Noah LaLonde just dropped the mic on My Life with the Walter Boys Season 2, and the tea is scalding: Cole Walter’s love for Jackie Howard isn’t fireworks and stolen kisses anymore; it’s quiet devotion, late-night talks on the barn roof, and a finale bombshell that’ll leave you screaming at your screen until Season 3 drops. The 27-year-old Canadian heartthrob, who plays the brooding, golden-haired Cole with the kind of effortless charm that makes fans forget he’s not actually a ranch-raised rebel, sat down with PEOPLE and peeled back the layers of one of Netflix’s most addictive teen dramas. “I opened the Season 2 scripts and thought, ‘Where are we together here?’” LaLonde admitted, his voice still carrying the shock. “Season 1 was all heat; Cole and Jackie were this electric, forbidden thing. Season 2? It’s deeper. Messier. Real.”
Let’s rewind for the uninitiated: My Life with the Walter Boys, adapted from Ali Novak’s Wattpad phenomenon, crashed onto Netflix in December 2023 and instantly became the streamer’s guilty-pleasure darling. Nikki Rodriguez stars as Jackie Howard, a Type-A Manhattanite orphaned in a tragic accident and shipped off to live with the chaotic Walter family in rural Colorado. Ten boys, one girl, zero chill. Cole (LaLonde), the second-eldest and resident bad-boy-with-a-heart-of-gold, locks eyes with Jackie from day one. Season 1 was pure rom-com crack: horseback rides at golden hour, near-kisses in the rain, and a love triangle with his steadier brother Alex (Connor Stanhope) that had fans picking teams like it was the Super Bowl. By the finale, Cole and Jackie were endgame; or so we thought.
Then Season 2 premiered on August 28, 2025, and the writers yanked the rug out. No grand gestures. No swoony slow dances at the county fair. Instead, Cole and Jackie’s relationship evolved into something rawer: two trauma-scarred teens learning how to hold space for each other. Jackie, still reeling from her parents’ death and the pressure of being the “perfect” guardian-appointed success story, builds walls higher than the Rocky Mountains. Cole, haunted by a near-fatal car accident that ended his football dreams and left him with a limp and a lifetime of guilt, becomes her quiet anchor. “Jackie compartmentalizes like a pro,” LaLonde explained, leaning forward with that intense Cole stare. “She’s got grief in one box, Yale applications in another, Walter family chaos in a third. Cole sees it; he admires it. But he also knows what it costs her.”
The shift stunned LaLonde at first. “I kept waiting for the big romantic scene; the one where Cole rides in on a horse and sweeps her off her feet. But the writers were smarter than that.” Instead, Season 2 gifts us micro-moments that hit harder than any kiss: Cole teaching Jackie to drive stick shift in his beat-up truck, both of them laughing until they cry when she stalls for the tenth time; Cole showing up at 2 a.m. with hot cocoa after Jackie’s nightmare about the crash; Jackie wordlessly handing Cole his pain meds when his leg flares up, no pity, just partnership. “It’s love in the mundane,” LaLonde said. “The kind that doesn’t need a soundtrack.”
But don’t mistake quiet for boring. The tension simmers. Alex, ever the golden boy, is still in the picture; now dating Erin (Alisha Newton), but his lingering glances at Jackie haven’t gone unnoticed. The Walter parents, George (Marc Blucas) and Katherine (Sarah Rafferty), grapple with their own marital strain, adding pressure to the household. And then there’s the ranch itself; teetering on foreclosure, forcing the boys to confront what “family” really means when the land might be sold out from under them. Jackie, ever the fixer, throws herself into saving the ranch, further burying her grief. Cole watches her spiral and finally snaps; not with anger, but with a plea: “Stop trying to save everyone else and let me save you for once.”
The finale? A gut-punch. After a blowout fight where Jackie accuses Cole of using her as a distraction from his own pain, the two end up alone in the hayloft during a thunderstorm. Lightning cracks. Rain hammers the tin roof. And Cole; voice breaking, soaked to the bone; says the words fans have been dying to hear: “I’m in love with you, Jackie Howard. Not the idea of you. Not the girl who fixes everything. You. All of it. Even the parts you hide.” Jackie, tears mixing with rain, whispers, “I love you too.” They kiss; slow, desperate, real. Cue the collective sob of 12 million viewers.
Except… the camera pans. Alex is standing in the barn doorway. He heard everything. The screen cuts to black on his devastated face. Cliffhanger achieved.
LaLonde teased the fallout with a grin that could melt steel. “Season 3 is going to be brutal. Alex isn’t just heartbroken; he’s betrayed. And Jackie? She’s finally let someone in, but at what cost?” He hinted at deeper exploration of Cole’s PTSD, Jackie’s survivor’s guilt, and a potential new love interest for Alex that “might just flip the entire triangle on its head.” The ranch’s fate hangs in the balance, with a mysterious buyer circling; rumors swirl it could be tied to Jackie’s late parents’ past. And in true Walter fashion, secrets are about to spill like feed from a torn sack.
Behind the scenes, the cast’s chemistry is the real MVP. LaLonde and Rodriguez spent off-days rehearsing in character at a real Colorado ranch, mucking stalls and roping cattle to nail the authenticity. “Nikki’s a machine,” LaLonde laughed. “She’d be memorizing Yale-level calculus while I was still figuring out how to not fall off a horse.” Their bond mirrors Cole and Jackie’s; Rodriguez even directed LaLonde in a short film between seasons, cementing their status as Netflix’s new power duo. The Walter boys themselves; from Ashby Gentry’s lovable goofball Danny to Johnny Link’s brooding Isaac; have become a real-life frat, spamming TikTok with prank videos and acoustic covers of the show’s folk-pop soundtrack.
Critics are eating it up. Variety called Season 2 “the rare teen show that grows with its audience, trading swoon for substance without losing the spark.” Viewers agree: the finale trended #1 globally for 48 hours, with X ablaze in “#ColeAndJackieEndgame” vs. “#TeamAlexDeservesBetter” wars. One viral tweet summed it up: “Cole Walter said ‘I love you’ in a thunderstorm and I haven’t been okay since.”
As Season 3 looms (filming starts spring 2026, targeting a late-2026 drop), LaLonde is philosophical. “Cole’s not the hero because he saves Jackie. He’s the hero because he stays. That’s the love story we need right now.” So grab your flannel, cue up the Zach Bryan playlist, and re-binge Seasons 1 and 2. Because when the Walter ranch finally catches fire; metaphorically or otherwise; you’ll want to be there for every ember.
Stream My Life with the Walter Boys now on Netflix – because some love stories don’t need grand gestures… but they do need a thunderstorm, a hayloft, and a brother who wasn’t supposed to hear the truth. Season 3 can’t come soon enough.
