This was a very interesting analysis. I'm an admitted big fan of the show, so maybe I'm a little too defensive of it, but I do have some disagreements with your analysis, perhaps to justify my own personal preferences.
Most importantly, I think the premise that Susannah immediately preferred Conrad for Belly and that is inextricable to their feelings is a little too absolute in this analysis. I think that they grapple with that, but it's ultimately ambiguous. It's a chicken and egg cycle, Belly's affinity for Conrad propels Susannah's encouragement of that connection which then propels Belly's affinity and on and on. There's no clear beginning, they've always known each other. I think the question of if the only reason they love each other is Susannah is unknowable, and they have to live with that, and that frames Belly's final decision less as a regression to her child self but more as a final step of growth and acceptance, not just of herself and her feelings, but also the general ambiguity of life and the linear experience of time. As Laurel says, no one knows what Susannah would have wanted (S3E4).
I also don't think the writers intend for it to seem that Belly lacks free will. She can't know if they'd feel that way without Susannah dying or without Susannah's meddling, but they do still feel that way. After all, Belly did send him away in the first place, she did get on the plane to Paris, she did reject him on the beach, she did choose Jeremiah at the motel before Conrad took back his feelings, etc. Those were all instances where she felt she had to do that: she would hurt Jeremiah, she would hurt their family(ies), she would shame herself again. In her final selection of Conrad, it's despite those risks rather than fearing them. That's its own form of rejecting expectations when Susannah did also endow Belly with the responsibility of maintaining the magic of Cousins. She can't control her feelings, but she is still choosing to take the selfish step of letting herself wholly embrace the part of herself that loves Conrad for the first time.
In contrast, Belly and Jeremiah's relationship is more explicitly about Susannah. The line about Susannah wanting her to end up with one of her boys immediately precedes Belly's first kiss with Jeremiah. Belly and Jeremiah cite Susannah to justify their nuptials and Belly uses Susannah to justify to herself a large wedding at the country club that Belly naturally is not enthusiastic about. Belly also references promising to herself that after Susannah died she promised to herself she'd never abandon Jeremiah, a promise she keeps to more intently than the promise she made to Susannah herself regarding Conrad — although interestingly that moment was interrupted by Jeremiah. It's never explicitly addressed but it feels as though that is another memory where she's replaced Conrad with Jeremiah, considering all she does for Conrad is help save the house and then study for an exam then begins dating his brother and does not really speak to him for 4 years.
The writers perhaps avoided explicitly identifying Belly's promise as another replaced memory, like the dog one, because they don't intend for the ending to be focused on them being bound by the promises made to Susannah. Conrad only vaguely refers to promises made — lacking knowledge of the promises Belly made to both Susannah and Jeremiah — in expressing no one would hold her to them, or at least he wouldn't. While you're free to disagree, and it's maybe more fun or makes the series more interesting, I do think the writers are using melodrama and gothic elements as a device for what is still ultimately a contemporary young adult story, with optimism in the ending and some modern liberal feminist sensibilities.
Jeremiah does find solace at the cursed house, finally realizing how much love he does have surrounding him in the absence of Belly. Conrad does grow in allowing himself to be selfishly honest and in consistently asserting it via letters following the wedding. Belly does get to go off on her own and let go of her guilt about everything that happened and finally gets to a point of self-acceptance. Instead of regressing to her child self, she's accepting that part of herself she's suppressed and hated and rejected for years. Yes, childhood is still a basis for her love and connection to Conrad, but I don't feel as though it's intended as a regression, although I can see why people feel that way.
I also disagree with the assessment of Belly's character as only selfishly seeking the validation of the brothers. To me, her relationship with Jeremiah is fueled by a self hatred and condescending responsibility towards Jeremiah that in many ways mirrors Conrad's. She feels deep shame for how she acted at the funeral and abandoning Jeremiah for someone who ultimately withdrew from her (as Jeremiah jealously predicted and then gloated about, in his dejected state). Yes, she does crave the easy attention Jeremiah can offer at that moment, but she also shrinks herself and sacrifices things she wants to prop Jeremiah up. Notably, this includes her more longstanding and intense attraction to Conrad.
She does also love the validation of mothering Jeremiah, but I attribute that to her wanting to have done that for Conrad in their relationship and him being unwilling to burden her in that way, which resulted in the end of their relationship. She was ill equipped to support Conrad because of her own suppression of what was happening to Susannah, as you describe so well, but I do think she wanted to be there for Conrad in an abstract sense. And, as you describe, he was at that time incapable of that because of his own obsessive thinking and well intentioned condescension towards Belly.
Overall, I think perhaps I'm arguing against myself and giving ammo to the people who might classify the show as slop, but I do think it's a little more sincere and optimistic than this analysis makes it out to be, at least in intention. It's not fully diving into Gothic melodrama, but rather hinting and nudging at it. Teasing you with it. Because rather than being condemned to a life with no sense of self because he lost Belly, Jeremiah's ending is actually a path towards actually finding it. And the story confers Belly and Conrad's love for each other a sort of special status, where their lives in their respective exiles were mostly, almost wholly, fulfilling, even without that intense romantic love that they only really have with each other. Coming back together is more the total fulfillment of their dreams (even if they can't ever know the provenance of said dreams) than a surrender to the decree of Susannah or facing a lifetime of abject misery.
That being said, this is a great essay and I really enjoyed reading it. The story absolutely does craft a pseudo-incestuous dynamic incredibly while subverting the natural aversion to it. And I think you nailed the dynamic between the brothers. I especially loved your analysis of the different relationships their characters have with violence. Of any of the characters, I have the fewest quibbles with your analysis of Conrad, and that's perhaps why the audience tends to find him the most compelling. He fits the melodrama framework so well, with his tendency towards martyrdom, the inevitability of his downfall because of his obsessive thoughts and, and his ultimate redemption through honesty. I think the writers soften the edges of Belly (as they're protective of her as the protagonist and, as a female driven writers room, the female character between two male characters) and Jeremiah (since he's the "loser") and shied away from fully leaning into the real melodrama of it all, for better or worse.
Sorry for the entire essay — much less elegant and eloquent than yours — in the comments! I'll absolutely be revisiting this. I devoured it. Thank you for sharing!
Thank you so much for the extremely kind words, and moreover for leaving such a thoughtful, considered, compelling reply. Forgive me if my own is a bit laconic by comparison—it is not meant to diminish your considerations, my brain is just frazzled because it’s late at night and I’ve been writing all week.
