Hallmark-approved summary: A widowed surgeon visits her family’s pear orchard in hopes of taking a break from her overbooked life and reconnecting with her distant son. She starts to fall for the farm manager, Will, who is growing a new hybrid pear and teaches her the importance of her heritage.
Actual summary: Pears deserve your attention, too.
Cast member prestige: Our female lead is Jen Lilley, a soap veteren with long-term stints on both General Hospital and Days of Our Lives. Our male lead, Ryan Paevey, is also a General Hospital vet and appeared in music videos for Christina Aguilera (role: “Love Interest”) and Toni Braxton (role: “Guy Shooting Pool”).
Hallmark Man does Hallmark job: Will Nash is an agronomist who, having been educated at a top-tier university, returns home to help rebuild his family’s legacy after their farm is razed to make room for a shopping mall.
Action:
We open on “Seattle West Hospital,” where busy Dr. Luna Gilson is being asked to stay late AGAIN for an emergency surgery. She’s not happy about it, because she had promised to be home early that night to have dinner with her eight-year-old son, Andy. When she does finally make it home, it’s dark out and Andy is in bed asleep. The nanny has left a plate of dinner for Luna without having been asked to do so, thus letting the viewers know that Luna coming home late is not a new occurrence.
Luna’s mom video-calls from Cameroon, where she and Luna’s dad are doing some kind of medical volunteer work. Luna complains to her mom that she’s exhausted after a day filled with “seven surgeries, rounds, and a board meeting,” to which mom replies that a break is surely in order. Mom suggests that Luna take Andy to spend his school fall break on their family’s ancestral pear farm. It’s owned by their great-grandparents and was recently put up for sale, but the house onsite is currently unoccupied. Luna’s not sure she can take a break from work.
The next morning, though, little Andy’s eating breakfast and accidentally drops a pile of school stuff. A paper program advertising a school play called “Autumn Surprise” flutters to the ground. Luna sees it and is upset that she didn’t even know her son was in a play. Andy shrugs and says “you were working.” When Luna protests that she would have made time to attend the play, Andy retorts: “You missed my spelling bee, so… I didnt think you would’ve come to this.”
Me: “Daaaaaaamn. That’s cold.”
My 10-year-old, incredulous: “THAT KID was in a spelling bee?”
Later, at Luna’soffice, Luna’s assistant (one of maybe two Black faces -- Hallmark is nothing if not consistent) is talking Luna through her upcoming schedule and reminding her of the “big promotion” up for grabs at the hospital. Luna, distracted, asks the assistant to clear her appointments for the week of Andy’s fall break. Unrattled by this huge request, the assistant gamely says, “Sure! That won’t be easy but I’ve been known to work a miracle or two.” To which Luna replies, “Great.”
Not THANKS. Not WOW, WHAT WOULD I DO WITHOUT YOU. “Great.” Luna, you’re on my list.
Next thing we know, Luna and Andy are packing for their trip. Andy sasses that his friends are going to “cool” places like Florida or Hawaii, not some pear farm. Luna counters that it’s their family’s farm, and promises it will be fun. Andy kiss-asses that he’s just excited to be spending some time with his mom. They take off. In the car, Luna marvels at Andy’s ability to identify pine trees on sight. Dream big, mom. Toward the end of their drive, they come upon a one-lane bridge and see that another car is already approaching from the other direction. Instead of yielding the right of way, Luna *gets out of her car* and demands that the driver of the other vehicle, a Rugged Looking Man, back up and let her through. For some reason, he obeys… and promptly gets a flat tire. Instead of helping, Luna drives off.
That’s strike two, Luna.
They arrive at the farmhouse. Upon entering, Luna tells Andy to take her old bedroom. Andy, with palpable disgust, asks “It’s not a girl’s room, is it?” And instead of strapping this school-shooter-in-the-making into a chair and delivering a seminar on misogyny, Luna LAUGHS and says “You’re safe; the room was redone years ago.” Luna is why we can’t have nice things.
Luna and Andy roam through the pear orchard. Andy notices a man standing among the trees, examining the pears. Luna immediately hands her phone to Andy and instructs him to, and I quote, “call the sheriff and tell him that we have a pear thief in Gilson Orchard; come quick!” She grabs a stick to use as a weapon and approaches the thief, but when he turns around, guess what? It’s the Rugged Looking Man from the one-lane bridge. Funny story: turns out this guy’s name is Will, and he just happens to manage her family’s farm. What a silly misunderstanding! Oh, but here comes the sheriff, in his sheriff-mobile. Luna introduces herself and explains the situation, and the sheriff gets back in his car and returns to town, chuckling, because frivolous calls to law enforcement are extremely light-hearted and always end peacefully.
