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Warning: This post contains spoilers for season 3 of The Summer I Turned Pretty.
Jenny Han has responded to the online reactions to the modest engagement ring Belly received from Jeremiah on The Summer I Turned Pretty.
“I really wanted something that felt modest, humble and sweet, that Belly could maybe stack,” the author, 44, told Variety on Thursday, Aug. 7. “Just thinking of her style, it’s more simple. She’s not about the flashy rings.”
In the show, Jeremiah Fisher (Gavin Casalegno) proposes to Belly Conklin (Lola Tung) without a ring outside of the hospital in which Belly’s brother Steven (Sean Kaufman) is on bed rest following a car accident. Jeremiah later gives Belly an incredibly dainty engagement ring.
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Han added that a large-stone ring for Belly is “not really what she values,” adding, “I think she would be more touched that he picked it out for her, and he knew what she would like.”
When asked about the strong opinions fans had online when the ring was revealed, Han told the outlet, “I think people were going in pretty hard on that ring! I thought it was really sweet.”
The author then revealed that Tung, 22, “liked it” for her character.
Han shook off criticisms of the small ring by also noting that both Belly and Jeremiah are college students on a budget.
“Either way, people weren’t gonna like what he did. It would be ridiculous if he showed up with a two-carat ring. How did you buy that? He can definitely upgrade her in the future, once he’s more settled and making his own money,” Han explained to the outlet.
The Summer I Turned Pretty follows Belly (Tung) as she navigates adolescence, and a love triangle between brothers Jeremiah (Casalegno, 25) and Conrad Fisher (Christopher Briney), who was her first love. The series is based on Han’s novels The Summer I Turned Pretty, It’s Not Without You and We’ll Always Have Summer, published between 2009 and 2011.
Han made her directorial debut with the fifth episode of season 3, and included the eye-catching book-to-screen adaptation of what fans online have dubbed “the peach scene.”
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In the scene, Conrad lovingly yet begrudgingly drives Belly to several different wedding planning stops as she prepares to wed his brother. Before heading back to the beach house, the pair stops to grab a snack – only Belly wants to stop at a peach stand, and Conrad is allergic to the fruit. Still, he wipes Belly’s mouth with his t-shirt.
“I wanted it to feel different. I wanted the episode to really feel that we were looking at Belly through Conrad’s eyes, seeing everything from Conrad’s point of view. So normally, the show defaults to Belly’s point of view,” Han said of her directing choices.
New episodes of The Summer I Turned Pretty drop on Prime Video every Wednesday at 3 a.m. ET/midnight PT.
