This Is What Didn't Work About 'Cruel Summer' Season 2

Publish date: 2024-05-02

Editor's note: The following contains spoilers for Cruel Summer Season 2.

The Big Picture

Freeform’s anthology series Cruel Summer follows the stories of two girls whose lives are woven together by tragic circumstances. In the first season, we met Jeanette Turner (Chiara Aurelia) and Kate Wallis (Olivia Holt), whose lives were forever changed after the latter was kidnapped by their school’s new assistant principal, Martin Harris (Blake Lee). Cruel Summer Season 2 begins years later, across the country in the small coastal town of Chatham, as the arrival of Isabella LaRue (Lexi Underwood) — the well-traveled daughter of diplomats — in the summer of 1999 puts the life of good girl Megan Landry (Sadie Stanley) on a new, horrific, and unsettling path. Isabella's presence eventually leads to the death of Megan's boyfriend Luke (Griffin Gluck) in the winter and the subsequent murder investigation where the local police begin to suspect both girls of the crime when his body is discovered in the summer of 2000. While the story is interesting, it is nowhere on par with the intrigue of the first season and ultimately falls flat because the relationship between Megan and Isabella isn’t believable or enjoyable in the slightest.

Cruel Summer
TV-14

In this anthology series, each season follows a new cast of characters who deal with traumatic events over several timelines, and how those events impact their lives.

Release Date April 20, 2021 Cast Chiara Aurelia , Olivia Holt , Froy Gutierrez , Harley Quinn Smith Seasons 2

The Timeline of ‘Cruel Summer’ Season 2

There are several reasons why the relationship between Megan and Isabella isn’t working in Cruel Summer Season 2, but the timeline and distance between the three narrative arcs is the biggest one. Isabella arrives in the summer of ‘99, eager to build a friendship with Megan. But, it takes a bit of time for Megan to even be nice to Isabella, much less start seeing Isabella as a potential best friend candidate. Yet, just five or six short months later, in December of ‘99, their friendship is suddenly incredibly intense. They are inseparable best friends, feeling as though they are missing pieces of each other’s family — sisters, in fact, as they often call each other.

However, by the summer of 2000, their relationship has completely deteriorated. They avoid each other whenever possible, particularly Megan with Isabella, and they hardly speak despite the fact that Isabella is still living with the Landrys. Ultimately, the issue here is that the story is too fast-paced, and too rushed, to be believable. More time was needed for the girls to flesh out their friendship and grow toward becoming best friends, especially as we aren’t even seeing much of that in the summer of ‘99 arc. Once Megan would even hold a conversation with Isabella, they suddenly became best friends, as we see them in the winter.

Like in the first season of the anthology series, the story should have been broken up to take place over three summers. This would have given us more time to see their friendship blossom while making it more believable that they could feel such intensity towards one another. If, perhaps, something enormous had happened in the summer of ‘99 that brought them together suddenly, it would work better. But, that isn’t the case. Similarly, because their friendship is so rushed, their falling out doesn’t mean much. It’s clearly tied to what happened on New Year’s with Luke, plus the wedge between them caused by the sex tape of Megan and Luke that Isabella took the fall for, but it simply doesn’t matter. There’s not enough weight behind the relationship to make the audience care about what was lost. Plus, the series’ treatment of Isabella doesn’t help either.

Isabella Doesn’t Entirely Feel Like One of the Leading Characters

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With how the story of Cruel Summer Season 2 is presented, the friendship between Megan and Isabella being the focal point also doesn’t work because Isabella doesn’t truly feel like the co-lead of the season. The central friendship and the story as a whole are incredibly imbalanced, leaning toward Megan — how it impacts her, how she feels about what’s going on, and why it matters to her — at every opportunity.

Chatham is her hometown, while Isabella is just a visitor who is supposed to stay for no longer than one year. Practically every character in the show revolves around Megan, so their relationships with Isabella aren’t as impactful when, again, it all falls back to Megan. There’s only a glimpse of one relationship with someone in town that truly matters for Isabella’s growth, which is her apparent friendship with Parker (Lisa Yamada) after her falling out with Megan in the summer of ‘00, but not enough where it makes even the sliver of an impact on the audience.

