire the third season of the show. The cast and the crew have previously questioned whether the show will follow the events of the book series or whether there will be changes.
“I do feel like there’s a strong chance that that’s a possibility,” Casalegno, 25, exclusively told Us Weekly in June 2023 about the show potentially straying from the original events in the books. “Obviously, I know where [my character Jeremiah] ends up going and what ends up happening. But I don’t emphasize on that. Because I think Jenny writes it so well that I’m able to kind of get there naturally without having to force it in a certain direction.”
Based on stills from season 3, The Summer I Turned Pretty is sticking to some plot points from We’ll Always Have Summer, which includes a big time jump. The show picks up with Belly in college, and she’s still with Jeremiah after choosing him over Conrad in the season 2 finale.
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Conrad, meanwhile, is focused on his future after getting into medicine, which was also mentioned heavily in Han’s third novel.
“Conrad’s been away from everyone for a while, and now he’s back in the mix with people,” Han shared. “It’s almost like rediscovering and also seeing the ways that they’ve both changed and have had some distance from each other, and who are these people now? Because there is a little bit of a time jump and he’s been gone. People will see the ways that he’s changed and he’s seeing the ways that Belly and Jeremiah — and Steven [Sean Kaufman] — have changed as well.”
As for flashbacks? There will be plenty of those after it became a staple on the hit Prime Video series.
“It’s very sweet and there’s so many amazing scenes for Belly and Jeremiah this season, so many,” Han noted. “Lola and Gavin have really great chemistry and got into such a good rhythm with each other, because we do have a little bit of a time jump going into season 3, so they needed to have that kind of bond, and it was really seamless. It’ll be joyful for people to witness it.”
The Summer I Turned Pretty concludes with 11 episodes in season 3, which premieres on Prime Video in July.