I certainly agree that, for Belly and for Conrad alike, the question of whether their love for each other sprung from Susannah’s expectations is essentially “unknowable,” insofar as it originates from a totally protean time in their lives in which causes and effects are at their most ambiguous. And in order to accept themselves and each other, they have to accept the doubt that comes with that unknowability. “They can’t ever know the provenance of their dreams” is such a beautiful and accurate way of putting it—that’s precisely right. But I do think the viewer has been placed in a position to understand that provenance—the show traces it out in such detail—and, for me, it does inevitably arrive at Susannah. The language of conspiracy may be somewhat too strong in my essay, though the deathbed promises, at the very least, are quite conspiratorial. Her hopes do not necessarily constitute anything so definite as a “plan,” but they are so profoundly embraided with the protagonists’ experience of their childhood, and they do seem to shape more or less everything that happens (all of the characters’ decisions, including decisions that run counter to her expectations, are made in relation to them). And I really think it unfolds in such a logical manner, especially with regard to the mirroring of parental and child relationships. I know this probably isn’t a satisfactory rejoinder. All I mean to say is I think their not-knowing is at odds with the viewer’s knowing (hence irony).
I admit that I cannot help but think of Belly’s choice at the end as a kind of non-choice, given that it involves surrender to a drive she herself describes as inflexible, permanent, and opposed to a great many of her conscious decisions. Which is not to say that her suppression/shame of the drive doesn’t cause her an enormous amount of suffering, so I do think the ending is optimistic in that sense. There is a self-acceptance—I just don’t think the “self” is extricable from the ideological chain it's linked in. (You’re right, also, that the two consciously unbind themselves from Susannah’s promises—only to fulfill the pattern the promises were designed to produce.)
I completely agree with you with regard to Jeremiah’s relationship to Belly; very insightful comment about the promise substitution. The reasons I disagree about his optimistic ending are a) I just don’t think the romance with Denise is very persuasive, just literally on a script level, even though I see her function b) the love he receives from his father, which I would argue is the decisive factor in the solace he finally finds, is predicated upon a lie. Perhaps the fact that Adam is now willing to tell this lie is demonstrative of his love, but it does form part of the ending’s irony, for me.
In writing the essay, I found Belly herself to be the most complex and contradictory figure to deal with, and I can admit that I drastically underrated the role of shame in her actions. You quite surpass me on this point. I do want to clarify that I don’t only think she’s selfish—I think fear is a big motivator too, and I would place greater importance on that (I oughtn’t to have lead with the narcissism)—but absolutely, guilt determines much more of her behavior than I have accounted for here. If I were to revise this essay I would try to be significantly more attentive to that.
Thank you for the kind words re: violence and martyrdom—they are favorite topics of mine, so I am glad those passages landed!
Your words have really given me a great deal to chew on and I’m extremely grateful that my writing has received such generous consideration. And thank you again for the kind words. I will conclude just by saying that I don’t think what you’re describing is “slop” at all, even if it isn’t quite my picture of the show; and it certainly isn’t my intention to somehow marshal the series out of being “slop” by territorializing it as Gothic melodrama, or by claiming that it’s somehow cynical/insincere/not what it appears to be etc.—quite the opposite!). It’s a beautiful series.
Thank you for your thoughtful reply! I suppose I still just disagree on the viewer having any clearer of an understanding on the origination of Belly's specific affection for Conrad over Jeremiah than Belly and Conrad and Jeremiah. I think, perhaps, it is caught up in your more tragic perception of Jeremiah's character. He was not esteemed as much by his parents, so of course he was never who Susannah was thinking of, that could only be Conrad. I can certainly see why people perceive it that way. But I feel as though that, like Jeremiah himself, it fails to see Jeremiah's own irony — that he's beloved by his family in ways he cannot see because he is too clouded by his insecurities.
His ending is optimistic, to me, not because of the romantic relationship with Denise exactly, but in the framing of the appreciation of the group. Even if the romance itself between Denise and Jeremiah is unconvincing, she is demonstratively an excellent friend to him. She hosts Jeremiah for months at her apartment, she goes above and beyond to help facilitate his event, and she gives him multiple pep talks. This is despite an initial judgement that he was unserious and entitled. Denise grows to appreciate his qualities and is willing to put herself out on his behalf — that's love, even if the romance between them doesn't work out (which I agree the show makes it seem likely that it won't — i just think that's part of the point).
He's also able to appreciate the love in people choosing to show up for him: Steven and Taylor and Laurel and Adam. They may be imperfect stewards of it, but it is love nonetheless, and he also starts showing some true love for himself in that sequence that does not make the imperfections of the love of others so debilitating for him anymore. That, after insisting Belly was his entire world and he needed to be her entire world also, is optimistic. That's where the show's "modern liberal feminist sensibilities" as I worded it come in — a true gothic melodrama would lean into that, but TSITP pumps the brakes.
Circling back to the overall point on the childhood dynamic where Belly's feelings for Conrad formed, I think Jeremiah is both Julia, dejected and stewing, but also Susannah, naturally sunny and adept at deliberately not talking about things to maintain the pleasant facade for selfish purposes. His lack of communication regarding his knowledge of Christmas in season 3 mirrors Susannah's regarding her imminent demise in season 1. Susannah and Conrad's deathbed discussion also highlights the esteem she has always carried for Jeremiah: when Conrad was born she found him perfect and totally beautiful, only to realize she was delusional when she saw the photos— but Jeremiah was, truly, born beautiful, and Susannah values that. Jeremiah grows up feeling he's only seen as lacking in comparison to Conrad, but that is not true. His parents do value traits of his over Conrad's, especially Susannah and not the interloper father — Adam whose opinion is discarded within the confines of Cousins anyway — even if they are not openly expressed. Conrad's anxious reluctance and obsessive sense of duty and doing the right thing would be happily traded for Jeremiah's eagerness to please.
The intense pressure placed on Conrad to fulfill the paternalistic role towards Jeremiah in many ways is a pressure that would make Jeremiah perfect for Belly, two sunny, happy people, biddable and capable of pure recreating the magic of Cousins, on the back of the work of an unappreciated Conrad. He's fixing up the house for Belly and Jeremiah and their friends to have the seamless fantasy, while dumping on him for intruding and disrupting that which only exists because of him in the first place. Yes, Susannah spins this in a fantastical magic sort of way, framing Conrad as a prince charming, but it also constructs Conrad as the human dumping ground of any complaint or quibble, which might push Belly towards Jeremiah, who is allowed to remain light and carefree in comparison.
So all that is to say I do not think the show adequately answers the question of why Belly preferred Conrad growing up to the point where it is wholly ironic for the audience to know definitively that it is Susannah— especially not in intention. I think the show intends to explore the nature vs nurture of it all and ultimately ends up with the (perhaps cop out) answer that it's a bit of both. You can never extricate Belly's feelings from the way they were socialized, even predating Belly's birth since she's the youngest. But there's also part of it, like her brown hair and brown eyes, that was just an accident of fate. A chromosome or two lines up differently and she is a person who would be drawn more to Jeremiah, or a person who can't stand the idea of either of them, despite the way they were raised. She was able to make those choices for a time, so some of the ingredients were there.
