The saga of how the Netflix series Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later came to be is an unexpected one. Originally a film released to little success, 2001's Wet Hot American Summer enjoyed a cult following and was eventually brought back to life on Netflix over a decade later. Just as WHAS came back to life, it looks like Ten Years Later is breathing life back into Coop's (Michael Showalter) hopes for a romantic connection with Katie (Marguerite Moreau). It's been a decade since their last fateful night at Camp Firewood but will seeing each other after so many years enough for Coop and Katie to get together in WHAS — finally?
Coop's feelings for Katie burned bright as a fire during Wet Hot American Summer: First Day Of Camp, and his hopes rose higher and higher during the original movie. However, in the end Katie choose bad boy Andy over the earnest, lovable Coop. While his hopes were dashed, Ten Years Later promises a new beginning for everyone returning to Camp Firewood. Has Coop changed enough to win Katie's heart? Has Katie changed enough to accept someone that is going to treat her even slightly better than Andy treated her? If Katie's final words to Coop at the end of the original film are any indication, Ten Years Later could end in wedding bells for these two.
At the very end of the original Wet Hot American Summer, Katie explains to Coop that even though she likes him, he's just not right for her at that moment. In her own words: "Andy is really hot. And don't get me wrong, you're cute too, but Andy is like, cut. From marble. He's gorgeous ... I don't even care that he cheats on me. And I like you more than I like Andy, Coop, but I'm 16. And maybe it'll be a different story when I'm ready to get married, but right now, I am entirely about sex ... That's where my priorities are right now. Sex. Specifically with Andy and not with you."
Katie's monologue may sound entirely negative (for Coop), but there is a kernel of hope in there. In between talking about how hot Andy is and how interested she is in having sex with Andy, she mentions that "maybe it'll be a different story when I'm ready to get married." Now that these campers are no longer teenagers, Katie might be ready to look at Coop and see the qualities in him that she'd want to see in a husband.
The priorities you have when you are 16 aren't the same priorities you have at 26. While Andy was the person Katie needed in her life at 16, that doesn't mean that he suits her at 26. But even if Katie decides that she's finally ready to try a relationship with Coop, will Coop be able to forgive her for his teenage heartbreak? Will they even have time to reconnect with the almost certain disaster that will come to Camp Firewood upon their return?
If Camp Firewood turned a man into a vegetable can, then it just might be magic enough to show these two lovebirds that they were meant for each other all along.
