XO, Kitty: The Spin-Off Based on "To All The Boys"

XO, Kitty is a Korean-American Netflix romantic comedy and drama television series that is a spin-off of the To All The Boys film series, which is itself based on the book series “To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before.” This Netflix series is focused primarily on Kitty Covey, Lara Jean’s younger sister.

XO: Pilot Episode

In the pilot episode of XO, Kitty has a lot of references to the romantic drama series To All The Boys. As Kitty is doing her presentation, viewers see flashbacks to a younger Kitty with her big sister Lara Jean and Lara Jean’s first love interest, Peter. The next scene shifts over to Kitty discovering a photo album of her late mother attending a boarding school in Korea when she was a junior in high school. Finally, Kitty sees the boarding school uniform with the badge KISS, short for Korean Independent School of Seoul, the school where her late mother attended.

After her father allows her to go to boarding school, Kitty is seen at the airport, boarding her flight to Korea. She writes an email to Lara Jean about her travels to Korea and her excitement about attending KISS. She signs her email with XO, Kitty.

In Korea, she reunites with her boyfriend and discovers lots of experiences at the boarding school, as well as what Korea has to offer. There is Korean dialogue with English subtitles displayed on the screen. Other cultural references include white cherry blossoms and a Korean temple.

The Series Overall

XO, Kitty is an entirely AAPI cast, with all of the actors being of Asian descent. This series proves to viewers that the representation of Asians in major and supporting roles is important. This teen comedy and drama series mostly takes place in Korea, as filming took place in Seoul. The titles of the episodes in this teen series are in acronyms such as XO and TGIF, commonly found in text messages. For fans of romance, this series is a good fit.

It is recommended that viewers watch the first movie, To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before, so they can understand the full plot.