Love Triangles
In Defense of ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’s Jeremiah: Is He Better For Belly Than Conrad?
Summer has arrived, and after two years away from Cousins Beach, we’re all more than a little ready for The Summer I Turned Pretty Season 3. The biggest question on our minds, aside from how many Taylor Swift songs will make the soundtrack, is which Fisher brother will Belly (Lola Tung) choose as her endgame?
According to The Summer I Turned Pretty novel series, Belly will ultimately end up with Conrad (Christopher Briney), but the show has diverged from the books in the past. Could the TV writers change up who Belly gives her heart to in the long run?
Team Conrad and Team Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno) have been warring on TikTok since the second season of the show aired in 2023. Flashbacks revealed that Belly and Conrad pursued a relationship after kissing at the beach at the end of Season 1, but it didn’t last through the school year as Conrad’s grief about Susannah’s (Rachel Blanchard) cancer diagnosis made him emotionally unavailable. By the time the crew reunited in the summer to save the beach house, Belly had reset her attention on Jeremiah, and so the see-sawing emotions between the two Fisher brothers continued.
Erika Doss / Prime Video
Jeremiah and Belly ended the season together, but it wasn’t without major drama and consequences. Conrad finally admitted that he had been just as in love with Belly as she was with him during their relationship, but it came months too late, and when her affection had already shifted. He didn’t realize how serious Belly and Jeremiah were until he caught them making out on the hood of his car after his last college final (this is overall a pro-Jeremiah article, but let’s go ahead and admit that was an extremely messed-up move). The brothers did have a brief emotional battle in the Season 2 finale before Conrad formally backed out of the race for Belly’s heart and let his brother have the girl. They scored the heartbreak with “Exile,” and honestly, I still haven’t really forgiven Prime Video for that attack.
So, now we have the classic second romance problem. This comes up in almost every teen love triangle story. The pattern is that the endgame couple falls madly in love or has an instant connection, but circumstances beyond their control force them apart. They pursue other relationships that help them grow into more mature, emotionally evolved people so that they can fall back in love (or admit they never fell out of love in the first place) as the best versions of themselves. The second loves are basically therapists that help emotionally stunted people get their crap together. There are cute, sometimes iconic moments, but you never really expect them to go the distance.
Classic examples of the love triangle do-si-do include Lucas (Chad Michael Murray), Peyton (Hilarie Burton), and Brooke (Sophia Bush) on One Tree Hill, Spencer (Daniel Ezra), Olivia (Samantha Logan), and Layla (Greta Onieogou) on All American, and Felicity (Keri Russell), Ben (Scott Speedman) and Noel (Scott Foley) on Felicity. It’s the classic structure of a love triangle to draw out the tension between the couple that is supposed to be together for as long as possible. It’s about creating that slow burn and enough drama to last you through multiple seasons of a television show. It’s a great setup that has led to incredible teen romance moments over the years, and The Summer I Turned Pretty has set itself up to follow in some well-worn footsteps.
Belly has been in love with Conrad Fisher since she first understood what a crush was. She spent her entire adolescence daydreaming of what it would be like to date him. And then her dream came true. It took a lot of miscommunication and frustration to get there, but they were finally able to get on the same page and forge a swoonworthy romance, marked by late-night conversations about the stars and hot chocolate by the fire. However, they never really dealt with the issues that caused drama when they first got together, and that ultimately became their undoing. Conrad took Susannah’s diagnosis hard, as did everyone close to her, and we can’t tell someone how to grieve. His way of coping with losing his mother was to emotionally cut himself off from everyone around him, including Belly.
Processing the loss of a parent when you’re that young is a Herculean task. Trying to do that while also in a long-distance relationship with someone who is significantly younger than you (not significant in a creepy way, but meaningful in terms of maturity) is basically impossible. It’s not a surprise that Belly and Conrad broke up. And it’s also not surprising that she found comfort in Jeremiah.
