It’s still spring, but Freeform watch ahead back to a Cruel summer with Tuesday’s two-hour-long premiere of the winding psychological thriller.
The series follows a nostalgic time jump on the storytelling: Episode 1 is told from Jeanette’s point of view on June 21, 1993 (and ’94 and ’95), while Episode 2 flips to Kate’s POV on June 26 during the same try. years. Now that we have established the timelines of the program, we come to the chronological order:
1993 | Jeanette (Tell me your secrets‘Chiara Aurelia) is an awkward teenager with sports props celebrating her birthday with her best friends Mallory (Super girlsee Harley Quinn Smith) and Vince (PEN15‘s Allius Barnes), who gave her a ‘You Go Girl! chain as a last minute gift. Jeanette se ma (Grey’s Anatomysays Sarah Drew) notes that it looks cheap, but it seems to be very important. (More on this later.)
Jeanette sees her beautiful, popular schoolmate Kate (Mantle & daggersays Olivia Holt) at a mall kiosk and pretends to be shopping on the same stand. When Jeanette blurts out that it’s her birthday, Kate is surprisingly sweet and wishes her a happy birthday before dating her hot boyfriend Jamie ()Teen Wolf‘s Froy Gutierrez). After that, Jeanette, Mallory and Vince decide to pick up an item on their summer to-do list, which is more like a compilation of gambles. So they break into a house that Jeanette’s father (Lois & Clark‘s Michael Landes) has just sold to the school’s new principal, Martin Harris (Parks and recreation‘s Blake Lee), who almost caught them. The rush to break the rules seems to get the good girl’s head.
In the second episode, we find out that Kate is dealing with the revelation in the same year that her mother has to keep track of her appearance (Better Off Ted ‘s Andrea Anders) has a relationship. The information sends Kate into a drunken spine, and so she ends up on the sidewalk in front of Martin’s house.
1994 | Jeanette – without wires and now shiny, straight hair – is woken up on her birthday by Jamie, who is now her boyfriend. Kate has been missing for some time, and Jeanette apparently took over the blonde’s life and became besties with Kate’s friends after she was no longer Mallory and Vince. But when Kate is miraculously saved – Martin holds her! – Jeanette’s new life is starting to fall apart. In a shocking moment, Jamie hits Jeanette and thinks she has something to do with Kate’s disappearance. At the end of the first episode, we find out that Kate went on national TV to declare that Jeanette had seen her when she was imprisoned, but she did nothing to help her. “Jeanette Turner, I hope you rot in hell,” Kate says directly into the camera as Garbage’s ‘Stupid Girl’ plays. It’s a ‘snack!’ turn – but that may not be the truth?
In Episode 2, there are rumors about Jeanette, but Kate is not yet on TV with her accusation. (I think. #Timejumpproblems) Jeanette tells Jamie – who’s back with Kate – that she has not seen the other girl and suggests that Kate’s trauma may be responsible for the misunderstanding. Kate spies the secret meeting and kissing the couple. When Kate finally talks to the police, she picks up Jeanette’s “You Go Girl!” necklace to prove that Jeanette was really there. Hmmm… The police then ask how well she knew Martin before the kidnapping. “Not at all,” she replied / lied.
1995 | Jeanette is now the most hated person in the country, and she has the angry, rough hairstyle to go along with it. She obsessively watches the VHS news material about Kate’s disappearance, while Jamie sits like a crawl in his car outside her house. Her father – whose happy marriage has apparently fallen apart over the past two years – wonders if his daughter is a sociopath, and Jeanette’s lawyer advises her to be more friendly.
Meanwhile, Kate is now going over grunge-y plaid and piercings and The Cranberries’ “Zombie” and dropped his filter. She reports to a chat room of the kidnapping victim to ask what will happen if people know she is not completely honest. The question can be answered because Jeanette is suing Kate. While Kate watches the announcement on the news, the episode flashes back to her in a beautiful red dress, slams on Martin’s basement door and begs him to open it. In 1995, Kate breaks out in a jerk.
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