Conflicted Feelings
Episode 5 of Summer Heat begins with Miguel handing over the mysterious envelope to his dad. Conrado watches all of this take place silently from the window. Meanwhile, Yasmin remains heartbroken over Chai breaking up with her last episode. She leaves numerous voicemails and decides to head out surfing. In doing so, she also ends up growing closer to Miguel too. It looks like we’ve got a love triangle on our hands! This is something made more complicated when Miguel gets changed with Conrado. The latter struggles to stay composed and verbalize how he’s feeling. Eventually he ends up flustered and walks away. Helena ends up spooked on her shift too when she notices a guy called Leo, an old bully from 5th grade, show up. She decides to ditch on her shift and hurries away. However, that night Yasmin ends up telling her Catarina’s secret about the shopping. Diego learns that Marilia is actually the one dealing drugs with Miguel. Diego is not happy and scoffs at the incredulousness of the whole situation. He hands back his house keys to her and refuses to acknowledge her pleas about it being tough to be a single mum. When he walks away, Diego runs into Catarina and reveals everything that’s just transpired. He’s also tellingly silent when the conversation steers across to their possible relationship. Predictably, Helena spills the truth about Catarina’s shopping to the whole gang. Catarina admits the truth about what she’s going through involving her mum, as well as how hard things have been for her. Only, midway through everyone starts to have an adverse reaction to the cleaning products and they’re forced to leave the dorm room. Rodrigo tries to get in Catarina’s good books again and manages to grant her a visit to see her mum in prison. When Catarina shows up, she promises to do everything possible to make her daughter happy. The conversation inevitably turns back around to Rodrigo again, and this sours the whole chat, realizing her mother isn’t ever going to change. Helena, ever the gossip, decides to look after Sofia in order to hide from Leo. She switches shifts with Marilia. In doing so, Helena learns about Marilia selling weed. Given how quickly she spread the news about Catarina, this certainly doesn’t look great for Marilia’s prospects. Just before the night’s big party (I say big, there’s barely a handful of people in this large room) Conrado thanks Miguel and in private, ends up kissing him. He’s taken aback and in the absence of any talking, Conrado grows worried and leaves. Marilia ends up talking to Helena that night, who divulges a secret of her own. It’s here we learn what happened with Leo, who used to tease her and call her Free Willy. She had to have surgery and almost died too, which only makes things worse. This has badly affected her, at least this episode anyway, and as the pair bond, they come to an understanding about what they’ve both been through and how they’re continuing to try and be the best version of themselves. This gives her enough courage to confront Leo and tell him that she’s changed and she’s not the same woman she was all those years ago. More drama ensues that night though as Miguel and Yasmin end up kissing. However, Conrado is also there too. Miguel takes him aside and the pair have a heart to heart. Miguel admits that Conrado is important to him and he’ll always be his friend but for Conrado he obviously wants more than that. In the morning, Maresia sees the state of the hotel – and the other kids – and decides to kick Miguel out. Only, Conrado appears and claims he’s the one responsible for the bazooka and alcohol.
The Episode Review
Summer Heat returns with its longest episode yet and another indication that this show is just pedaling the same storylines we’ve seen so many other times in other shows – but nowhere near as strong. The Conrado subplot is a nice touch, but alongside the love triangles, misunderstandings and the uninteresting weed subplot, it all feels like a murky shade of grey and lacks a real standout hook to keep this one watchable. Some of the characters are quite engaging but it’s all wrapped up in this veil of archetypal blandness that makes it hard to really rally behind Summer Heat. Given we’ve seen Brazil deliver some decent Netflix originals before (like 3%) then this one is a bit of a disappointment.
