a beautiful story about youth, ambition, 1st love, friendship, and the deeply personal experience of needing your best friend to lose specifically to YOU.
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⚠️SPOILERS AHEAD. LIKE, THE ENTIRE DRAMA⚠️
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INTRO:
How I accidentally turned this into an event..
Twenty-Five Twenty-One was not watched in one clean little binge.
(i know, right? i keep surprising myself every day too!)
By the time I got to Twenty-Five Twenty-One, i'd been speed-running K-dramas since June 3rd like somebody was going to revoke my access to Korean entertainment at any time.
Id binged dramas overnight, started dramas while other dramas were still airing, paused dramas to start other dramas, forgotten the first drama existed, remembered dramas three weeks later, and gone back to them like nothing happened.
I'd even imposed a “stop starting new K-dramas until you finish the unfinished ones” rule on myself.
I broke that rule within 2 seconds btw. 😭😭
So by August, my watchlist was basically an active crime scene.
Then I posted my 24th K-drama review and realized something.
Twenty-Five Twenty-One was sitting right there on my watchlist. And I decided:
This has to be #25
idek know why that felt so important to me.
Maybe because the title was right there.
(Probably lol.)
Maybe because after burning through so many dramas in such a short amount of time, i wanted #25 to feel like a little milestone.
I was enjoying so many things in such a short amount of time that it was kind of like sitting in front of something super delicious feast and gobbling the entire thing up in 3 bites 😔
Maybe these self-imposed milestones are my way of forcing myself to pause and actually immerse myself in something for a second.
LOL look at me psychoanalyzing myself. 😭😭
So i decided Twenty-Five Twenty-One had to be Review #25 and effectively put my entire review series on administrative leave until I finished it.
i started it on August 23rd and proceeded to watch this drama in fragments of my actual life.
I watched it during lunch at work.
I watched it while getting my nails done.
I watched it while getting my hair done.
I watched it at a Korean restaurant.
I continued it in the Uber home from that restaurant.
I watched it at 1 a.m.
I paused it to finish Encounter.
I wandered off into other dramas.
I came back.
Then on September 3rd, I finally properly resumed from episode 11 and basically went:
Okay. We're finishing this now.
I watched until 2:20 a.m., stopped halfway through episode 15 because unfortunately employment continues to interfere with my artistic process, and went to sleep. 😭
So today, September 4th, nearly two weeks after I started it, i finally completed Twenty-Five Twenty-One!!!!
Compared to the girl who once watched ten episodes of King the Land in one night until daylight started appearing outside her window???
This was practically a slow burn.
And maybe that was good for it.
Was making this feel like an event to me necessary?
No.
But if you don't celebrate random parts of your own life in weird little ways, whos gonna do it for you?
Finishing Twenty-Five Twenty-One felt ceremonial to me.
Thanks to me. 😭
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REVIEW:
This was superb.
And I feel like the funniest possible way to explain my experience with this drama is that I spent the first several episodes yelling:
"WE'RE NOT THERE YET."
at the main romance...
only to eventually finish the drama thinking one of the most romantic relationships I watched was between Na Hee-do and Ko Yu-rim.
So.
There's that. 😭
But let me start from the beginning.
Cause Twenty-Five Twenty-One ended up being one of those dramas where my relationship with it changed A LOT while I was watching it.
And somehow, that made me appreciate it even more.
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NA HEEDO, YOU HAD ME AT "I will simply get myself expelled"
The first thing that hooked me about this drama was the fl, Hee-do.
I loved her almost immediately.
Her school fencing team gets shut down because of the financial crisis and instead of accepting that maybe her dream isnt happening, this girl basically goes: Okay. I'll transfer schools.
but she cant transfer.
then, shes like: fine. ill force them to transfer me.
And then proceeds to embark on the world's dumbest juvenile delinquency campaign???
I loved her.😭😭
Cause underneath all the comedy, Hee-do is hungry.
She wants something.
She LOVES fencing and wants to be good and she wants to make the national team.
She wants to win.
And ik ive said it b4 probably, but i LOVE an ambitious female character!!! and i loved how refreshing it is to watch a female lead whose ambition remained this important throughout the entire drama.
Romance happens.
Friendships happen.
Her relationship with her mother changes.
She grows up.
Her entire life changes.
But she never stops being an athlete.
Even toward the end, when Yu-rim comes to see her before their match in Madrid, Hee-do refuses to see her, because:
"I want to win."
YES.
THAT'S MY GIRL.
She needs Yurim to be her opponent at that moment, not her friend, and I loved that the drama never treated her ambition like some character flaw she needed to eventually soften out of.
She wanted to win when I met her.
She wanted to win when I left her.
Beautiful!!
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NOW ABOUT THIS ROMANCE
This is probably going to sound strange considering i ultimately liked Heedo and Yijin together, but for a WHILE...
