Love Story, I Know It’s Not Great. So Why Can’t I Stop Watching?

I didn’t plan to care.

I turned it on half out of curiosity, half out of boredom. The new dramatization of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy and John F. Kennedy Jr. — the 90s golden couple we all thought we understood.

Five minutes in, I texted a friend:
“The acting is off.”
Ten minutes in:
“Her voice isn’t right.”
Twenty minutes in?
I had poured a second glass of wine and was fully committed.

Why?

Because it isn’t about the show.

It’s about the story we never stopped telling ourselves.

If you were a woman in the 90s, you remember exactly where you were when their photos were everywhere. Glossy magazine covers. Grainy paparazzi shots. Her in a black coat and sunglasses. Him smiling like the world was still uncomplicated.

They looked like a fairy tale — but not a Disney one.

They looked like adults.

Sexy. Sophisticated. New York and serious.

She was a fashion publicist who didn’t perform for the camera. He was American royalty trying to carve his own identity outside the shadow of John F. Kennedy. Their wedding on Cumberland Island felt secret and sacred in a world that was already overexposing everything.

And here’s what the show gets wrong — but also accidentally gets right.

The acting may not land, but the tension does.

Because their relationship wasn’t simple.

There were whispers even then. Fights. Pressure. The weight of the Kennedy name. Her discomfort with the spotlight. His need to carry a legacy. Two ambitious people were trying to build intimacy while the entire country watched.

At 25, I thought they were perfect.

At 50, I see the strain.

I see a woman who may have loved deeply but also valued privacy. I see a man who adored her but perhaps didn’t always understand what it cost her to stand next to him.

The show makes it look glamorous.

But what it really was… was complicated.

And maybe that’s why I keep watching.

Because at this age, I’m not interested in fantasy.

I’m interested in the truth beneath it.

When I watch their story unfold — even imperfectly — I don’t see a fairy tale. I see two people trying to protect something fragile while the world tries to consume it.

And that hits differently now.

Especially if you’ve lived through a love that wasn’t protected.

Especially if you’ve rebuilt your life after something cracked wide open.

There’s a scene where they’re walking down a Manhattan street, tension simmering between them, cameras flashing. She looks exhausted. He looks frustrated. It’s subtle, but it’s there.

And I thought: That’s real.

Not the polished magazine cover.

That moment.

Because mature love isn’t about the cover shot.

It’s about what happens when the flashbulbs fade.

It’s about whether someone stays when you’re not glossy.

That’s the part the show can’t quite capture — but the history does.

Their story ended tragically in 1999, in a plane crash that froze them in time. No messy divorce. No slow unraveling. No public middle age. Just an abrupt ending that sealed them into myth.

And myth is powerful.

Myth lets us project onto it whatever we need.

In our 20s, maybe we needed glamour.

In our 30s, maybe we needed proof that love could look elevated.

At 50?

I think we watch because we’re measuring.

Measuring what we believed about love then… against what we know about love now.

I don’t want a headline romance anymore.

I don’t want flashbulbs.

I don’t want a love that looks good in black-and-white photographs but cracks under pressure.

I want the kind that survives Tuesday mornings. The kind that sits beside you in a hospital waiting room. The kind that holds your hand when the room is quiet and there are no cameras.

The show may not be great.

But it reminds me of who I used to be — the girl who thought love had to look epic to be real.

Now I know better.

Epic love isn’t always the loudest one.

Sometimes it’s the one that lasts.

And maybe that’s why I’m still watching.

Not because I want what they had.

But because I finally understand what they didn’t.

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https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0BlyS1wbXeWXhfZXbaABnR?si=UcX0zgS8T-GT8tboRBuvAg&pi=OzoJ0RTjSLWPf