As the chorus of Dua Lipa’s “Love Again” played, “The Summer I Turned Pretty” Season 2 ended with heroine Belly (Lola Tung) triumphantly returning to volleyball camp to win back her spot on the team before her senior year of high school.
In a fresh relationship with longtime best friend Jeremiah Fisher (Gavin Casalegno), Belly narrates in the final scenes of the show, “The future is unclear. But it’s still mine.”
Season 3 will leap into that future when it premieres July 16, picking up toward the end of Belly’s junior year of college, a nearly four-year time jump.
“Inevitably, a lot of growth happens between end of high school and end of college,” Lola Tung previews of Season 3 in an interview with TODAY.com.
Belly (Lola Tung) and Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno) in “The Summer I Turned Pretty” Season 3.Erika Doss / Prime
According to the season’s official logline, the show will pick up as Belly’s “looking forward to another summer in Cousins with her soulmate, Jeremiah,” confirming their relationship is going strong after they got together in the final episodes of Season 2.
But stars Sean Kaufman and Rain Spencer, who play Belly’s brother, Steven, and her best friend Taylor, respectively, say their characters’ relationship hasn’t fared the same.
Belly, Taylor and Jeremiah have also taken on college life at Finch University, while Steven and Belly’s former flame Conrad Fisher (Christopher Briney) have graduated and entered the adult world.
TODAY.com caught up with the cast of “The Summer I Turned Pretty” to break down how their characters have changed during that time jump, and what might be ahead.
Belly and Jeremiah Are Going Strong In College
Both Belly and Jeremiah chose to attend the fictional Finch College, brought to life in the show by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s campus.
The season’s official trailer hints that Belly and Jeremiah have experienced college together, from move in day to late night dancing on the quad.
Belly and Jeremiah take on college.Erika Doss / Prime Video
Tung says in that time, “Belly has learned what it means to be in a committed, more long-term relationship.” So committed in fact, they get engaged, the Season 3 trailer reveals.
Belly’s also found a stronger sense of self and “comfortability” in a space that isn’t home or her favorite place, Cousins Beach.
“She has a new understanding of what being away from home and living on her own feels like,” Tung says.
“I think she’s just lived a lot more life and and naturally has learned from it and matured,” she adds. “I think there’s an energetic shift. You can feel it when we enter the season.”
Belly and Taylor Are Still ‘Ride or Die’
While college represents a “completely new environment,” with brand new friends and experiences — one constant has been her friendship with Taylor, Tung says of her character.
Spencer tells TODAY.com Taylor and Belly are still “ride or die” four years later.
“I think when you grow up with someone and you grow up with a best friend, you’re naturally going to have different versions of yourself, you know? It’s really special if you can grow with a friend and get along with every version of the other person,” Spencer says. “And that is absolutely the case.”
With that close lasting friendship though is a “real honesty” which will be seen this season, Spencer says.
“There’s a ‘no BS’ sort of mentality with each other that I think is important in a friendship,” she adds.
Conrad’s Been on the West Coast
Conrad went to college at Stanford University during this time jump. Season 2 ended with him planning to transfer to the West Coast school, a move made possible by a late night study session with Belly and Jeremiah that helped him pass the semester at his original school, Brown University.
At the end of Season 2, Belly and Conrad officially cut things off, after she kissed Jeremiah and he said they were just friends. But the season’s ending hinted that they would lightly keep in touch — after all, they’re connected by the Cousins Beach house they fought so hard to save. Conrad tells her he’ll see her at Cousins for the Fourth of July that year.
Now, four years later, it seems there’s been something of an estrangement between Belly and Conrad. The Season 3 trailer hints that Conrad’s been living in San Francisco and studying to practice medicine. (Since Conrad is older than both Belly and her brother Steven, he would have graduated from undergrad during the time jump.)
But the trailer also teases a surprising reunion, likely around Christmastime, that’s enough of a shock to make Conrad drop the candy cane out of his mouth.
According to the Season 3 synopsis, “some core-shaking events” will bring Conrad back into Belly’s life.
Belly (Lola Tung), Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno), Conrad (Christopher Briney), Steven (Sean Kaufman), and Taylor (Rain Spencer) in “The Summer I Turned Pretty.”Amazon / MGM Studios
Taylor and Steven Are Focused on Their Careers and Families
Meanwhile Taylor has been dreaming up big plans for the future while at Finch. Spencer tells TODAY.com her character has dreams of working in public relations and moving to New York.
When it comes to her personal life, the time jump will also show Taylor’s growth from her traits of “brattiness” and “being overprotective,” Spencer says.
“There was a lot of talking about how much have these characters grown in the four years? Which is a lot — like, you’re a different person,” she says.
Season 3 will also introduce viewers to Taylor’s family life, including her dynamic with her mom, who’s played by an actor Spencer wasn’t able to confirm at the time of the interview but is “really funny.”
“Their sort of like parent/daughter relationship is like switched. Taylor feels more like the parent a bit, which is an interesting dynamic that’s funny and presents its own challenge,” she says.
Steven, meanwhile, has graduated from Princeton University and is working at a firm called Breaker, Kaufman tells TODAY.com. He teases his character will encounter a coworker named Denise and that their “workplace dynamic really changes Steven,” he says.
Steven (Sean Kaufman) and Adam (Tom Everett Scott) in “The Summer I Turned Pretty.”Amazon / MGM Studios
Reflecting on the Cousins Beach core friend group, Kaufman says, “Everybody has kind of gone their own way as they’ve gotten older.”
So the drama between the Belly, Jeremiah and Conrad love triangle — which in Season 2, caused a fight between the newly dating Taylor and Steven — “no longer means as much to them.”
“Steven has a real adult job to worry about. He can’t be worried about who his sister’s dating sometimes,” he says. “But I will say, there’s a little bit of that still.”
“He really tries to make an effort to be in Belly’s life and to be supportive of her, like, no matter what,” he adds.
And As For Steven and Taylor’s Relationship?
“It is not where we left off, I’ll say that,” Kaufman answers.
Season 3 will pick up with Steven and Taylor in a “messy place.”
Taylor (Rain Spencer) in “The Summer I Turned Pretty.”Amazon / MGM Studios
“These four years have been like, break up, back together, break up, back together, break up back together,” he says.
But based on the trailer, there’s still love there. In one scene, Steven blows Taylor a kiss as she leans out a window of what appears to be a sorority house.
Laurel Finds Herself on ‘Steady Ground’
In Season 2, Belly’s mom, Laurel Park (Jackie Chung) channeled the fresh pain of losing her lifelong best friend Susannah Fisher (Rachel Blanchard) into writing a memoir.
Now, around five years since Susannah’s death, Season 3 will find Laurel on more “steady ground,” Chung tells TODAY.com.
“She has her feet under her now, and with her kids gone she has an opportunity to look around and see what’s out there, and see what her life can be, and to look for new relationships,” she adds.
But that grief for Susannah will always be there, Chung says, and part of how she’s honored that over the years is staying close to the Fisher boys.
“She wants to stay close with them, and she wants to check in on them to make sure they’re OK,” she says.
“Laurel cares so much about her kids, but she also has enough love to encompass the Fisher family, and it’s so important for her because of Susannah to make sure that they are one unit, and that she’s connected to everyone in that family,” she adds.
