New Prime Video movie The Map That Leads to You is now streaming, and if The Summer I Turned Pretty fans are feeling as bereft about this week’s episode as I am, I couldn’t encourage you to watch it more.
Based on the book of the same name, The Map That Leads to You follows Heather (Madelyn Cline), who decides to travel through Europe with two of her closest friends, where she almost instantly meets Jack (KJ Apa). As the pair spend more time together, their plans dramatically change… as does the course of their lives.
As you might imagine, there’s a hefty dose of will-they-won’t-they romance here. Given neither of our two world travelers are from the place they’ve met in, the call of home is already pulling them in opposite directions (Jack is Australian, Heather is American). On top of this, Jack seems like the biggest commitment-phobe of all time, and it’s not until later that we learn there’s a more sinister reason for why. The result is a push-pull dynamic that both are equally enthralled with and infuriated by, and even objectively, their chemistry is off the charts.
So, what might this remind you of, pray tell? Perhaps Belly (Lola Tung) and Conrad (Christopher Briney) in The Summer I Turned Pretty springs to mind. Season 3 episode 7 has just rubbed salt in Conrad’s wounds of rejection by having his declaration of love rejected during Belly’s bachelorette party. Frankly, it’s the latest installment in a connection that’s driving me up the wall, so here’s why I recommend watching The Map That Leads to You instead this week.
Why I recommend watching The Map That Leads to You instead of The Summer I Turned Pretty season 3 episode 7
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I’m going to preface this by confirming that The Map That Leads to You is far from perfect. It’s sappy, predictable, and equally frustrating in moments that The Summer I Turned Pretty fans will know all too well. But isn’t this all why we love watching these romantic dramas in the first place? It’s a well-known fact that The Summer I Turned Pretty is routinely criticized for being generally terrible, yet it continues to be the most-watched show on Amazon’s streaming service. We love a bit of trash, but there’s a limit.
I’m getting to the stage of thinking that Belly’s dilemma between going ahead with her marriage to Jeremiah (Gavin Casalegno) and doing something about her true feelings for Conrad is being dragged out too long. Week on week, we curse and cry at our TV screens while Belly continues to be insufferably delusional, Conrad rips his own heart in two and Jeremiah doing absolutely nothing of note while getting his own way. We need one of the three to have a breakthrough now, but it’s just not happening.
This is where The Map That Leads to You wipes the floor with any of the episodes we’ve seen so far. Sure, we’re getting the same sort of pushback, but it’s pithy and reassured. Heather is willing to do whatever it takes to get her man (rightly or wrongly), and that means trying to track Jack down while he goes through his own internal crisis. She’s patient, understanding and willing to disrupt the life she’s left waiting back at home for her shot at big-time love. It’s totally the wrong decision, obviously, but it’s an undeniably endearing one.
The fact that it’s a feature film rather than a TV series certainly helps, but we really whip through Heather’s dilemma thanks to reactive, decisive choices she makes at a moment’s notice. She makes sure her friends are okay with her change of plans before she carries them out, she checks in with her dad regularly to let him know the basics, and she’s also trying to keep a handle on how she’s feeling about things while falling for Jack. That’s more emotional intelligence than we’ve ever seen in The Summer I Turned Pretty, and their ages aren’t too dissimilar either (it’s not explicitly mentioned, but I will guess Heather is around 20).
It’s to a weekly episodic format’s advantage to prolong storylines, but I’m going to need Belly to channel her inner Heather sooner rather than later. We’re only four episodes away from the season 3 finale of The Summer I Turned Pretty, and given we’re expecting Belly and Conrad to get together properly (and perhaps even marry, according to the original books), so a lot needs to happen in a short amount of time. Chop chop, people.
In the meantime, I’m going to keep my peace by remembering the satisfaction of The Map That Leads to You‘s lead romance. If anything, the only detail really askew in the new Prime Video movie is the soundtrack not featuring ‘Maps’ by Maroon 5 (with the exact film title featured as a lyric). Come on, we know Jenny Han would have thought of that.
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