Jenny Han has become one of the signature voices of the teenage love dramas in 2025. After the success of To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, it was no surprise that The Summer I Turned Pretty blew up. However, teenage romances eventually end and evolve into adult relationships, plunging Belly (Lola Tung) and her friends into new responsibilities and unexpected surprises. While the series has always engaged in teen drama, a choice to fast-forward a little too far makes the events of the story particularly frustrating.
The Summer I Turned Pretty Season 3 Plot
Belly arrives at college in the fall, where she excitedly gets to embrace her relationship with Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno). Rather than living out their freshman year, we flash forward three years. Jeremiah and Belly dated the entire time, despite Belly’s mother warning her to experience life without him. Together, Belly and Jeremiah deal with the on-again, off-again relationship between Taylor (Rain Spencer) and Steven (Sean Kaufman). Conrad (Christopher Briney) stays away from the couple as much as possible, hoping to move on from Belly.
Suddenly, the world changes for everyone in the days leading up to the dedication of Susannah’s Memorial Garden. Belly gets into the study abroad program so she can spend the fall of her senior year in Paris. Jeremiah finds out he has to stay in school for an extra semester. Conrad gets a job offer that will overlap with the ceremony. However, when Jeremiah and Taylor get mixed up in a frat and sorority scandal, everyone’s relationships are put to the test.
Narrative choices unbalance the story.
There are many ways that a flash-forward can enhance a show’s storytelling possibilities. However, The Summer I Turned Pretty pushes itself forward a little too far. By having a full three-year jump without any meaningful change in the characters and their relationships, it makes everyone feel emotionally stunted past the point of believability.
At the same time, characters speak in beautiful metaphors about each other, but the lack of communication or maturity makes any perceptions of passion feel shallow. As we dig deeper into these relationships, it becomes clear that the characters are beyond complacency. The relationships are beyond toxic, and the decisions they make are shockingly out of character given the depth we’ve felt from them across the previous two seasons.
Instead, the writers have characters make choices meant to set up future drama rather than be active in their own lives. By the end of episode 2, “The Last Christmas,” it is obvious which direction Belly should go, but instead, she makes choices that actively make her love triangle worse. This, despite the fact that she should not be with either of the brothers.
The ensemble does get material to show growth.
This really comes down to the storytelling aspects of The Summer I Turned Pretty. It’s not unreasonable for the cast to want to push further, but instead, they continue to play the emotional maturity of teenagers. This is where the time jump hurts most, because there is no marked difference in the portrayal of these characters despite years of grief, loss, reevaluation, and hurt. A 22-year-old does not have all the answers, but they are far more emotionally complex than the 16- and 17-year-olds who first populated the series. However, you’d never know that from the writing.
It would help if the actors had more shades to play. Tung remains the emotional center of the series, and she excels in the role. The second episode gives her more depth and complexity, but we have seen her hit these marks before. Casalegno and Briney are asked to stand up and look pretty, hitting the marks as they have before but adding little else to the show.
However, the two actors who get the most growth, Kaufman and Spencer, rarely get screen time worthy of their talent. These actors are actually playing a more complex version of their tumultuous relationship, and having to deal with the fallout is one of the most interesting aspects of the season. They feel destined to be together forever, yet there’s a melancholy in the chemistry between the two performers that helps them stand out from the crowd.
The production and style remain intact.
Luckily, the show still looks much better than its peers. The cinematography is a bit flat at times, but the lighting is leaps and bounds better than in the other Jenny Han projects or the Kissing Booth movies. It helps that the new season takes place in a college town instead of Cousins. The gorgeous Northeastern college campus provides a stunning setting for the characters, while the lived-in world feels far more dynamic than the beach towns of previous seasons.
Additionally, the general craft around the show remains strong. The Amazon budget gives the show the ability to drop in two Chapel Roan and a Cranberries needle drop in the first episode alone. The costumes are excellent and help with the storytelling. It’s nice to see the final season get to flex its muscles in this regard. Many shows reduce their budgets as they approach the final run. Here, the producers allocated a budget to the series to tell the best version of the story possible (even if the storytelling falls flat).
Is The Summer I Turned Pretty Season 3 worth watching?
No, but if you’re a fan of the series already, you should see it through to the end. Just know that these characters are making dumber, more frustrating decisions in their twenties than when they were teenagers. It’ll touch the melodrama center that you’re hoping for, but it’s not the epic romance that the series paints itself as.
While there are still questions about how the series will end (no episodes were provided to critics ahead of time, so only the first two episodes were available online for this review), the bland romance has been overtaken by Han’s other projects. We recommend rewatching those shows and movies instead of another round of The Summer I Turned Pretty.