As summer in the UK seems to be truly over, it seems serendipitous that the finale of The Summer I Turned Pretty drew a rather hype-filled chapter of TV to a close at the same time – during a damp week in September.
Adapted from To All The Boys… author Jenny Han’s YA novel trilogy, the series has captured many a heart over the last three years, based around a love triangle between young Belly Conklin (Lola Tung) and two brothers Conrad and Jeremiah. The trio grew up together, but then start to navigate teen lust, insecurity and, ultimately, romance.
Amazon has reported that the first episode of season one saw 25 million global viewers tune in, which is a 40% increase from season two. Not long after the finale aired this week, it was also confirmed that TSITP would be returning for a movie, with Jenny Han herself explaining that it will cover “another big milestone left in Belly's journey”. “I thought only a movie could give it its proper due,” she added.
"This isn’t a love story, it’s an odyssey of villainy."
Prime Video has reported that The Summer I Turned Pretty season 3 is the most-watched TV season among women aged 18-34. There have been many theories as to why the show – this season in particular – has become such a cult obsession, for millennial women. The nostalgia of watching a teen drama full of gorgeous music (hey, Taylor Swift, every single episode) and even more gorgeous (if totally emotionally illiterate) male love interests harks back to our own roots, back when One Tree Hill and The OC aired weekly on e4 and we got to see Chad Michael Murray and Adam Brody’s heart throb faces.
Love triangles were also a huge feature of teen drama storylines back then too – try Lucas, Peyton and Brooke in One Tree Hill and the Seth, Summer and Anna chapter in the first season of The OC. Echoes of high school melodrama from our younger years call to us from The Summer I Turned Pretty’s gorgeous seaside landscapes and at-times seriously petty miscommunications and fall-outs.
So many benefits to streaming culture colour our everyday lives right now – having any film or TV show at your fingertips, wherever you want, whenever you want, the ability to watch an entire series in one weekend if the mood possesses you.
But what TSITP and Amazon have done by releasing a new episode each Wednesday is returning us to “water cooler” culture when it comes to discussing what we think will happen next on the – let’s face it – most melodramatic, controversial, ship ride or die series for many years.
Jenny Han just gave us the update we've been waiting for.
Removing the ability to find out what we want to do know immediately – how things shake out between the most inappropriate yet compelling love triangle of the century – has not just created an absolute hit, but it’s caused us to communicate with others, speculate, build communities around the suspense we feel around a series that isn’t airing according to our need for instant gratification. Our acute need to know what happens at the end of The Summer I Turned Pretty has led to our need to watch together – in a time of isolation, at-home digital obsessions and solo “bingeing”.
Enter the watch parties. They seemed to start in the US, with footage of sports bars full of screams hitting social media from the first night season 3 started. It has become “a spectator sport” to watch an episode, with the cheers and screams usually reserved for football matches now used whenever Conrad Fisher appears on screen. The tensions between Team Conrad and Team Jeremiah could rival that of the competitive vibes felt on North London derby day.
We’ve seen an uptick in watch party culture lately. From Married At First Sight UK cast members throwing one for the series’ vows episode – which led to some seriously raunchy behaviour between the party guests, even a proposal – to fashion lovers watching designer Jonathan Anderson’s first Dior show broadcast from a bar in Paris, after a critic wasn’t invited and decided to open up the conversation. Love Island USA’s watch parties also made a big impact, another example of the feminisation of the “game night”. A much-anticipated event with a clear competition afoot, but with nothing to do with organised sports. Watch parties are making space for not just a like-minded community, but for women and non-heterosexual men to get in on the joy that is screaming for your team in public.
While women certainly participate in this element of “watch party culture” – take women's football fan culture, over half of women's football fans (53%) have developed their interest in the game in the last three years alone – it is so often co-opted by “lads”, and therefore does not and cannot in current climate always feel like a safe space.
Marty, 30, went to a TSITP finale watch party in a bar in London's Kings Cross, and it was way busier than anyone expected. People were packed into the bar, sitting on the floor or standing when seats ran out.
Jenny Han left a subtle hint in a finale post-credits message…
“People were sat on the floor in their Team Conrad (the only correct choice) t-shirts, and everyone was vibing and looking forward to watching the finale together,” she told GLAMOUR. "We all spoke before/after (and commented throughout, and groaned whenever Jeremiah appeared on the screen), and it was nice to debrief.
“After we finished the episode, we found out about the movie, which made it all that much better! Was it super chaotic? Yes. Were the vibes great though? Yes. Did I have to watch it again when I got home because I couldn’t quite see and hear it? Yes. But would I do it again? Yes.”
It was also a decidedly women-dominated event, with all the female energy that comes with that. “I did not see a single man there, it was great," Marty says. "I do feel like it’s very much the kind of show your boyfriend would pretend not to care about, but get super involved with, though.”
Megan, 28, threw a small watch party at her house with her friend and her boyfriend, who may have been “unwilling” at first but ended up dressing up as Conrad and making a peach cake for the event (if you know, you know). “It was really fun, overstimulated, emotional and manic,” she says. Once news of the upcoming movie dropped, the party then descended into an “emotional” debate as to whether it was needed or necessary.
The addictive TV show depicts a toxic rivalry between a mother and her son's girlfriend, with Wright behind and in front of the camera.
The recent increase in watch parties, in public and private, seems to suggest that we want to connect more when it comes to what we’re consuming, and how we feel about it. The memes and social media takes have created a community that craves IRL connection, and discussions of a series' stakes, ships and everything between.
There have even been TSITP-themed dating events, with one in Shoreditch's Boxpark named The Summer I Turned Flirty. Marty reckons that the bleak state of dating right now is part of the reason why the show and its subsequent fan obsessions with Team Jeremiah and Team Conrad. She tells GLAMOUR: “How am I meant to go back on Hinge after watching Conrad?”
So while The Summer I Turned Pretty's story has drawn to a close – for now, anyway. Here's hoping the watch party era, and the community vibes that it brings with it, has just begun.