That’s not the last we see of the sheriff, however. The next day, as Luna and Andy are enjoying a walk through the orchard and a lesson on picking pears from their new pal Will, the sheriff speeds back onto the property and announces there’s been a nearby farm accident. They have no doctor in town (small town -- they used to have a doctor but he retired), the ambulance is still thirty minutes away (small town -- pretty scenery, but you might die), and the sheriff heard that Luna was a doctor (small town -- people are spies). Will Luna help? She will!
On the scene of the farm accident, Luna lays her healing hands upon the injured man’s leg, blinks a couple of times, and diagnoses a “broken tibia.” Then the ambulance arrives. Wow, thank God she was there.
Will drives Luna back home, where he offers to fix a leaky sink and then disappears into the night. Luna, having found her grandmother’s recipe box, announces to Andy that she is going to make him her grandmother’s famous pear cobbler. Andy is dubious, as apparently Luna doesn’t cook. What follows is a kitchen hijinks montage that is insane, even by Hallmark standards, wherein we are to believe that Luna preps, bakes, and serves FOUR subsequent pear cobblers, each of them inedible, in the course of one evening. I just… help me help you, Hallmark.
At some point during this mess, Luna gazes out the kitchen window and sees Will tip-toeing away from a locked greenhouse, looking secretive. The next day she asks him about it, but he deflects. He tries to convince her to stay for the upcoming harvest festival. Later, as Luna is poking through a “memory box” she finds in a barn, Andy comes over munching on an apple that he says Will picked for him from one of their on-site trees. Luna’s all “we don’t grow apples.” And Andy’s all “but here I am, eating one.” Luna asks Will about this, but he’s coy.
Time passes. Luna and Andy do more farm frollicking. Luna’s assistant calls to talk about scheduling some surgeries, but Luna hesitates and asks to call her back. Then she and Andy and Will head to town to volunteer with decorations and setup for the harvest festival. They learn the exciting news that “Frank Honeywell is going to be one of the judges in the Best Pear Competition” at said festival. This is, apparently, a big deal. Will and Luna engage in some deep talk about goals, plans, and pears. Will wants to own his own farm one day, to make up for the one his family lost during the recession. Luna’s not sure what she wants. They drive back to the orchard and flirt under a harvest moon.
The next day, having declined her assistant’s call AGAIN, Luna scopes out Will’s top secret apple trees. He finds her there and spills the beans: he’s been raising top-secret, patent-pending hybrid pears, with the look of pears, the coloring of apples, and the taste of apricots. They have a longer storage life and are less susceptible to bruising. Potential investors are interested but not sold yet. Winning the pear competition at the harvest festival would help seal the deal.
Over breakfast the next day, Luna apologizes to Andy for having been an absentee mom. Andy says he wants to stay at the orchard for the harvest festival, and Luna agrees.
Flash to pear harvest day! There’s been a big rainstorm, the pears have to be harvested quickly for some reason, and they need all hands on deck. They pick pears, and Luna video-calls her parents, and everyone is charmed and exhausted. Afterwards, over pear cider, Luna reveals to Will that she is considering staying.
Flash to the harvest festival! Andy talks his mother into entering a pumpkin carving contest because, he claims, “it’s what you do all day” as a surgeon. She… scoops out people’s insides and carves buck teeth onto their faces in front of a live audience? Ok. Later, Will and Luna walk around the festival at night. There is some kind of hoedown happening, which of course they participate in, culminating in an almost-kiss which is interrupted at the last possible moment by a surprise visit from Luna’s parents. Who just popped on a plane for a last minute flight FROM CAMEROON? Luna’s parents tell Luna that someone has put in an offer on their pear farm. Luna feels sad, and tells her parents that she feels like she and Andy belong here.
Will wins the pear contest. Naturally.
The next day, Luna’s assistant calls and says she got the promotion to Senior Consultant of General Surgery. Also naturally.
Andy eavesdrops and overhears the phone call, running outside and blabbing the news to Will. Luna comes out a few minutes later and, excited, tells Andy to come inside because she has “big news to share.” Once Andy leaves, Luna turns to Will and asks if she will see him later. Coldly, he flounces “I don’t think so. I have plans of my own.”
Unless you’re new here, you’ve likely already guessed that the big news? Is that Luna has decided to open a medical practice here in town and stay on the farm. Andy is confused, and tells his mom what he overheard. Luna assures her son that she called her assistant back and turned down the promotion. Realizing that his blabber-mouthing just basically destroyed all of his mom’s romantic plans, Andy runs off to find Will and tell him the truth. Which he does. Causing Will to text Luna: “Meet me at the greenhouse.”
She meets him at the greenhouse. Will has news of his own. Guess what? HE is the person who bought the pear farm. Which means: wheeeeeee, he owns her now! Isn’t it romantic? They kiss.
Rating: 6 of 10 pumpkins for pretty Vancouver-masquerading-as-Washington scenery and the inventive use of pears in lieu of apples as an edible symbol of fall. Warning for moms raising future soldiers of the patriarchy.
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