The Summer I Turned Pretty Season 2: Let Belly Grieve

While watching the primary three episodes of “The Summer I Turned Pretty” season two — launched Friday, July 14, on Amazon Prime Video — I got here again to at least one thought time and again: can somebody be good to Belly?! Stop studying if you have not watched but, however when the present picks up, the varsity yr is about to finish, and Belly (Lola Tung) is bereft as a result of their household good friend Susannah (Rachel Blanchard) has died a few month in the past. Susannah’s sickness has hung over the entire faculty yr, with Belly’s mother, Laurel (Jackie Chung), spending loads of time going forwards and backwards to the Fisher home to assist to Susannah, Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno), and Conrad (Christopher Briney).

Belly, in the meantime, has struggled principally because the final summer time ended. Her grades aren’t nearly as good. She underperformed on her volleyball crew. Of course, this all is sensible given what she’s gone via, however nearly each single individual on “The Summer I Turned Pretty” is exceptionally imply to Belly about it.

Take Belly’s steering counselor. She notes that Belly’s grades have dropped, and Belly reveals that their household good friend died. The steering counselor cruelly notes that the drop has been yr lengthy, not simply after the demise. Somehow a educated steering counselor would not know {that a} yr of getting a liked one slowly die of most cancers would have an effect on how somebody would do at school for all 10 months.

But Belly’s circle of relatives are not any higher at acknowledging her grief. When her mother questions her about her grades and Belly factors out that all of them had a protracted, onerous yr, Laurel tells her to cease making excuses. But grief is just not an excuse — it is the reality. Pretty a lot everybody in Belly’s life (apart from her finest good friend Taylor, performed by Rain Spencer) refuses to provide her an inch of help and love.

Part of why everybody’s obliviousness (which veers into downright cruelty) hits so onerous for me is as a result of I’ve been via one thing just like Belly. My 12-year-old cousin died in the beginning of my senior yr of school. I tried to inform myself I was high-quality and it wasn’t affecting me, however I ended up dropping the ball in loads of huge areas of my life. It’s nonetheless onerous for me to suppose again on that point with out some disgrace concerning the individuals I let down. I’ve sadly misplaced different relations since, however within the intervening years, I’ve discovered that being affected by a liked one’s sickness and demise is totally regular, and I want I’d recognized to provide myself house and style.

Belly is just not an ideal individual, and she or he makes some questionable decisions in season two. But that is as a result of she’s a teenage lady going via one thing horrible. Of course, Belly’s household can also be grieving, however for her mother to deal with her so callously was actually stunning to me. I want “The Summer I Turned Pretty” modeled what it means to take care of and help a grieving individual in these early episodes.

New episodes of “The Summer I Turned Pretty” debut Fridays on Prime Video.