Courtesy of Netflix
Netflix has struggled to create another teen romantic comedy as strong as To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, which blew up online and garnered a massive following after its August 2018 premiere. Following that summer success—which also brought the equally pleasant, office-set rom-com Set It Up to the platform—the streamer tried to capitalize on Noah Centineo’s charm, with films like Sierra Burgess is a Loser and The Perfect Date. It followed up those uninspiring releases with splashy teen movies like He’s All That and Work It, neither of which worked either. Even the two sequels to the original To All the Boys weren’t quite as good.
Could XO, Kitty, a To All the Boys spinoff series following Lara Jean Covey’s (Lana Condor) younger sister Kitty (Anna Cathcart), break Netflix’s rom-com curse? Seeing how the show brings back To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before author Jenny Han, there seemed to be a big chance. But it turns out that XO, Kitty, which premieres today on Netflix, can’t drum up off-the-charts chemistry like To All the Boys and lacks Centineo-levels of charisma—yet the premise is just enticing enough to make it worth the watch.
Our Kitty is all grown up since the last time we saw her. She’s now a high schooler, but she is just as loud (if not louder) and stubborn as she was back in middle school. After visiting Korea with her family in the third To All the Boys installment, Kitty has developed a long-distance relationship with Dae (Minyeong Choi). Dae is sweet and willing to keep their relationship going—he’s a keeper!—but Kitty is struggling to stay afloat in this whole LDR sitch. Why not make life easier and move to Korea, to be closer to him? After all, Kitty’s mother, who passed away when she was a baby, went to the Korean Independent School of Seoul (KISS, an acronym that made me giggle every time I heard it in the show). What a coincidence—that’s where Dae goes, too.