Most, if not all of us, have at least heard of Jenny Han’s The Summer I Turned Pretty by now. Since its third season just wrapped up, I have many, many thoughts about it and figured it would make a great topic to discuss. Favoring the books over the TV show, here’s my logic to being Team Jeremiah throughout most of the trilogy.
#1: Conrad vs. Jeremiah’s characters
For those of you who have only watched the show, picture in your minds the two brothers: affectionate, loving Conrad and manipulative, annoying Jeremiah. Got that? Okay. Now imagine the brothers switched roles – Jere is the caring one in the books, believe it or not! Throughout the first two, there are countless examples of Jeremiah being there for Belly, especially when Conrad decided he was too good to talk to her.
Conrad still has feelings, for Belly, of course, but he is WAY worse at showing them in the books. He ignores her and treats her like a little kid. Even when they dated, there were still moments where he acted like he didn’t care, prom being the number one example. Jeremiah, however, takes Belly to the movies, teaches her how to drive a car, and wished he could have been her date to prom.
#2: Jeremiah’s coping
It’s really easy to excuse Conrad’s behavior because of Susannah’s death. However, many people forget that Jeremiah had to deal with the exact same thing, alone because Conrad needed his own time. It takes strength to cope with a death, and I think Jere did a better job at it than Conrad did without pushing the people he loves away. Additionally, Jeremiah grew up constantly being compared to Conrad and had to learn to be his own person by himself. I really admire that quality in him.
#3: Jeremiah WAS successful!
In the books, Jeremiah never graduated late or was in debt. Besides a bad credit score, he was responsible and not as careless with drinking (or with his mother’s ring!) as the show portrayed him to be. On that note, he proposed with a ring, too! We don’t know how big it was but…it was a start.
Conclusion
By the third book, I will say that I switched teams very fast after Cabo’s incident. However, Jeremiah’s character was not as bad as the show painted it out to be. Instead, the books demonstrated Conrad’s maturity throughout the years, highlighting him without making Jeremiah look bad. Jere simply wasn’t “the one” for Belly, but that doesn’t take away his qualities as her friend.
Okay, so maybe this article was a bit more about clearing up Jeremiah’s name, but can you blame me? I had to witness this favorite brother of mine act like a cheater on screens for three seasons. It hurt to watch even with everyone’s happy endings, in different versions but, nonetheless. That being said, should my next article be a comparison between the books and TV series?