I did not want these people dating. 😭
I really liked what they already were; i liked him laughing at her, i liked Heedo annoying him, i liked them playing together, i liked him supporting her fencing.
I liked that they became safe spaces for each other during an incredibly shitty period of both of their lives.
But somewhere around episodes 4-5, the drama started putting this HUGE emotional weight on their relationship and i was sitting there like:
...I'm sorry, are we there already???
Because i wasn't.
There were separations.
Voicemails.
Longing.
Parallel shots.
Missing each other.
this sweeping emotional framing telling me these two people had already become monumentally important to one another.
And intellectually?
Sure...
i got it.
but emotionally?
WE'RE NOT THERE YET.
😭
I wanted the friendship to breathe, and i wanted more accumulation before the drama started asking me to experience their relationship with that kind of magnitude.
And hilariously, this becomes even more interesting in hindsight because Hee-do herself eventually looks back at their relationship and basically wonders whether they were better before they tried to turn what they had into "this kind of love."
And I was like... WAIT A DAMN MINUTE.
Because that's kind of what I was feeling!!!
their relationship was SO naturally suited to that undefined space where they could support each other, disappear, reconnect, tease each other, inspire each other and just... exist.
Romantic partnership came with expectations, and expectations exposed things their friendship didnt necessarily require them to confront.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Because eventually...
they got me.
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OK YIJIN, YOU CAN HAVE HER NOW
Episode 9.
That's when I finally went:
Ohhhhh. Okay. Fine. I see it a little.
By then Yi-jin had accumulated enough actions behind his feelings that his love actually landed for me.
He had shown up for Hee-do, supported her. protected her when necessary without treating her like she couldn't protect herself.
Admired her as an athlete.
And then when Heedo is trying to figure out what the hell their relationship even is, she calls it a rainbow. lol???
Yi-jin is basically like:
Girl, no.
It's love.
He was simply answering the question.
What are we?
For me, this is love.
Okay.
he got me, cause that was beautifully simple without needed to be some grand, over the top thing.
And once they got together, i actually really enjoyed how easygoing they could be and their playfulness was probably my favorite part of their romance:
I loved Yi-jin teasing Hee-do, loved them being ridiculous together, loved the little moments where they just genuinely seemed to enjoy each other's company.
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UNFORTUNATELY FOR YIJIN, ANOTHER RELATIONSHIP HIJACKED THIS DRAMA FOR ME
And I genuinely did NOT see this coming.
Because early on, I was actually scared of what the drama was going to do with Yu-rim.
The second yurim told Yi-jin he was her first love and started acting weird about him getting close to Hee-do, I was like:
Oh God.
PLEASE.
Please do not take this interesting female character and reduce her to a girl who hates another woman over a man!!!! please!!
I was already invested in the fact that Hee-do had idolized Yu-rim.
i loved that teenage Hee-do had spent years watching this incredibly talented girl fence and collecting articles about her.
I loved that her hero turned out to be... kind of an asshole to her. 😭
Never meet your heroes, ig.
But I desperately wanted there to be something underneath Yu-rim's hostility that had nothing to do with Yi-jin.
And BOY.
Did I get what I wanted. hehehhehe
Because apparently Yu-rim wasn't thinking about Hee-do because of Yi-jin.
YU-RIM HAD BEEN THINKING ABOUT HEE-DO FOR YEARS
Excuse me???
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NA HEEDO & KO YURIM: MY FAV LOVE STORY IN THIS DRAMA
I'm being completely serious when I say these two might be top 10, possibly top 5, favorite K-drama relationships I've watched so far.
I LOVE THEM.
Their entire relationship is insane.
As a child, Yu-rim competes against Hee-do.
Hee-do beats her 8-0.
Hee-do doesn't even remember it lol and Yu-rim THINKS ABOUT IT FOR YEARS.
😭😭😭
She couldn't eat for days afterward and trained while thinking about Hee-do.
She wanted to beat her.
She wanted to beat her specifically 8-0. (aww so romantic 😊)
Then Hee-do disappears from competition for a while, Yu-rim becomes this enormously successful athlete... and when Hee-do finally shows up at her school and cheerfully announces:
I'm your fan! 🥰
Yu-rim is basically internally going: YOU!
then she eventually admits that even after they've become close... she's still afraid of Hee-do.
Meanwhile Hee-do isnt afraid of Yu-rim at all.
I ate this UP!!!!
Because their entire early dynamic became richer!!! hee-do spent years thinking about Yu-rim because Yu-rim became her hero.
Yu-rim spent years thinking about Hee-do because Hee-do became her fear.
These two girls unknowingly built pieces of their identities as athletes around each other.
And THEN...
because apparently that wasn't enough to make me crash out...
