We go from summer travel chaos and zoo elephant stories to a deep recap of “Summer Dress,” where Belly’s glow-up collides with debutante pressure and a love triangle that starts to sharpen. We track who supports Belly’s growth, who tries to control the narrative, and why the red jeep moment changes the vibe of her first real date.

Cousins Beach is back, and so are all the feelings you forgot you had. We’re kicking off our rewatch podcast with “Summer House” (The Summer I Turned Pretty Season 1 Episode 1), and we’re looking at the pilot the way it’s meant to be watched: with nostalgia in your chest and a running tally of every green flag and red flag on screen.

We talk about why this series lands so powerfully, especially if you grew up with a “summer place” of your own. From unpacking groceries to fireworks, hot dogs, and s’mores, the show nails the ritual side of summer and uses it to make Belly’s shift feel seismic. We also get into Jenny Han’s adaptation choices, what the show keeps from the books, and how a straight-to-series pilot sets the tone so fast you end up binging before you realize it.

Then it’s time for the real debate: Jeremiah vs Conrad vs Cam Cameron. We break down that first arrival, Conrad’s vibe, Jeremiah’s easy warmth, and the bonfire chaos that introduces Cam as a surprisingly healthy alternative. We also dig into Belly’s lens as a narrator and how her idea of Conrad can be more fantasy than fact. If you’ve ever argued about the love triangle, this is where the scoreboard starts.

Subscribe, follow, and share this with the friend who will fight you about Team Jeremiah. After you listen, drop your take: who “wins” the pilot, and what moment sealed it for you?

There’s a specific kind of summer magic that makes you want to believe the most complicated love story is the truest one. Salt air, sunburned shoulders, a crush that makes your heart skip and suddenly the broody guy in a dark sweater feels like destiny. We’re here to challenge that.

We’re Lauren and Alex, and we’re launching Team Jere, a deep-dive rewatch of all three seasons of The Summer I Turned Pretty with one big question driving every conversation: why do we keep rooting for the person who makes us cry when we could choose the person who makes us feel safe and fully ourselves? Lauren comes in unapologetically Team Jeremiah, while Alex brings the millennial tendency to fall for the tortured hero trope and a willingness to be convinced. Together, we’re breaking down what the show gets right about first love, what it glamorizes about emotional chaos, and what healthy romance actually looks like in modern dating.

Along the way, we’ll dig into the show’s deeper themes, including grief, growing pains, messy firsts, and the way pop culture shapes our expectations of love. We’ll also talk adaptation choices and what changes between the books and the series mean for how characters get framed, including the shade Jeremiah catches on screen versus on the page. And we’ll keep coming back to the debate at the heart of Cousins Beach: is it better to chase fireworks, or choose the person who shows up?

We kick things off July 4th and spend the entire summer breaking down Season 1 episode by episode. Subscribe now, share the show with a friend who loves a hot take, and leave a review to help more fans find us. Then tell us where you stand: are you Team Jeremiah or still defending the broody guy?