New cast members shake up MTV’s ‘Siesta Key’

It’s the same “Siesta Key” you know and love (or know and hate), only more so.

The unscripted MTV show set in the Sarasota area is back with new episodes (it’s not a new season, but the second half of the first season, officially) and it brings us some new drama and some new cast members. (The cast now consists of 12 or 13 people, depending on whom you count as regulars). But the basic “trouble-in-paradise” conflicts of the show that made it MTV’s biggest hit of the season remains. There are hook-ups and break-ups, flirtations and betrayals among attractive people in beautiful surroundings.

New cast members (whom, at least according to original cast member Juliette Porter, are real-life friends, acquaintances and co-workers of the core group) seem to have been chosen to inject extra conflict and diversity into the proceedings.

The new arrivals are:

▪ Canvas, Chloe’s coworker, an Atlanta transplant who in this week’s episode openly flirts with Brandon, who’s supposed to be in a relationship with Madisson.

▪ Madisson’s friend Tarik; the first gay person in the show’s cast.

▪ Maddison’s sister Paige, who was shown infrequently in previous episodes.

▪ Hannah, who in the first episode hosts a pool party (a “Siesta Key” staple) where a lot of the drama unfolds.

▪ Carson, whom we haven’t seen much of so far.

Canvas was central to the this week’s episode, the other new people not so much. (Tarik and Canvas don’t seem to like each other; in his first interaction with her, he makes fun of her name and warns her against flirting with Maddison’s boyfriend Brandon.) Since the show largely centers around intra-cast hook-ups and jealousy, it might be interesting to see how the sole gay character figures into the storyline in the rest of the season.

This story was originally published January 18, 2018 at 12:08 PM with the headline "New cast members shake up MTV’s ‘Siesta Key’."