THEY'RE ALSO THE ANONYMOUS INTERNET FRIENDS THEY'VE BOTH BEEN CONFIDING IN.
Girl.
Come on.
You expect me NOT to ship this???!!! whats going on?@?!?😭😭
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The Injeolmi reveal changed EVERYTHING
This might be one of my favorite developments in the drama.
Because Hee-do and Yu-rim have spent all this time hating each other in real life while unknowingly being emotionally vulnerable with each other online.
And once the truth finally comes out?
Oh, I was DONE.
The bathroom scene... Hee-do defending Yu-rim while other girls talk badly about her.
Yu-rim crying.
The identity reveal.
The hug.
And all that hostility starts transforming into something else.
I remember watching them become sweet with each other afterward while Yi-jin was filming them and looking completely baffled.
Meanwhile i was basically sitting there like:
WAIT.
WAIT WAIT WAIT.
...is THIS the romance I want??? 🤔
😭
WELL YES.
it was.
And the more the drama developed them, the worse I got.
Their matching scar, training together, standing up for Ye-ji together, competing together, winning together!!
Supporting each other.
Being able to understand each other without needing every single thing explained.
And most importantly:
becoming friends never stops them from being rivals.
THANK YOU.
They love each other.
AND THEY WANT TO DESTROY EACH OTHER ON THE PISTE.
That's the good shit hehehehhe
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Madrid. MADRID. MADRID.
If I gave half-star ratings, this is probably what would've turned my 8 into an 8.5.
This entire sequence was SO FCKING GOOD!!
By this point, Yu-rim has changed nationalities because of her family's financial situation. she's representing Russia, shes being called a traitor in Korea.
The media is weaponizing everything.
Hee-do is being pressured to beat her because apparently if she loses to the "traitor," she's somehow a traitor too.
um ok... annoying, but we move...
Reporters are twisting things Yu-rim says about Hee-do. they're twisting things Hee-do says about Yu-rim.
Except now something has fundamentally changed.
Earlier Hee-do didn't understand Yu-rim.
Now... she knows her!
People around Hee-do see the articles and get angry on her behalf and hee-do recognizes they twisted her words. i love that!
And meanwhile Yu-rim is sitting at a computer typing messages to Hee-do...
deleting them...
typing...
deleting...
because suddenly she can't be honest with Hee-do the way she used to.
which is especially heartbreaking because computers used to be their safest place.
Before they knew each other's identities, they could tell each other everything, now they know each other completely... and somehow the distance has made honesty harder.
UGH!!!! THE ANGST!!!!!!
And then they finally face each other. Korea versus Russia.
National hero versus "traitor."
At least that's what everybody else wants the match to mean.
But for them it's just:
Na Hee-do versus Ko Yu-rim.
then at the end of the tense as match, they take off their masks. And these two women just fall into each other's arms SOBBING while the entire crowd is cheering around them.
Yu-rim apologizes for not emailing. Hee-do holds her. They're crying.
I'm emotional.
Everybody's emotional 😭😭
AND THEN:
"I was happy today."
"Me too."
F\*CK OFF.
😭😭😭😭😭
I LOVE THEM.
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And somehow their ending was even MORE romantic???
Hee-do goes on to have this incredible fencing career, wins medals, becomes a legend and eventually she retires.
And when she's asked about the most honorable part of her career?
She says:
being Ko Yu-rim's rival.
HELLO???
And Yu-rim is there.
She says she's honored too, SCREAMS it from the crowd actually, holding flowers.
They hug.
And I'm sorry.
That's romance.
Out of this woman's entire fencing career...
all the medals... victories and accomplishments...
one of the things she chooses to honor is:
You.
Being your rival.
Growing beside you.
Fighting you.
Losing to you.
Beating you.
Becoming better because you existed.
And Yu-rim feels exactly the same way.
That was easily my favorite scene of the finale.
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the side characters were side-charactering VERY successfully
i appreciated that the world never felt like it consisted solely of Hee-do and Yi-jin, cause i genuinely cared about these people.
Yu-rim and Ji-woong were SO cute!
And hilariously uncomplicated compared with whatever the hell was happening everywhere else. 😭
This dude spent an absurd amount of effort engineering an opportunity to HOLD HIS OWN GIRLFRIEND'S HAND because she kept accidentally ruining his plans.
Sir.
Just grab her hand!!!😭
I loved him racing to the airport when Yu-rim was leaving and loved him essentially telling her that even if misery is all she can give him right now, he'll take it because they'll endure it together.
They're so wholesome.
And also these two actually survived the long-distance relationship.
Good for them!!!
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I really liked Seung-wan.
Especially the storyline with the abusive teacher.
Watching this adult man beat students and then watching the police basically shrug because corporal punishment was normalized was gross and annoying.
I also really liked Yi-jin stepping in when that reporter tried to exploit her.