That determinism coming not just from socialization I think does validate your interpretation that her choice at the end is a surrender to the drive. I agree that in many ways it is. I suppose I just chafe against the implication that the choice of self acceptance and love is less free will than choosing to repress oneself would be in describing it as a "non-choice." But I actually don't think we disagree much on that.
Sorry again for the essay in the comments and please don't feel any pressure to reply in kind! I am anxious to read the next parts of your essay! As is probably evident by my lengthy comments, I could read multiple books on this show.
Where in the world is Conrad the "human dumping ground"? Even when he is struggling, everyone around him can clearly see he is not emotionally okay—it is written all over his face. He isn't a dumping ground; he is dealing with his mother's illness by keeping it a secret and acting like a broody, passive-aggressive martyr. Sussanah's illness is the excuse for all of Conrad’s emotional disregulation. So where is the broodiness coming from besides the other instance of Adam's infidelity.
If anyone is the actual emotional dumping ground and regulator of that house, it is Jeremiah. The show explicitly makes this point when his own mother acknowledges it, telling him, "You never let anyone see you hurting." Jeremiah openly states that nobody really sees him. He even tells Conrad that he doesn't want to pretend to be happy when he's not.
Even the books back this up, with Belly explicitly noting that Jeremiah had to be the emotional regulator of the house because Conrad’s volatile emotions dictated the entire household. This is evidence over interpretation.
Conrad isn't some helpless victim with no exit; he has a massive support system waiting on him hand and foot. Belly is constantly wants to cater to him, Steven is giving him advice to be "zen," and Laurel is coddling him with "you're my special guy." Not to mention that Adam favours Conrad and Jeremiah is overlooked.
You can't call Jeremiah a victim of his own doing when infact he has been "overlooked".
He's not less competent as is evident by the surfing and soccer trophies in his room. He's just not celebrated as Conrad is. Conrad takes centre stage and it is given Jeremiah is less loved to Conrad.
It seems you and Brian are just feeding each other's echo chamber at this point, which is probably why he likes everyother comment instead of actually having the capacity to respond to the glaring logic flaws I have pointed out.
Furthermore, I am actually glad Jeremiah ends up with Denise. They clearly emerge as the actual power couple compared to Bonrad. Conrad and Belly end up exactly like Tom and Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby—trapped in a toxic, wealthy, regressive illusion of their own making—and the show heavily hints at this parallelism when it literally uses that movie as an easter egg.
Reading through your response alongside Elise’s comment highlights exactly where the analysis—and the broader fan response—veers into a deeply "Bonrad-biased" territory that sanitizes the narrative to protect Conrad and Belly at Jeremiah’s expense.
First, Elise’s defense of the central pairing relies on minimizing Susannah’s interference, framing Belly and Conrad's love as an "unknowable," organic chicken-and-egg cycle. This completely lets Susannah off the hook for grooming this relationship and programming it as a family expectation. This dynamic isn't hidden or "unknowable" to the characters either, considering Conrad explicitly verbalizes it by telling Belly, "I don't love you because my mom said we should marry when we were 6."
Worse, the commentary completely pathologizes Jeremiah’s relationship with Belly.
To argue that their bond is fueled by Belly's "self-hatred," "shame," and a "condescending responsibility"—or that she is merely "shrinking herself" to "mother" him—strips Jeremiah of being a valid, loved romantic choice. It reduces his entire romance into a mere symptom of Belly’s psychological guilt.
Elise openly admits she accepts your analysis of Conrad because he fits the "melodrama framework" and gets a grand "redemption".
Meanwhile, Jeremiah is reduced to the narrative "loser" whose happy ending is just "finding solace" at the house without Belly. It essentially argues that his ultimate character growth is realizing he can exist without the girl who was always meant for his brother.
You rightly point out in your reply that his optimistic ending with his father is actually predicated on a lie.
God forbid a boy simply experience the agonizingly common plight of unrequited love—loving the girl who spent her life looking at his brother, harboring the desperate, fragile hope that one day she might finally see him. By pathologizing his longing as pure Oedipal hunger or a vehicle for Belly's guilt, this framework strips Jeremiah of his basic dignity.
Jeremiah is human, real, and consistently shows up for her. He had to mature incredibly fast under the brutal weight of staying behind to watch his mother wither away, all while Conrad was safely away at college, unloading his dump on Belly on cold winters floor and baggage using her as a emotional crutch or fulfill his dying mother's wish, when in S2x02, he tells Belly, "you don't know how happy my MOM is, now that you're my girlfriend."
Jeremiah uses actual words of affirmation and doesn't see her as a possession when he tells her, "I'm yours" (not you're mine) unlike Conrad that says "You're it for ME, Belly". He's only ever looking out for himself.
Jeremiah never berates or demeans her. In Season 1, when Jeremiah senses her discomfort with the elitism and pretentiousness of the debutante ball, he actively breaks into a hip-hop song to ground her and ease her anxiety.
Instead of dealing with this reality, the narrative is forced to deliberately manufacture Jeremiah’s flaws just to prop Conrad up. The entire Lacey ordeal is pure, sinister writing. You cannot logically tell me that a guy who was profoundly betrayed at 16 by the girl he longed for—who dumped him for his own brother—would years later just go and sleep with Lacey the very next week after a breakup, even if they were technically apart. It is a manufactured plot device intended to demean his character and prop Conrad in comparison.
Even in the wedding planning arc, Jeremiah steps up, gets a job to provide for her, and catches literal accounting errors—yet the script absurdly insists he simultaneously doesn't understand how credit cards work.
Meanwhile, Conrad is canonized for his four years of arbitrary abstinence, a supposed display of "intensity" that is completely absent from his actual behavior in the previous seasons. He remained abstinent not out of some profound, untouchable grief, but because he implicitly knew he would eventually be rewarded for his performative penance. 😈
If the show actually wanted to justify Belly’s ultimate choice, it should have committed to making Jeremiah emotionally abusive, berating her in front of his friends, or treating her with utter contempt.
Jeremiah should have ended up a cliché—a spoiled brat in a frat house wasting away his father's money.
Instead, Jeremiah has his shit together—is independent of "daddy's moneyy" and is a passionate level-headed chef, which makes you question Belly's choices entirely.
He doesn't remain the "mutton-headed" brother from Moonstruck.
But it is Conrad buying the direct flight to Paris out of "daddy's money" and Belly learning to do her own laundry. Stupidly enough, they both walk by the Sienne river in Paris and absolve each other of the hurt they've caused Jeremiah.
The storytelling refuses to let these characters' actions have authentic weight, rewriting Jeremiah's unrequited love as a psychological malfunction doesn't uncover hidden depth—it simply sanitizes the narrative's structural flaws.
Ultimately, forcing a Conrad-endgame completely goes against the very premise of the text. The show is called The Summer I Turned Pretty, yet if Conrad always loved Belly and Belly always loved Conrad, what were we breaking stones in the sun for? Shoving her back to Conrad completely violates her character arc because her deepest psychological insecurities started with him.
