Surviving Summer season 2 review: Teen drama keeps it simple

In the second season of Surviving Summer, Summer reunites with her friends in Shorehaven and gets selected for the state team. However, the team captain will do anything to turn everyone against Summer. The second season is now streaming on Netflix. 

Story

Summer returns to Shorehaven a year after the events of the first season. She has realized that surfing is her passion. She now wants to be a surfer, so she comes for the Victoria State Team tryouts.

She has been surfing for the past year, and she has honed her skills to the point that she leaves everyone astounded. None of her friends got selected for the Victoria State Team in their first year of surfing, but Summer manages to do that.

Summer wants to be with Ari, but he has moved on and is now dating someone else. Summer’s talent makes Ari’s new girlfriend, Wren, who is a skilled surfer herself, feel threatened. Wren is ready to do whatever it takes to make Summer lose her friends and Ari. 

Then there are Wren’s siblings, Baxter and Elo. While Baxter and Wren are on the state team, Elo is chosen to coach the team. Baxter starts liking Summer, which complicates matters further.

With Wren bullying Summer and making her life difficult at every step, will Summer be able to follow her passion, or will she give up and go back to New York?

Performances

Sky Katz successfully portrays Summer as a peppy teenager. The audience will not always like her because of the choices that she makes, and perhaps that indicates that Katz did a good job at playing the role.

As high-spirited as Katz is, Kai Lewins, who plays Ari, is just as tame. Unfortunately, the actor fails to make an impression. Annabel Wolfe, on the other hand, gives a convincing performance as Wren, a teenager who knows how to manipulate people and situations.

Josh Macqueen is another new addition to the cast, and his performance is also praiseworthy. The performances by the rest of the cast were not the worst, but they were not great either.

Positives

The surfing competitions add a touch of distinctiveness to the show. Surviving Summer could have been just another uninspiring teenage drama, but the exciting surfing shots and competitions prevent it from becoming that.

All the characters in the show are flawed, but at the same time, none of them are entirely bad. It is understandable why each of them is the way they are, which makes their depiction realistic. 

There are no grand redeeming acts, and that allows the audience to see them as teenagers who make the wrong choices every now and then. Furthermore, the characters’ actions are not always predictable, so their stories keep the audience invested in the show. 

The show tries to make a statement through Bodhi’s subplot in this season. Although it could have been explored more, it somewhat manages to capture the dilemma of speaking out or keeping quiet that any other person who is yet to gain recognition would face in her place.

Negatives

The conflicts in the show are such that they will keep the audience adequately entertained as long as they are not expecting anything more complex than basic teen drama. The show’s plot is simple and nothing extraordinary.

The development of Summer and Ari’s relationship is supposed to be the highlight of the season. However, there is nothing meaningful about their relationship, so the audience never truly cares about what happens to them.

Verdict

Surviving Summer season 2 has impressive surfing scenes that make this show unique. The drama in the show is not bad either. It is a show that the audience can enjoy if they are not expecting anything too intense or intelligent.

---

Also Read: Surviving Summer season 2 summary and ending explained