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'Cruel Summer's Sadie Stanley, Lexi Underwood and Griffin Gluck on Season 2 Twists & Turns

They also talk about the complicated character dynamics between Megan, Isabella and Luke, and reacting to the show's secrets.

Every part of the story impacts Megan more than Isabella, which is the direct consequence of how this season was written because it’s the only realistic way to move forward given that Isabella’s only a visitor. Megan is the prime suspect in Luke’s murder, as she was the one actively dating him at the time of his disappearance. Isabella’s relationship with Luke in the summer of ‘99 just builds to Luke and Megan getting together, which also doesn’t do anything except screw Isabella over. Not enough of the focus on the sex tape being released, and Isabella taking the fall, is devoted to how it impacts Isabella and her new life in Chatham. Sure, there’s a little bit of a story told there, but it’s again primarily about Megan and how it puts her future and reputation at risk.

Megan Doesn’t Deserve Isabella’s Friendship Upon Her Arrival to Chatham

Additionally, it’s hard to buy into this relationship because Megan has so little regard for Isabella as a human being, much less a friend. More often than not, Megan is treating Isabella terribly. She didn’t speak to her much at first, while Isabella devoted too much of her time to making Megan like her and let her in. Once they do become friends, the friendship is all about Megan. Isabella sacrifices everything — a relationship with Luke, her reputation, her own feelings — to make Megan’s life easier, while the same cannot be said on a single occasion for Megan. So, while Isabella’s treatment of Megan enters the “ride or die” territory that the series claims, the why of the situation doesn’t make sense for her. Why is she fighting so hard for Megan? This doesn’t even have an answer, sans a lazy one about Isabella’s mental health, once we learn the entire story.

It Falls Flat Compared to Jeanette and Kate’s Rivalry

What made the story of Season 1's co-protagonists Jeanette and Kate so enticing was that their lives did not entirely overlap throughout the years — 1993, 1994, and 1995 — we followed. Their lives impacted one another’s, which made the mystery about whether Jeanette actually saw Kate while she was imprisoned far more intriguing. And, when their lives did cross over, it made the story and episodes more entertaining. But, as a whole, the characters had their own lives, and their own relationships, and it allowed the mystery and the characters to breathe. We got to know the girls on such a deep level that the reveals were worth the journey in the end. Having Isabella be yet another person caught up in Megan’s life takes away from that experience and hurts the dual perspective the show uses for its narrative, which is what Cruel Summer should be all about.

'Cruel Summer' Ends on a Disappointing Note

The story of Cruel Summer Season 2 eventually leads to an interesting and shocking point in the finale where, believe it or not, we were hoping for another season of Megan and Isabella's exploits to take the spotlight. Unfortunately, though, Cruel Summer has been canceled, as Freeform seemingly steps away from scripted content, meaning this lackluster season and dissatisfying end will be the show's final season and legacy.

The second season tried, and very obviously failed, to live up to the first season's unbelievable story, particularly regarding the twist at the end with the revelation that Jeanette did know Kate was locked in Mr. Harris' basement (just not when Kate accused her of finding out). So, revealing that Isabella was actually responsible for Luke's murder, and the means of doing so, was actually quite intriguing. She shoved his head underwater with her shoe, drowning him as he was too weak to fight back after the events of that night, then proceeded to put on an act for all of Chatham. The reason we were hoping for more of Megan and Isabella was that Megan actually finds out what Isabella did and how Isabella manipulated and lied to her before leaving town; this is completely unlike the first season where Jeanette gets away with what she did and Kate never finds out the truth, allowing both to move on with their lives.

However, the Season 2 finale ends with Megan fueled to seek vengeance as Isabella seemingly begins the process again with a new girl she meets on her plane, potentially setting up events for a much darker tale and a fiercer battle between the two leads. It's actually just a shame that it didn't end after the first season, particularly because the ending was so gripping and enticing that the show would have forever been remembered as a classic and a highlight of the ever-increasing list of limited series. The twist was utterly shocking and will go down in history as one of television's greatest twists. Megan and Isabella's story, on the other hand, will be forgotten.

Cruel Summer is streaming on Hulu in the U.S.

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