She spent her childhood feeling fundamentally "unpretty" and lesser-than, repeating the belief that "Conrad would never feel for me what I feel for him." He was the golden child, the unattainable prize.
Instead of growth, the narrative just demands she make peace with her own regression because she has brown eyes and brown hair and will simply always love Conrad Fisher.
Worse, the writing refuses to give Belly any real personality, ambition, or intellect beside her obsession for Conrad. It's an incredibly bad look for a main character when a sharp, brainy straight-shooter like Denise can arrive as a late-stage addition and completely eats Belly up. It's not quite the ending one wants.
In the meanwhile, you may want to read some of my own dumbed-down pieces on TSITP for a bit of insight. It may help with the other parts of your essay.
I think there is a fundamental contradiction in your analysis between arguing that Belly and Conrad choosing to be together is "the loop of the infinity pendant closes because the text's structural unconscious demands it" and "forcing a Conrad-endgame completely goes against the very premise of the text." Does it necessarily loop back to Belly and Conrad or is it unnatural and forced for it to circle back to Belly and Conrad? It cannot be both.
You also seem to just be, fundamentally, negative towards the concept of melodrama. Your comments betray a deep hostility towards the premises of it that I think impede your appreciation of the narrative and of Brian's thoughtful analysis. You're putting too much moral weight on it, describing it as "archaic" and "a bad look." It feels as though you have a very puritanical idea of what themes should be explored in fiction and resent that this story engages with ones you do not like.
There is no contradiction here—you are confusing a script's internal mechanics with authentic narrative growth.
When I say the loop closes because the text's structural unconscious demands it, I am pointing out that the show operates on a rigid blueprint designed from day one to force a Conrad endgame. However, that endgame can simultaneously be unnatural and forced because the actual character arcs—specifically Belly’s deep-seated insecurities rooted in Conrad making her feel "unpretty"—completely contradict that destination. The writers are forcing a round peg into a square hole to satisfy a prophecy, which is precisely why it feels unearned.
As for my supposed "hostility" toward melodrama, pointing out that a narrative lacks a basic "action has consequences" framework isn’t being puritanical—it’s basic storytelling critique. Classic melodrama (think Douglas Sirk) works precisely because the choices characters make carry immense, agonizing social and psychological weight. The show wants the high-stakes drama of a girl shuffling between the beds of two grieving brothers, but it refuses to let her face any actual social fallout or grinding reality for it. It wants the aesthetic of melodrama with the consequence-free lightness of pure teenage wish-fulfillment.
Calling a poorly written protagonist out for lacking ambition or personality isn't putting "moral weight" on fiction. It’s simply refusing to mistake lazy character development for deep, untouchable art.
I find what you said about the term "soulmates" hiding the incestuous undertones of the protagonists' relationship fascinating; in German and Italian the word for soulmate can be translaged as soul relation/soul sibling.
making a substack account to tell you i am very grateful that you published this, i find it very compelling and thoughtful. I don’t agree with you about anora being mélo but that’s okay. Looking forward to reading the next few parts
and in reading the comments i am realizing i would love to hear more of your thoughts and others’ on belly’s motives—i am less compelled by the argument that she is interested in fulfilling a maternal role for them both than that the fisher boys are in seeking maternal love or validation through belly, just because i think it’s a lot less clear what belly’s motives are in general. i did not finish the series (got halfway through season 2 & didn’t read the books), which i think is partially because i felt there was a big gap between how fleshed out i found belly as a character vs Conrad or Jeremiah which kind of left me cold—which makes sense to me given the nature of the romance, conrad and jeremiah get to have distinct and clear character traits and motivations so that the viewer can share in the pleasure of attraction to/discovery of/choice between them where belly is positioned as a point of identification for the viewer, whose wants and feelings need to remain a little opaque so that she can be co opted by the audience? Which makes me want to read more about romance and self insertion, which I haven’t thought about much before. Thanks again for posting!!
In the triad, Belly functions the closest to the Id. Hence, "Belly" (= appetite). I should clarify btw, that like all good psychoanalytic subtext, it would be far too crude to identify any one character with any one aspect, exclusively -- after all, Freud himself makes clear that the tripartite model includes substantial interpenetration between superego-ego-id. Nevertheless, the connection exists.
It's in the nature of Id to be amorphous and unconstructed
really really great. can’t say how much i appreciate the even keel when talking about incest. every conversation around it seems to centre disgust in a way that i find cruel and juvenile. excited for part two 🙏
This is a beautifully woven tapestry, Brian, but I find myself experiencing a cold chill of disagreement precisely where your "glass wall" feels most transparent.I must concede your primary victory: Belly’s ultimate capitulation to Conrad in Paris is indeed a submission to Susannah’s archaic prophecy rather than a triumph of free will. The loop of the infinity pendant closes because the text’s structural unconscious demands it.
However, your grand architecture evades a much more pedestrian reality: the sheer, visceral "ick" of dating two brothers. The show makes no earnest effort to give Belly the actual, grinding reality of that choice. It treats the social and psychological fallout of shuffling between fraternal beds with a consequence-free lightness that belongs strictly to teenage wish-fulfillment, lacking the punitive weight of true melodramatic irony. Actions simply do not have structural consequences here.
Season Two is the singular saving grace because the intrusion of real grief temporarily forces an encounter with the "Real," but the rest of the enterprise remains firmly tethered to fantasy.
Furthermore, reducing Jeremiah’s entire romance to a mechanical quest for a "maternal substitute" strips the character of any basic dignity.
God forbid a boy simply experience the agonizingly common plight of unrequited love—loving the girl who loved his brother, hoping she might finally see him. By pathologizing his longing as pure Oedipal hunger, you miss the genuine human tragedy of his position.To spin an exhaustive, psychoanalytic framework out of The Summer I Turned Pretty is an elegant exercise, but we are giving monumental meaning to a show that is ultimately pure wish-fulfillment.
If we are to take this text as a peak of contemporary visual culture, it would leave the writers of The Good Doctor quaking in the corner at the sheer gravity of their own unrecognized genius. Let us not be entirely ridiculous.
You do realize how central wish-fulfillment is to the entire edifice of psychoanalytic theory right? A narrative being built out of wish fulfillment isn't a kind of shallower alternative to a text truly amenable to psychoanalytic readings; if anything, it's a precondition. And arguably, melodrama as a genre, as a defining feature separating it from other genres, is built on the skillful manipulation of audience wish fulfillment as the raw material for weaving art
I can't believe this was free to read 👏👏👏
This was a very interesting analysis. I'm an admitted big fan of the show, so maybe I'm a little too defensive of it, but I do have some disagreements with your analysis, perhaps to justify my own personal preferences.
