Peacock’s newest series, The Five Star Weekend, has arrived to give you a dose of escapist television if you’re choosing to stay inside to beat the heat.
While most summer shows with a pristine beach setting revolve around a love triangle, this one puts friendship between mature women at the forefront instead.
But when has a girls’ weekend gone off without its fair share of drama? While all the women arrive in Nanatucket harboring and navigating their own secrets and crises, much of the tension is brought on by mysterious and undeniably chic Gigi.
The drama, based on beach-read queen Elin Hilderbrand’s best-selling 2023 novel of the same name, finds Jennifer Garner’s Hollis Shaw, a famous food blogger, in a state of grief after the unexpected death of her husband, Matthew (Josh Hamilton), mere days before Christmas.
Six months later, that same grief hits her hard during an appearance on Today (hey, Jenna Bush Hager!), where her manager suggests she round up four of her closest friends from different phases of her life for a weekend of fun to help her unwind, take her mind off everything and find herself again.
Initially not in favor of the idea, Hollis decides that maybe the best medicine is time with the people who know you best, extending an invite to her childhood “sister” Tatum, played by Chloë Sevigny, college bestie Dru Ann, played by Regina Hall, and D’Arcy Carden’s Brooke, a friend from the motherhood phase of her life.
The fourth VIP is Genna Chan’s Gigi Ling, Hollis’ internet friend. They’ve never met in person, a fact that the other ladies in the group find very weird, especially as she’s one of Hollis’ fandom fans, known as the Holla Babes, whom she connected with after Matthew’s death.
Gigi served as a huge support system for Hollis as she navigated the loss of her husband, as Hollis later admits to her friends that it was simply easier to confide in a stranger.
What she doesn’t know is that Gigi is no stranger at all.
Not everyone is convinced that Gigi’s intentions are in the right place, likeable as she may be, particularly Dru, who directly asks Gigi what secrets she’s harboring a handful of times.
While Hollis is convinced her friendship with Gigi is purely coincidental, she doesn’t realize there’s actually a deeper connection between them as they’re both mourning the loss of the man they loved.
The same man.
So Who Is Gigi—Really—on The Five Star Weekend?
Dru’s intuition about Gigi isn’t wrong, as fans learn early on in the eight-episode season that Gigi was having an affair with Matthew.
The revelation comes early into the season, letting viewers in on the secret that Gigi’s harboring way before anyone from the “Five Star Weekend” crew catches on.
The difficult part is that Gigi isn’t a bad person. From the get-go, she wrestles with the decision of accepting Hollis’ invitation, knowing she sought her out in the first place to comfort her own pain and ease her guilt. Along the way, the two genuinely bonded and became friends, but under false pretenses, though Hollis remains the one and only thing keeping her connected to Matthew’s memory. No one else understands what she’s going through.
She knows Hollis deserves the truth, but she’s also deeply aware that there’s no chance of a friendship once that truth is out there, so she goes back and forth between telling Hollis and chickening out every time she gets close.
Eventually, the secret gets out on accident, which provides her with some relief, as Brooke finds Gigi’s phone and accidentally stumbles upon a photo of her and Matthew being cozy in the “memories” tab. Brooke confronts Gigi about it, who expresses guilt over the whole thing, knowing that no matter what she says, it doesn’t make the situation any better.
Brooke then wrestles with telling Hollis the truth, knowing that it will ruin her at a time when she’s already trying to pick up the pieces.
The timing is never right, so she eventually confides in Dru and Tatum, who then turn to Gigi to get some answers about the relationship.
THE FIVE STAR WEEKEND — Pictured: (l-r) Jennifer Garner as Hollis, Harlow Jane as Caroline, Gemma Chan as Gigi, Regina Hall as Dru-Ann (Photo by: Seacia Pavao/PEACOCK)
Gigi’s Origin Story
Again, Gigi feels incredibly guilty for the part she’s played in destroying a marriage, all while grappling with the loss of the only man she ever loved, and trying to find closure amid an unexpected friendship with his widow.
Fans learn that Gigi, a pilot, met Matthew, a surgeon, during a weather delay at the airport. They got to talking before letting their feelings get the best of them during an overnight stay at the hotel. They both knew what they were doing was wrong, but they couldn’t stop from diving in, meeting up in different cities along her route for their tryst.
While little is known about Matthew, fans get a glimpse into his broken marriage with Hollis, which only gets worse when their daughter Caroline leaves for college.
Not only is their spark gone, but Matthew doesn’t fully support her influencer lifestyle, seemingly annoyed with how much effort and attention she puts into it, and dismissing the notion that it’s a fulfilling career.
The morning of the accident, Hollis confronted Matthew about his trip to Paris, questioning why the company was having a conference a few days before Christmas. She expresses that she wants to make their relationship work again, as Matthew questions if it makes her sad that they have to put in this much work into something that was once so easy.
He seems to have a change of heart on his way to the airport, leaving Gigi a message that they have to talk. He never got to end the nearly year-long affair and confess the truth to his wife, as he was in an accident that took his life.
After Hollis learns of the affair, she confronts Gigi, getting the confirmation she needed that her marriage was worse off than she ever cared to admit, though she confesses to her friends that deep down, she always knew; she saw the signs, but she didn’t want to face the music, so she just pretended it wasn’t happening.
While Hollis and Gigi had a real connection, there is no happy ending for them, nor do they see the affair as some kind of blessing that brought them into each other’s lives.
Hollis forgives Gigi and sends her on her way with some toffee, proving that holding a grudge doesn’t benefit anyone. It’s necessary closure for both of them, as Gigi realizes that the ultimate reason she came for the girls’ weekend was to tell Hollis that Matthew chose her in the end.
The confession helps Hollis take the first step in allowing herself to move on, as she hooks up with her high school boyfriend, Jack, the man she still pined for when her marriage was on the rocks.
In a weekend where nothing goes according to plan, despite the detailed itineraries, it was real, raw, and exactly what everyone needed to grow and move forward with authenticity—even Gigi.