General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Surviving Summer

Surviving Summer is an Australian teen surfing drama series produced for Netflix, following rebellious Brooklyn teenager Summer Torres after she is sent to live with family friends in the small town of Shorehaven on Victoria's Great Ocean Road, where she falls in love with surfing and the local surf community.¹ The first season premiered on Netflix on June 3, 2022, and a second season followed in September 2023.¹^•² Netflix canceled the series in February 2025, leaving it at two seasons and a total of 18 half-hour episodes.²^•³

Key fact	Detail
Format	Australian teen drama about competitive surfing; TV rating TV-PG, rated age 10+ by Common Sense Media¹
Seasons	Season 1 premiered June 3, 2022 (10 episodes); Season 2 premiered September 15, 2023 (8 episodes)¹^•⁴
Total length	18 episodes of 30 minutes each, completed in 2023³
Creators	Joanna Werner and Josh Mapleston; produced by Werner Film Productions²^•³^•¹⁴
Lead cast	Sky Katz as Summer Torres, Kai Lewins as Ari Gibson, Lilliana Bowrey as Poppy Tetanui, Savannah La Rain as Bodhi Mercer, João Gabriel Marinho as Marlon Sousa⁵
Early performance	Season 1 debuted in Netflix's Top 10 in 43 countries with 20.3 million hours viewed in its first week⁶
Cancellation	Netflix confirmed no third season in February 2025 after season 2 viewership dropped from 4.6M to 2.1M views²

Spoilers

Premise and story

Season 1 follows Summer Torres, a problem child from New York who has been expelled from private school for the second time. With her mother Margot about to leave for work in the Middle East and no other school willing to take her, Summer is sent to live with the Gibsons, family friends in Shorehaven, Victoria, whom she has not seen since she was little.⁷ She initially resists the town, where, as her new host sister puts it, surfing is "all anyone talks about," but she comes to love the place, the people, and the waves.⁸^•¹ At the center of her new circle is Ari Gibson (Kai Lewins), a former competitive surfer recovering from a life-altering injury, along with Poppy, Bodhi, and Marlon.⁹

Season 2. The second season returns to Shorehaven a year later. Summer has been surfing constantly in the breaks around Rockaway Beach, New York, and returns with a new goal: to make the State Team and compete at Nationals as a career surfer, like her Australian friends. She announces her ambition at tryouts and proves a genuine contender, but making the team makes an enemy of its captain, Wren, who is Ari's new girlfriend.¹⁰ Season 2 ended with open threads about where Summer and Baxter ended up, threads that the cancellation left unresolved.²

Cast and characters

Sky Katz, previously known for Disney's Raven's Home and an America's Got Talent competitor, plays Summer Torres.⁸^•⁵ Kai Lewins plays Ari Gibson, and the family cast includes Dustin Clare as Ari's father Thommo and Adrienne Pickering as his mother Abbie.⁷^•⁵ Lilliana Bowrey, a professional surfer and the reigning Open Women's Queensland Surf Champion, plays Poppy Tetanui.⁵ Season 2 added Annabel Wolfe as Wren and Josh Macqueen as Baxter, Wren's brother on the state surf team.⁵

Production and filming

The series was created by Joanna Werner and Josh Mapleston, with Gemma Crofts also credited as a writer.²^•¹⁴ Werner, previously known for the teen dramas Dance Academy and Ready for This, co-created the show, and the beaches and towns along the Great Ocean Road inspired it, so the producers chose to shoot on location.⁶

Production was based in the town of Anglesea for 10 weeks, supported by VicScreen's Regional Location Assistance Fund, and shot at some of Victoria's best-known beaches, including the globally renowned surf spot Bells Beach, about 90 minutes from Melbourne.⁶ Reviewers noted that this on-location filming gave the series a grounded quality.⁹ Screen Australia records the series as a Werner Film Productions production of 18 episodes of 30 minutes, completed in 2023.³

Reception

Season 1 drew a small but strong critic sample on Rotten Tomatoes, with a 100% Tomatometer from 5 reviews and an 83% audience score from more than 50 ratings; season 2 scored 92% among 4 critic reviews.¹¹^•¹² Critics were divided on depth: Mel Campbell of ScreenHub called it "Dance Academy for surfing," while Common Sense Media's review credited the setting, soundtrack, and surf photography but found the storytelling conventional, writing that the series "never fully catches a wave."¹¹ Common Sense Media praised the show's positive messages about courage, perseverance, compassion, and teamwork, and noted a main character's struggle with PTSD and anxiety as a distinctive thread.¹

On Netflix, season 1 ranked among the service's Top 10 in 43 countries and drew 20.3 million hours viewed in its first week, and was reported as the 9th most popular series on Netflix Australia.⁶^•¹³ Viewership for season 2 declined: it debuted with 2.1 million views against 4.6 million for season 1.²

Cancellation

In February 2025, What's on Netflix confirmed there were no plans for a third season. Actress Lilliana Bowrey had told fans in a December TikTok video, "There isn't one!!", and repeated on YouTube that there would be no season 3.² The outlet linked the cancellation to the drop in viewership between seasons and noted that the series retains a small but notable international fanbase.²

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Scripted television and comedy series › Drama and prestige series (individual series) › Teen and coming-of-age drama

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

Notice something wrong?