Most importantly, I think the premise that Susannah immediately preferred Conrad for Belly and that is inextricable to their feelings is a little too absolute in this analysis. I think that they grapple with that, but it's ultimately ambiguous. It's a chicken and egg cycle, Belly's affinity for Conrad propels Susannah's encouragement of that connection which then propels Belly's affinity and on and on. There's no clear beginning, they've always known each other. I think the question of if the only reason they love each other is Susannah is unknowable, and they have to live with that, and that frames Belly's final decision less as a regression to her child self but more as a final step of growth and acceptance, not just of herself and her feelings, but also the general ambiguity of life and the linear experience of time. As Laurel says, no one knows what Susannah would have wanted (S3E4).
I also don't think the writers intend for it to seem that Belly lacks free will. She can't know if they'd feel that way without Susannah dying or without Susannah's meddling, but they do still feel that way. After all, Belly did send him away in the first place, she did get on the plane to Paris, she did reject him on the beach, she did choose Jeremiah at the motel before Conrad took back his feelings, etc. Those were all instances where she felt she had to do that: she would hurt Jeremiah, she would hurt their family(ies), she would shame herself again. In her final selection of Conrad, it's despite those risks rather than fearing them. That's its own form of rejecting expectations when Susannah did also endow Belly with the responsibility of maintaining the magic of Cousins. She can't control her feelings, but she is still choosing to take the selfish step of letting herself wholly embrace the part of herself that loves Conrad for the first time.
In contrast, Belly and Jeremiah's relationship is more explicitly about Susannah. The line about Susannah wanting her to end up with one of her boys immediately precedes Belly's first kiss with Jeremiah. Belly and Jeremiah cite Susannah to justify their nuptials and Belly uses Susannah to justify to herself a large wedding at the country club that Belly naturally is not enthusiastic about. Belly also references promising to herself that after Susannah died she promised to herself she'd never abandon Jeremiah, a promise she keeps to more intently than the promise she made to Susannah herself regarding Conrad — although interestingly that moment was interrupted by Jeremiah. It's never explicitly addressed but it feels as though that is another memory where she's replaced Conrad with Jeremiah, considering all she does for Conrad is help save the house and then study for an exam then begins dating his brother and does not really speak to him for 4 years.
The writers perhaps avoided explicitly identifying Belly's promise as another replaced memory, like the dog one, because they don't intend for the ending to be focused on them being bound by the promises made to Susannah. Conrad only vaguely refers to promises made — lacking knowledge of the promises Belly made to both Susannah and Jeremiah — in expressing no one would hold her to them, or at least he wouldn't. While you're free to disagree, and it's maybe more fun or makes the series more interesting, I do think the writers are using melodrama and gothic elements as a device for what is still ultimately a contemporary young adult story, with optimism in the ending and some modern liberal feminist sensibilities.
Jeremiah does find solace at the cursed house, finally realizing how much love he does have surrounding him in the absence of Belly. Conrad does grow in allowing himself to be selfishly honest and in consistently asserting it via letters following the wedding. Belly does get to go off on her own and let go of her guilt about everything that happened and finally gets to a point of self-acceptance. Instead of regressing to her child self, she's accepting that part of herself she's suppressed and hated and rejected for years. Yes, childhood is still a basis for her love and connection to Conrad, but I don't feel as though it's intended as a regression, although I can see why people feel that way.
I also disagree with the assessment of Belly's character as only selfishly seeking the validation of the brothers. To me, her relationship with Jeremiah is fueled by a self hatred and condescending responsibility towards Jeremiah that in many ways mirrors Conrad's. She feels deep shame for how she acted at the funeral and abandoning Jeremiah for someone who ultimately withdrew from her (as Jeremiah jealously predicted and then gloated about, in his dejected state). Yes, she does crave the easy attention Jeremiah can offer at that moment, but she also shrinks herself and sacrifices things she wants to prop Jeremiah up. Notably, this includes her more longstanding and intense attraction to Conrad.
She does also love the validation of mothering Jeremiah, but I attribute that to her wanting to have done that for Conrad in their relationship and him being unwilling to burden her in that way, which resulted in the end of their relationship. She was ill equipped to support Conrad because of her own suppression of what was happening to Susannah, as you describe so well, but I do think she wanted to be there for Conrad in an abstract sense. And, as you describe, he was at that time incapable of that because of his own obsessive thinking and well intentioned condescension towards Belly.
Overall, I think perhaps I'm arguing against myself and giving ammo to the people who might classify the show as slop, but I do think it's a little more sincere and optimistic than this analysis makes it out to be, at least in intention. It's not fully diving into Gothic melodrama, but rather hinting and nudging at it. Teasing you with it. Because rather than being condemned to a life with no sense of self because he lost Belly, Jeremiah's ending is actually a path towards actually finding it. And the story confers Belly and Conrad's love for each other a sort of special status, where their lives in their respective exiles were mostly, almost wholly, fulfilling, even without that intense romantic love that they only really have with each other. Coming back together is more the total fulfillment of their dreams (even if they can't ever know the provenance of said dreams) than a surrender to the decree of Susannah or facing a lifetime of abject misery.
That being said, this is a great essay and I really enjoyed reading it. The story absolutely does craft a pseudo-incestuous dynamic incredibly while subverting the natural aversion to it. And I think you nailed the dynamic between the brothers. I especially loved your analysis of the different relationships their characters have with violence. Of any of the characters, I have the fewest quibbles with your analysis of Conrad, and that's perhaps why the audience tends to find him the most compelling. He fits the melodrama framework so well, with his tendency towards martyrdom, the inevitability of his downfall because of his obsessive thoughts and, and his ultimate redemption through honesty. I think the writers soften the edges of Belly (as they're protective of her as the protagonist and, as a female driven writers room, the female character between two male characters) and Jeremiah (since he's the "loser") and shied away from fully leaning into the real melodrama of it all, for better or worse.
Sorry for the entire essay — much less elegant and eloquent than yours — in the comments! I'll absolutely be revisiting this. I devoured it. Thank you for sharing!
Thank you so much for the extremely kind words, and moreover for leaving such a thoughtful, considered, compelling reply. Forgive me if my own is a bit laconic by comparison—it is not meant to diminish your considerations, my brain is just frazzled because it’s late at night and I’ve been writing all week.
I certainly agree that, for Belly and for Conrad alike, the question of whether their love for each other sprung from Susannah’s expectations is essentially “unknowable,” insofar as it originates from a totally protean time in their lives in which causes and effects are at their most ambiguous. And in order to accept themselves and each other, they have to accept the doubt that comes with that unknowability. “They can’t ever know the provenance of their dreams” is such a beautiful and accurate way of putting it—that’s precisely right. But I do think the viewer has been placed in a position to understand that provenance—the show traces it out in such detail—and, for me, it does inevitably arrive at Susannah. The language of conspiracy may be somewhat too strong in my essay, though the deathbed promises, at the very least, are quite conspiratorial. Her hopes do not necessarily constitute anything so definite as a “plan,” but they are so profoundly embraided with the protagonists’ experience of their childhood, and they do seem to shape more or less everything that happens (all of the characters’ decisions, including decisions that run counter to her expectations, are made in relation to them). And I really think it unfolds in such a logical manner, especially with regard to the mirroring of parental and child relationships. I know this probably isn’t a satisfactory rejoinder. All I mean to say is I think their not-knowing is at odds with the viewer’s knowing (hence irony).