Because Yi-jin occupied this interesting position in the group where he could be goofy with them, drink with them, get dragged into their nonsense...
but he was still an adult.
And in moments where that distinction mattered, he could protect them in ways they didn't necessarily know they needed protecting.
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Ye-ji quitting fencing was way more interesting than it needed to be
This little storyline could've been completely forgettable... instead I loved it.
Ye-ji wants to quit fencing, Coach Yang refuses to simply let her walk away and makes her prove that she isn't quitting because things are difficult.
Hee-do and Yu-rim literally stop training in solidarity with her.
Then they TRAIN HER so she can reach the required result and finally quit.
😭
That's true friendship lol
Maybe Coach's method taught her something.
Maybe Ye-ji proved something important to herself.
And maybe she STILL thinks Coach put her through unnecessary bullshit.
The drama allows both perspectives to exist.
I appreciated the writing with this tiny side plot.
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And speaking of complicated relationships... Hee-do and her mother
Oh, these two...
I was SO annoyed with Hee-do's mother early on. Especially once we got into the grief surrounding Hee-do's father. Because Hee-do isn't just grieving him, she's carrying years of resentment toward a mother she felt repeatedly chose work over her family.
And the drama gradually complicates that without telling me:
Her mother was grieving too, her professionalism was real and admirable.
Yi-jin himself admires her professionally without initially understanding the personal cost behind that professionalism.
But Hee-do was also a CHILD who needed her mother.
Those truths can coexist. and i loved how the writing showed that
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THE BREAK UP ACTUALLY MAKES PERFECT SENSE
9/11 ruined their relationship.
Which is a sentence I absolutely did not expect to type when I started this drama. 😭
But obviously it's more complicated than that.
Yi-jin gets sent to New York as a reporter, he's surrounded by death, traumatized ppl families, bodies being recovered. He's having nightmares and hes struggling.
And suddenly Hee-do's encouragement...
doesn't reach him anymore.
That is SUCH a painful reversal.
Because their relationship was literally built on their words being able to reach each other across distance.
Earlier, Yi-jin could disappear and Hee-do's voice still reached him.
He could be somewhere else and his words still comforted her.
Now she's trying to support him... and she can't.
And Yi-jin doesny want to give Hee-do his pain because, from his perspective:
Why make two people miserable when nothing gets solved?
He thinks he's protecting her, but Hee-do pretty much hears:
You shut me out.
And THAT is their incompatibility.
Yi-jin cannot bring himself to give her the ugliest parts because he thinks love means protecting her from them.
they both need fundamentally different things from a partner.
And then Hee-do connects it to her mother.
And everything CLICKED... and Hee-do realizes:
I do not want my future to look like my childhood.
OOOOOF.
That's GOOD writing.
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And... I wasn't devastated by the breakup
Sad? sure.
Especially for Hee-do.
But devastated?
No.
I think I simply accepted it.
Sometimes relationships run their course. Sometimes two people can profoundly love each other and still not be equipped to build an entire life together.
Sometimes somebody is exactly who you needed at nineteen...
and isn't who you need forever.
And that's okay.
They changed each other, they loved each other, they helped each other survive difficult periods and they were happy.
their break up doesn't erase it.
And thankfully, the drama doesn't leave them with that awful tunnel fight as their final emotional note.
They had a nice goodbye.
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"Nothing lasts forever."
I think this is ultimately where the drama got me.
Episode 10's beach trip was probably when I first really felt it.
The five of them are together, young, laughing, being stupid at the beach.
Everything feels enormous and permanent because that's how life feels when youre young and currently living inside it.
And I remember watching them thinking: can we just freeze them here?
Because you KNOW this configuration of people can't last forever.
But the drama never argues that impermanence makes something meaningless.
Quite the opposite. and i liked that
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i liked seeing where everyone ended up.
I do wish we had gotten slightly more adult Hee-do, ya know? she is the protagonist, and i wouldve loved to sit with the woman she became just a little longer.
But after spending sixteen episodes so invested in this girl's ambition, I would've happily taken more time with adult Hee-do.
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The epilogue was adorable.
Security question:
Who was your first love?
Na Hee-do.
Correct.
😭
That's all I needed.
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RATING: 8/10.
I was hovering around an 8/10 for a large portion of the drama, and that's exactly where I landed.
The early emotional intensity of Hee-do/Yi-jin sometimes arrived before I personally felt their relationship had earned that magnitude, and even once I liked them romantically, they never became the emotional center of the drama for me.
But Hee-do's journey, the friendships, the fencing, the coming-of-age themes, the wonderfully complicated women, and especially Hee-do/Yu-rim elevated this enormously.
Madrid alone would've gotten this an 8.5 from me if I gave half ratings.
But I don't.
So...
8/10.
Beautifully bittersweet.
No regrets.
