REVIEW: ‘XO Kitty’ Season 3 Tests Everyone’s Love Matches

All aboard the romance yacht, as XO Kitty Season 3 sees Kitty Song Covey (Anna Cathcart) returning to the Korean Independent School of Seoul (KISS) for her senior year! The self-proclaimed matchmaker finds herself fully in love with Min Ho Moon (Sang Heon Lee), and she has her Sunset List to ensure all her senior year plans go according to plan. But like many plans, the chances of derailment are never zero.

In this third semester of Kitty’s senior year, she returns to KISS for her “perfect” year. She’s going to make meaningful memories with her friends, grow closer to her relatives in Korea, and make big decisions about her future. And, she’s going to define her relationship with Min Ho. For real this time. But when surprise revelations dismantle her plans and relationships, Kitty will have to learn to embrace the unexpected.

Along with Cathcart and Lee, many of the characters in XO Kitty Season 1 and 2 also return: Min-yeong Choi (Dae), Gia Kim (Yuri), Anthony Keyvan (Q), Regan Aliyah (Juliana), Hojo Shin (Jiwon), Peter Thurnwald (Alex), Joshua Lee (Jin), Sasha Bhasin (Praveena), Michael K. Lee (Professor Lee), Philippe Lee (Mr. Moon), Jocelyn Shelfo (Madison), Han Bi Ryu (Eunice), and Sunny Oh (Mihee).

Kitty’s third semester is about living life, figuring out her future, and maybe seeing where things stand with Min Ho.

If this seems like a lot of characters to track, it is—not to mention there are three new important actors and characters added this season: Sule Thelwell (Marius), Soy Kim (Yisoo), and Christine Hwang (Gigi). To say there are too many characters in this series now would be an understatement. However, XO Kitty Season 3’s showrunner, executive producer, and writer, Valentina Garza, somehow finds a fair balance to flesh out both its main and side characters—even adding in some spicy lore with its cameo appearance of the season.

XO Kitty Season 3 finally recaptures its wholesome charm from the To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before trilogy movies, specifically with the way it links Kitty’s immediate family with their Korean-born relatives. The concept of family consistently holds up, and many of Kitty’s final conflict resolutions involve either receiving advice from family or repairing familial bonds.

XO Kitty Season 3 features ups and downs for all characters, amplified by talk of the future. 

On the opposite side of the warm-hearted Covey sisters, XO Kitty Season 3’s sort-of villain of the season is Marius. If Audrey Huynh’s Stella Cho looked psychotic with the way she was trying to dismantle Min Ho and Mr. Moon’s reputations, Marius comes in as a whirlwind for Q and Jin, with Min Ho and Kitty catching strays. Marius doesn’t try to poison anyone like Stella did, but his ability to manipulate information with the Kitty friend group is articulate and is understandable when teenage raging hormones are also in the way.

Every couple and relationship is tested in XO Kitty Season 3. All of them make sense, except Juliana and Praveena’s relationship, and Madison and Mihee’s friendship near the end. Juliana has these standout moments of helping out core members of the Kitty crew, like Yuri and Kitty.

It didn’t seem like Juliana’s character development was heading into reconnecting with Yuri until Praveena brought it up. Ultimately, this shows that the writers lacked direction and finesse and were unsure of where to take Praveena’s character arc. She might be put on the back burner in future seasons.

The writers don’t seem to really know what to do with Praveena, and it shows.

The issue with Madison and Mihee is that they are side characters who mostly act as deus ex machina or last-minute solutions to other characters’ problems. These examples are seen when Yuri sells her boots to Madison to just reach her financial goals to stay at KISS, and Madison typically breaks the character tension by throwing some kind of party. It’s not Shelfo’s fault, but it’s another example of the writers not knowing what to do with her, resorting to showing her playing a VR game in the background for comedic effect.

Madison and Mihee’s friendship torpedoing for a second didn’t make sense, and was quickly resolved just as quickly as it fell apart. The writers are trying to include everyone in this journey that revolves around Kitty, but it’s beginning to distract from the main plot and doesn’t advance character development for characters like Madison and Mihee. 

XO Kitty Season 3 features music from Girlset (formerly VCHA), MEOVV, Wonho, and more. Jina Hyojin An and Shirley Song continue to compose and produce all the music for this season, bringing in fun, atmospheric pop vibes that integrate with Kitty and Min Ho’s themes. As Kitty and her friends do a lot more partying in their senior year, the music choices matter the most.

Senior year means more parties and more drama in XO Kitty Season 3.

Overall, there are some solid picks throughout XO Kitty Season 3, whether it is during the beer pong match or Yuri’s Seoul Fashion Week runway set. Even in one final romantic moment of the season, the score sounds very reminiscent of the lighthearted notes of a typical K-drama show kiss or hugging moment. A great song or instrumental has to sell that frozen-in-space-and-time kiss or hug in any K-drama or romance story. 

Other K-drama elements XO Kitty Season 3 executes well include its portrayal of parents who are overly involved in shaping their kids’ futures, overcoming those barriers, navigating the ups and downs of young stardom, and figuring out how to deal with an unexpected life event. Almost all the kids, except Kitty, in this season face some kind of parental pressure for planning their future career or college goals. Eunice’s self-recognition of not sticking through the harsh reality of fame while attending high school is a huge character examination.

The way an unexpected event is portrayed in XO Kitty Season 3 comes from a place of understanding and vulnerability, airing out the secrets. This issue being addressed shows how family, more specifically the women in the family, are supportive and accepting rather than upset and defensive. This may set unrealistic expectations for young viewers of the show, since this is a best-case scenario, but it shows there are healthy ways to ask for and receive help.

While some answers remain up in the end, the future seems bright for more seasons with Kitty.

Speaking of final moments, the ending teases more drama and chaos to come in another season. The Covey family continues to build on its foundations, while memories are being made by our favorite characters. At the end of the day, the KISS squad always figures out the best solution.

XO Kitty Season 3 strikes a good balance between adding in-world references, having Kitty reflect on her family’s past, and showing her realize how much her family and Min Ho affect her future decisions. This is a nice full-circle moment for her arc, comparing how the audience saw her older sister, Lara Jean, navigate high school and her future, with Kitty discovering what her future could look like.

While XO Kitty Season 3‘s finale wraps up most plot threads perfectly, it shows how committed the showrunners and creators are to building out this world. As long as Kitty doesn’t get the Emily in Paris treatment with all of Emily Cooper’s love interests piling up in every season, this show keeps its core meaning of true love. 

XO Kitty Season 3 is now streaming exclusively on Netflix.

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