I admit that I cannot help but think of Belly’s choice at the end as a kind of non-choice, given that it involves surrender to a drive she herself describes as inflexible, permanent, and opposed to a great many of her conscious decisions. Which is not to say that her suppression/shame of the drive doesn’t cause her an enormous amount of suffering, so I do think the ending is optimistic in that sense. There is a self-acceptance—I just don’t think the “self” is extricable from the ideological chain it's linked in. (You’re right, also, that the two consciously unbind themselves from Susannah’s promises—only to fulfill the pattern the promises were designed to produce.)
I completely agree with you with regard to Jeremiah’s relationship to Belly; very insightful comment about the promise substitution. The reasons I disagree about his optimistic ending are a) I just don’t think the romance with Denise is very persuasive, just literally on a script level, even though I see her function b) the love he receives from his father, which I would argue is the decisive factor in the solace he finally finds, is predicated upon a lie. Perhaps the fact that Adam is now willing to tell this lie is demonstrative of his love, but it does form part of the ending’s irony, for me.
In writing the essay, I found Belly herself to be the most complex and contradictory figure to deal with, and I can admit that I drastically underrated the role of shame in her actions. You quite surpass me on this point. I do want to clarify that I don’t only think she’s selfish—I think fear is a big motivator too, and I would place greater importance on that (I oughtn’t to have lead with the narcissism)—but absolutely, guilt determines much more of her behavior than I have accounted for here. If I were to revise this essay I would try to be significantly more attentive to that.
Thank you for the kind words re: violence and martyrdom—they are favorite topics of mine, so I am glad those passages landed!
Your words have really given me a great deal to chew on and I’m extremely grateful that my writing has received such generous consideration. And thank you again for the kind words. I will conclude just by saying that I don’t think what you’re describing is “slop” at all, even if it isn’t quite my picture of the show; and it certainly isn’t my intention to somehow marshal the series out of being “slop” by territorializing it as Gothic melodrama, or by claiming that it’s somehow cynical/insincere/not what it appears to be etc.—quite the opposite!). It’s a beautiful series.
Thank you for your thoughtful reply! I suppose I still just disagree on the viewer having any clearer of an understanding on the origination of Belly's specific affection for Conrad over Jeremiah than Belly and Conrad and Jeremiah. I think, perhaps, it is caught up in your more tragic perception of Jeremiah's character. He was not esteemed as much by his parents, so of course he was never who Susannah was thinking of, that could only be Conrad. I can certainly see why people perceive it that way. But I feel as though that, like Jeremiah himself, it fails to see Jeremiah's own irony — that he's beloved by his family in ways he cannot see because he is too clouded by his insecurities.
His ending is optimistic, to me, not because of the romantic relationship with Denise exactly, but in the framing of the appreciation of the group. Even if the romance itself between Denise and Jeremiah is unconvincing, she is demonstratively an excellent friend to him. She hosts Jeremiah for months at her apartment, she goes above and beyond to help facilitate his event, and she gives him multiple pep talks. This is despite an initial judgement that he was unserious and entitled. Denise grows to appreciate his qualities and is willing to put herself out on his behalf — that's love, even if the romance between them doesn't work out (which I agree the show makes it seem likely that it won't — i just think that's part of the point).
He's also able to appreciate the love in people choosing to show up for him: Steven and Taylor and Laurel and Adam. They may be imperfect stewards of it, but it is love nonetheless, and he also starts showing some true love for himself in that sequence that does not make the imperfections of the love of others so debilitating for him anymore. That, after insisting Belly was his entire world and he needed to be her entire world also, is optimistic. That's where the show's "modern liberal feminist sensibilities" as I worded it come in — a true gothic melodrama would lean into that, but TSITP pumps the brakes.
Circling back to the overall point on the childhood dynamic where Belly's feelings for Conrad formed, I think Jeremiah is both Julia, dejected and stewing, but also Susannah, naturally sunny and adept at deliberately not talking about things to maintain the pleasant facade for selfish purposes. His lack of communication regarding his knowledge of Christmas in season 3 mirrors Susannah's regarding her imminent demise in season 1. Susannah and Conrad's deathbed discussion also highlights the esteem she has always carried for Jeremiah: when Conrad was born she found him perfect and totally beautiful, only to realize she was delusional when she saw the photos— but Jeremiah was, truly, born beautiful, and Susannah values that. Jeremiah grows up feeling he's only seen as lacking in comparison to Conrad, but that is not true. His parents do value traits of his over Conrad's, especially Susannah and not the interloper father — Adam whose opinion is discarded within the confines of Cousins anyway — even if they are not openly expressed. Conrad's anxious reluctance and obsessive sense of duty and doing the right thing would be happily traded for Jeremiah's eagerness to please.
The intense pressure placed on Conrad to fulfill the paternalistic role towards Jeremiah in many ways is a pressure that would make Jeremiah perfect for Belly, two sunny, happy people, biddable and capable of pure recreating the magic of Cousins, on the back of the work of an unappreciated Conrad. He's fixing up the house for Belly and Jeremiah and their friends to have the seamless fantasy, while dumping on him for intruding and disrupting that which only exists because of him in the first place. Yes, Susannah spins this in a fantastical magic sort of way, framing Conrad as a prince charming, but it also constructs Conrad as the human dumping ground of any complaint or quibble, which might push Belly towards Jeremiah, who is allowed to remain light and carefree in comparison.
So all that is to say I do not think the show adequately answers the question of why Belly preferred Conrad growing up to the point where it is wholly ironic for the audience to know definitively that it is Susannah— especially not in intention. I think the show intends to explore the nature vs nurture of it all and ultimately ends up with the (perhaps cop out) answer that it's a bit of both. You can never extricate Belly's feelings from the way they were socialized, even predating Belly's birth since she's the youngest. But there's also part of it, like her brown hair and brown eyes, that was just an accident of fate. A chromosome or two lines up differently and she is a person who would be drawn more to Jeremiah, or a person who can't stand the idea of either of them, despite the way they were raised. She was able to make those choices for a time, so some of the ingredients were there.
That determinism coming not just from socialization I think does validate your interpretation that her choice at the end is a surrender to the drive. I agree that in many ways it is. I suppose I just chafe against the implication that the choice of self acceptance and love is less free will than choosing to repress oneself would be in describing it as a "non-choice." But I actually don't think we disagree much on that.
Sorry again for the essay in the comments and please don't feel any pressure to reply in kind! I am anxious to read the next parts of your essay! As is probably evident by my lengthy comments, I could read multiple books on this show.