Prime Video
Jeremiah, who was also grieving the loss of his mother, was more adept at explaining his feelings to Belly, even if they weren’t pleasant. He told her where he stood with her when she broke his heart, when he felt abandoned by her, and when they were contemplating giving a relationship a real go. For what it’s worth, he was also honest with Conrad about what he needed from his older brother before he and Belly could give their relationship a real shot. Conrad decided to break his own heart, and whether that was for Belly and Jeremiah’s benefit or because he knew he wasn’t ready to be the boyfriend that Belly needed remains unclear.
Jeremiah was the boyfriend that Belly needed at the end of Season 2. His ability to actually talk through his issues is essential as she processes her own grief at this crucial stage of growing into new adulthood. Their friendship foundation gives them the safety to grow and make mistakes together. It’s a more grounded relationship than the pedestals that Belly and Conrad held each other on, which is what Belly meant when she told Jeremiah before they hooked up in Season 2 that she wanted something “real.”
Season 3 will hopefully reveal what that grounded, “real” relationship has done for both Belly and Jeremiah. We’re getting a multi-year time jump, and we’ll see how they’ve changed since the summer they saved the beach house. Fans of the TV show will also find out if the series will follow Jeremiah’s cheating storyline from the books, a contentious point for Team Conrad. (For the sake of this article, if it hasn’t happened already in the show, we are not considering it as fact or an indictment of show Jeremiah’s character). So the real question is, has Belly grown into someone who is a better match for Conrad (and vice versa) or have she and Jeremiah forged a lifelong connection (they are planning a wedding, after all)?
There are historical TV references to support the latter path for The Summer I Turned Pretty. Most famously, Dawson’s Creek ended with Joey (Katie Holmes) and Pacey (Joshua Jackson) getting together instead of Joey uniting with her first love Dawson (James Van Der Beek). It was revolutionary at the time to see the guy the show was named after lose the girl, but there was also no denying that Pacey and Joey had a more epic romance. Pacey invested in Joey, the girl in front of him, rather than the fantasy of her that Dawson took for granted until he felt he was going to lose her. Pacey met Joey where she was, much like Jeremiah was able to do in The Summer I Turned Pretty Season 2.
Dawson’s Creek creator Kevin Williamson always lamented that Joey ended up with Pacey in the series finale, but he also co-created another second romance endgame the next decade. He helped Julie Plec launch The Vampire Diaries. Many people expected Elena (Nina Dobrev) to end up with Stefan (Paul Wesley), but her endgame was actually Damon (Ian Somerhalder). It should be noted that Williamson was Team Stelena despite the finale, so at least he stays consistent. Damon and Elena were allowed more time together over the course of the series, and maybe Stelena would have had a better chance if Dobrev hadn’t stepped away from the show at the end of Season 6. She did step away though, and Damon was the one to ultimately capture her heart.
Team Conrad has canon on their side. There is every chance that The Summer I Turned Pretty follows the blueprint laid out by the books and by countless teen dramas before them. However, the second option is also valid. Jeremiah has already proven that he’s a better communicator and more emotionally consistent than his brother. He hasn’t taken Belly for granted in the same way that Conrad has. Jeremiah and Belly have the potential to have a Pacey and Joey-level romance, but we won’t know until Season 3 airs, and we see who they’ve become over the course of their relationship. Even if Jeremiah doesn’t end up being Belly’s endgame, Team Conrad folks will have to concede that her being with Jeremiah is what allowed Belly – and Conrad – to grow into the people they needed to be to give their relationship a genuine chance.
No matter how this ends, more respect needs to be given to the role of the second love in a love triangle and what Jeremiah has meant to Belly throughout their young lives. Also, nothing could be worse than Belly “choosing herself” after three seasons of this back and forth.
Do you think Jeremiah is the better choice for Belly? Vote below and sound off in the comments below.
The Summer I Turned Pretty, Season 3, July 16, Prime Video.
