Amazon tell ‘The Summer I Turned Pretty’ fans to stop abusing cast
Amazon‘s Prime Video have told viewers of their hit show, The Summer I Turned Pretty, to stop abusing cast members on social media.
The hugely successful series is currently in its third and final season. Following the release of the eighth episode, Prime Video have issued a statement to tell viewers to remember that it is a piece of fiction rather than real life.
“The show isn’t real but the people playing the characters are,” the caption for the social media post, made on August 26th, reads. It also contains a graphic which reads, “The summer we started acting normal online.”
On the same day, the official The Summer I Turned Pretty account on X also re-shared a post it published initially in July titled, “PSA for the Summer community”. The message reads: “Cousins is our safe place. Everything good, everything magical. Let’s keep the conversation kind this summer.”
Additionally, author Jenny Han, who wrote the books that the series is based on, posted online a day earlier, “I know fans of the show are passionate and no one has bad intent. But even in jest, posting images of a woman being slapped or choked is not funny.”
Lola Tung, who plays Belly in the series, and her co-star, Gavin Casalegno, who plays Belly’s fiancé Jeremiah, have faced the most abuse out of the castmates. Belly is in a love triangle with Jeremiah and his brother Conrad, with online fans split between Team Conrad and Team Jeremiah.
Caselegno recently opened up about the audience’s opinion on him as a result of his character, telling the New York Times that he’s aware people “tend to dislike him”.
As a result of the backlash, Caselegno no longer checks Instagram, which means, “I really haven’t seen that much hate”. However, he did also say, “I think it’s important to also understand and realise that this is a fictional story – and it’s also not me. I don’t think there’s a single human being in the world who can carry the emotional negativity to the degree that stuff like this happens.”
Tung also said to Teen Vogue last month about the online hate, “People get a little scary about it. Please don’t threaten to kill someone if something doesn’t go your way – I promise you, it’s not that serious.”
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