Where in the world is Conrad the "human dumping ground"? Even when he is struggling, everyone around him can clearly see he is not emotionally okay—it is written all over his face. He isn't a dumping ground; he is dealing with his mother's illness by keeping it a secret and acting like a broody, passive-aggressive martyr. Sussanah's illness is the excuse for all of Conrad’s emotional disregulation. So where is the broodiness coming from besides the other instance of Adam's infidelity.
If anyone is the actual emotional dumping ground and regulator of that house, it is Jeremiah. The show explicitly makes this point when his own mother acknowledges it, telling him, "You never let anyone see you hurting." Jeremiah openly states that nobody really sees him. He even tells Conrad that he doesn't want to pretend to be happy when he's not.
Even the books back this up, with Belly explicitly noting that Jeremiah had to be the emotional regulator of the house because Conrad’s volatile emotions dictated the entire household. This is evidence over interpretation.
Conrad isn't some helpless victim with no exit; he has a massive support system waiting on him hand and foot. Belly is constantly wants to cater to him, Steven is giving him advice to be "zen," and Laurel is coddling him with "you're my special guy." Not to mention that Adam favours Conrad and Jeremiah is overlooked.
You can't call Jeremiah a victim of his own doing when infact he has been "overlooked".
He's not less competent as is evident by the surfing and soccer trophies in his room. He's just not celebrated as Conrad is. Conrad takes centre stage and it is given Jeremiah is less loved to Conrad.
It seems you and Brian are just feeding each other's echo chamber at this point, which is probably why he likes everyother comment instead of actually having the capacity to respond to the glaring logic flaws I have pointed out.
Furthermore, I am actually glad Jeremiah ends up with Denise. They clearly emerge as the actual power couple compared to Bonrad. Conrad and Belly end up exactly like Tom and Daisy Buchanan from The Great Gatsby—trapped in a toxic, wealthy, regressive illusion of their own making—and the show heavily hints at this parallelism when it literally uses that movie as an easter egg.
Reading through your response alongside Elise’s comment highlights exactly where the analysis—and the broader fan response—veers into a deeply "Bonrad-biased" territory that sanitizes the narrative to protect Conrad and Belly at Jeremiah’s expense.
First, Elise’s defense of the central pairing relies on minimizing Susannah’s interference, framing Belly and Conrad's love as an "unknowable," organic chicken-and-egg cycle. This completely lets Susannah off the hook for grooming this relationship and programming it as a family expectation. This dynamic isn't hidden or "unknowable" to the characters either, considering Conrad explicitly verbalizes it by telling Belly, "I don't love you because my mom said we should marry when we were 6."
Worse, the commentary completely pathologizes Jeremiah’s relationship with Belly.
To argue that their bond is fueled by Belly's "self-hatred," "shame," and a "condescending responsibility"—or that she is merely "shrinking herself" to "mother" him—strips Jeremiah of being a valid, loved romantic choice. It reduces his entire romance into a mere symptom of Belly’s psychological guilt.
Elise openly admits she accepts your analysis of Conrad because he fits the "melodrama framework" and gets a grand "redemption".
Meanwhile, Jeremiah is reduced to the narrative "loser" whose happy ending is just "finding solace" at the house without Belly. It essentially argues that his ultimate character growth is realizing he can exist without the girl who was always meant for his brother.
You rightly point out in your reply that his optimistic ending with his father is actually predicated on a lie.
God forbid a boy simply experience the agonizingly common plight of unrequited love—loving the girl who spent her life looking at his brother, harboring the desperate, fragile hope that one day she might finally see him. By pathologizing his longing as pure Oedipal hunger or a vehicle for Belly's guilt, this framework strips Jeremiah of his basic dignity.
Jeremiah is human, real, and consistently shows up for her. He had to mature incredibly fast under the brutal weight of staying behind to watch his mother wither away, all while Conrad was safely away at college, unloading his dump on Belly on cold winters floor and baggage using her as a emotional crutch or fulfill his dying mother's wish, when in S2x02, he tells Belly, "you don't know how happy my MOM is, now that you're my girlfriend."
Jeremiah uses actual words of affirmation and doesn't see her as a possession when he tells her, "I'm yours" (not you're mine) unlike Conrad that says "You're it for ME, Belly". He's only ever looking out for himself.
Jeremiah never berates or demeans her. In Season 1, when Jeremiah senses her discomfort with the elitism and pretentiousness of the debutante ball, he actively breaks into a hip-hop song to ground her and ease her anxiety.
Instead of dealing with this reality, the narrative is forced to deliberately manufacture Jeremiah’s flaws just to prop Conrad up. The entire Lacey ordeal is pure, sinister writing. You cannot logically tell me that a guy who was profoundly betrayed at 16 by the girl he longed for—who dumped him for his own brother—would years later just go and sleep with Lacey the very next week after a breakup, even if they were technically apart. It is a manufactured plot device intended to demean his character and prop Conrad in comparison.
Even in the wedding planning arc, Jeremiah steps up, gets a job to provide for her, and catches literal accounting errors—yet the script absurdly insists he simultaneously doesn't understand how credit cards work.
Meanwhile, Conrad is canonized for his four years of arbitrary abstinence, a supposed display of "intensity" that is completely absent from his actual behavior in the previous seasons. He remained abstinent not out of some profound, untouchable grief, but because he implicitly knew he would eventually be rewarded for his performative penance. 😈
If the show actually wanted to justify Belly’s ultimate choice, it should have committed to making Jeremiah emotionally abusive, berating her in front of his friends, or treating her with utter contempt.
Jeremiah should have ended up a cliché—a spoiled brat in a frat house wasting away his father's money.
Instead, Jeremiah has his shit together—is independent of "daddy's moneyy" and is a passionate level-headed chef, which makes you question Belly's choices entirely.
He doesn't remain the "mutton-headed" brother from Moonstruck.
But it is Conrad buying the direct flight to Paris out of "daddy's money" and Belly learning to do her own laundry. Stupidly enough, they both walk by the Sienne river in Paris and absolve each other of the hurt they've caused Jeremiah.
The storytelling refuses to let these characters' actions have authentic weight, rewriting Jeremiah's unrequited love as a psychological malfunction doesn't uncover hidden depth—it simply sanitizes the narrative's structural flaws.
Ultimately, forcing a Conrad-endgame completely goes against the very premise of the text. The show is called The Summer I Turned Pretty, yet if Conrad always loved Belly and Belly always loved Conrad, what were we breaking stones in the sun for? Shoving her back to Conrad completely violates her character arc because her deepest psychological insecurities started with him.
She spent her childhood feeling fundamentally "unpretty" and lesser-than, repeating the belief that "Conrad would never feel for me what I feel for him." He was the golden child, the unattainable prize.
Instead of growth, the narrative just demands she make peace with her own regression because she has brown eyes and brown hair and will simply always love Conrad Fisher.
