By Fiorela Gonzales

People We Meet on Vacation, an adaptation of the best-selling book by Emily Henry, is the newest rom-com to hit Netflix. A gender-swapped “When Harry Met Sally…”, it’s a lighthearted and sweet enough film to fill the rom-com gap that’s been missing in current years, but it fails to fill the shoes of the Harry and Sally it tries to emulate.

The film follows Poppy (Emily Bader) and Alex (Tom Blyth), who are two best friends, yet complete opposites in personalities. Poppy is outgoing, bubbly, and a bit rambunctious. Alex, on the other hand, is incredibly stoic, uptight, and introverted. They start their friendship on a road trip home from Boston College to both of their hometown of Linfield, Ohio. The story is told in a nonlinear narrative and jumps back and forth between the present and interspersing years throughout the past. In the present, Poppy and Alex are currently in a tumultuous moment in their friendship as they haven’t spoken in a few years, but she travels to Barcelona for the wedding of Alex’s brother. Here, she will see Alex for the first time in a few years. Though Poppy has wanderlust and loves to travel and Alex is a homebody whose ideal location is his hometown of Linfield, Ohio; they decide no matter what happens to take a vacation together every summer to maintain their friendship. The interspersing flashbacks show us each of these trips and their ensuing chaos within it.

It’s important to note that Poppy has an incredible and incredibly coveted (something that is mentioned often) job. She writes for a travel magazine in New York City where she gets paid to go on luxurious vacations. It is also important to note that throughout this 9-year vacation friendship, Alex has been dating his long-term girlfriend, Sarah (Sarah Catherine Hook). It’s clear throughout the film that both Poppy and Alex are in love with each other, but failing to do anything about it. Most of the reason stems from their opposite personalities, but the big goalie in the way is the obvious girlfriend, who we meet once and very briefly. The girlfriend feels a little bit thrown in for the sake of the story. If there was no girlfriend, they would just get together, which is an unfortunate plot in the story. She’s just a placeholder, with no real reason other than to drive the narrative, and that’s not fair to that character.

Since this story is a rendition of When Harry Met Sally…, it’s hard not to draw comparisons. One of my favorite things about the former movie is that every character is a fully thought-out human that exists and you root for. It’s hard not to think about Harry and Sally’s best friends, Jess and Marie, who end up together. Two characters who are not the main characters of the film – but just as beloved (if not sometimes more). This gap is extremely noticeable with People We Meet on Vacation, whose extra characters feel thrown in as a plot device. The only two interesting characters are Poppy’s parents, played by Molly Shannon and Alan Ruck, who have a criminal 2 minutes of screentime.

In general, though, the movie is sweet and light enough to enjoy. I was having a nice time watching it, even if it doesn’t feel amazing or groundbreaking. That is, until the end. And then it just flops for me. Spoiler, but Poppy and Alex admit their feelings for each other while at the wedding. (Something they can do now because Alex ended things with Sarah.) Then they get into a fight because Alex feels that Poppy will never know what she wants in terms of her future and that she’ll always run away to more vacations. At the final beat of the movie, Poppy quits her travel writing job and goes to Linfield, Ohio to find Alex and admit her feelings for him and that she wants her life to be with him. Then they move into an apartment together in New York City. I don’t find the story of a woman quitting her incredible travel writing job to be with her boyfriend romantic. Not in this conservative era at least. They also move to New York City together at the end, so what was the point of her quitting her job? She can’t be with Alex unless she’s only going on vacation with just him and not getting paid for it?

Aside from the conservative leaning ending, I’m also not a fan of the final declaration of love. Again, hard to compare to When Harry Met Sally…, which has one of the most iconic final love declarations in a movie, but the one in this film barely holds any weight. She runs after him (running is something she hates and he loves) until she catches up to him and admits that she always was afraid she was “too much” for Alex but that she wants to be with him. Alex doesn’t say much in this moment, which I found a bit odd. Poppy saying she feels like she’s “too much” is such a sad sentiment that is never really explored throughout the film and then completely ignored by Alex when she says it at the end.

Overall, People We Meet on Vacation is no When Harry Met Sally… A hard bar to reach, but the film loses itself by the end. It’s a lighthearted watch for the most part. The actors are beautiful, and the locations of the vacations are beautiful, but it all feels as surface level as that. And sorry but not falling for “woman has to quit her amazing job for a man” propaganda. Especially when the movie ends with them both together in literally the same location that she started in. What was the point?

2 ½ stars.