Worse, the writing refuses to give Belly any real personality, ambition, or intellect beside her obsession for Conrad. It's an incredibly bad look for a main character when a sharp, brainy straight-shooter like Denise can arrive as a late-stage addition and completely eats Belly up. It's not quite the ending one wants.
In the meanwhile, you may want to read some of my own dumbed-down pieces on TSITP for a bit of insight. It may help with the other parts of your essay.
Plugging two of 'em here:
How Susannah’s Letter Clocked Conrad’s Tea! https://abbyblabby.medium.com/the-summer-we-choose-to-love-and-be-loved-not-just-be-in-love-and-be-loved-how-susannahs-e470e610f47d
Belly did not choose Conrad — Jenny Han did. https://abbyblabby.medium.com/belly-did-not-choose-conrad-jenny-han-did-a-masterclass-in-writing-bias-and-manipulation-0e24dacc6264
Belly Conklin's reckoning with her "prettiness" in TSITP is NO reckoning at all! https://abbyblabby.medium.com/the-summer-belly-got-a-man-but-everyone-else-got-an-identity-3fec107763ea
Thank you. looking forward!
I think there is a fundamental contradiction in your analysis between arguing that Belly and Conrad choosing to be together is "the loop of the infinity pendant closes because the text's structural unconscious demands it" and "forcing a Conrad-endgame completely goes against the very premise of the text." Does it necessarily loop back to Belly and Conrad or is it unnatural and forced for it to circle back to Belly and Conrad? It cannot be both.
You also seem to just be, fundamentally, negative towards the concept of melodrama. Your comments betray a deep hostility towards the premises of it that I think impede your appreciation of the narrative and of Brian's thoughtful analysis. You're putting too much moral weight on it, describing it as "archaic" and "a bad look." It feels as though you have a very puritanical idea of what themes should be explored in fiction and resent that this story engages with ones you do not like.
There is no contradiction here—you are confusing a script's internal mechanics with authentic narrative growth.
When I say the loop closes because the text's structural unconscious demands it, I am pointing out that the show operates on a rigid blueprint designed from day one to force a Conrad endgame. However, that endgame can simultaneously be unnatural and forced because the actual character arcs—specifically Belly’s deep-seated insecurities rooted in Conrad making her feel "unpretty"—completely contradict that destination. The writers are forcing a round peg into a square hole to satisfy a prophecy, which is precisely why it feels unearned.
As for my supposed "hostility" toward melodrama, pointing out that a narrative lacks a basic "action has consequences" framework isn’t being puritanical—it’s basic storytelling critique. Classic melodrama (think Douglas Sirk) works precisely because the choices characters make carry immense, agonizing social and psychological weight. The show wants the high-stakes drama of a girl shuffling between the beds of two grieving brothers, but it refuses to let her face any actual social fallout or grinding reality for it. It wants the aesthetic of melodrama with the consequence-free lightness of pure teenage wish-fulfillment.
Calling a poorly written protagonist out for lacking ambition or personality isn't putting "moral weight" on fiction. It’s simply refusing to mistake lazy character development for deep, untouchable art.
I find what you said about the term "soulmates" hiding the incestuous undertones of the protagonists' relationship fascinating; in German and Italian the word for soulmate can be translaged as soul relation/soul sibling.
This is why I have a substack. Essaycraft at its finest. I'm so grateful this crossed my path
making a substack account to tell you i am very grateful that you published this, i find it very compelling and thoughtful. I don’t agree with you about anora being mélo but that’s okay. Looking forward to reading the next few parts
and in reading the comments i am realizing i would love to hear more of your thoughts and others’ on belly’s motives—i am less compelled by the argument that she is interested in fulfilling a maternal role for them both than that the fisher boys are in seeking maternal love or validation through belly, just because i think it’s a lot less clear what belly’s motives are in general. i did not finish the series (got halfway through season 2 & didn’t read the books), which i think is partially because i felt there was a big gap between how fleshed out i found belly as a character vs Conrad or Jeremiah which kind of left me cold—which makes sense to me given the nature of the romance, conrad and jeremiah get to have distinct and clear character traits and motivations so that the viewer can share in the pleasure of attraction to/discovery of/choice between them where belly is positioned as a point of identification for the viewer, whose wants and feelings need to remain a little opaque so that she can be co opted by the audience? Which makes me want to read more about romance and self insertion, which I haven’t thought about much before. Thanks again for posting!!
In the triad, Belly functions the closest to the Id. Hence, "Belly" (= appetite). I should clarify btw, that like all good psychoanalytic subtext, it would be far too crude to identify any one character with any one aspect, exclusively -- after all, Freud himself makes clear that the tripartite model includes substantial interpenetration between superego-ego-id. Nevertheless, the connection exists.
It's in the nature of Id to be amorphous and unconstructed
Fuck yeah man
really really great. can’t say how much i appreciate the even keel when talking about incest. every conversation around it seems to centre disgust in a way that i find cruel and juvenile. excited for part two 🙏
This is a beautifully woven tapestry, Brian, but I find myself experiencing a cold chill of disagreement precisely where your "glass wall" feels most transparent.I must concede your primary victory: Belly’s ultimate capitulation to Conrad in Paris is indeed a submission to Susannah’s archaic prophecy rather than a triumph of free will. The loop of the infinity pendant closes because the text’s structural unconscious demands it.
However, your grand architecture evades a much more pedestrian reality: the sheer, visceral "ick" of dating two brothers. The show makes no earnest effort to give Belly the actual, grinding reality of that choice. It treats the social and psychological fallout of shuffling between fraternal beds with a consequence-free lightness that belongs strictly to teenage wish-fulfillment, lacking the punitive weight of true melodramatic irony. Actions simply do not have structural consequences here.
Season Two is the singular saving grace because the intrusion of real grief temporarily forces an encounter with the "Real," but the rest of the enterprise remains firmly tethered to fantasy.
Furthermore, reducing Jeremiah’s entire romance to a mechanical quest for a "maternal substitute" strips the character of any basic dignity.
God forbid a boy simply experience the agonizingly common plight of unrequited love—loving the girl who loved his brother, hoping she might finally see him. By pathologizing his longing as pure Oedipal hunger, you miss the genuine human tragedy of his position.To spin an exhaustive, psychoanalytic framework out of The Summer I Turned Pretty is an elegant exercise, but we are giving monumental meaning to a show that is ultimately pure wish-fulfillment.
If we are to take this text as a peak of contemporary visual culture, it would leave the writers of The Good Doctor quaking in the corner at the sheer gravity of their own unrecognized genius. Let us not be entirely ridiculous.
You do realize how central wish-fulfillment is to the entire edifice of psychoanalytic theory right? A narrative being built out of wish fulfillment isn't a kind of shallower alternative to a text truly amenable to psychoanalytic readings; if anything, it's a precondition. And arguably, melodrama as a genre, as a defining feature separating it from other genres, is built on the skillful manipulation of audience wish fulfillment as the raw material for weaving art