Dear X Review
Director: Lee Eung-bok and Park So-hyun
Date Created: 2025-11-07 03:51
4.5
Dear X Review: Directed by Lee Eung-bok and Park So-hyun, with the screenplay penned by Choi Ja-won. The series stars Kim Yoo-jung as the enigmatic Baek Ah-jin, Kim Young-dae as Jun-seo, and Kim Do-hoon as Kim Jae-oh, alongside Lee Yul-eum, Kim Yi-kyung, Bae Soo-bin, Kim Yoo-mi, and Kim Ji-young. This twelve-episode thriller is based on the webtoon 친애하는 X by Ban Ji Un.
Dear X Episode 1-4 Recap
Dear X Episode 1 begins with a chilling view of Baek Ah-jin’s broken-down childhood. Neglected by her alcoholic mother and overlooked by her abusive father, young Ah-jin quickly learns that love is transactional and power is survival. But when she witnesses her father push her mother down the stairs and then calmly walk away, in that moment, she inherits a darkness that will come to define her.
Years later, Ah-jin is now a beautiful top actress whose beauty is inseparable from her murderous thinking. In a high school flashback, she humiliates her teacher, Ms Kwak, by telling her students about an affair she’s having online; the vengeful outgrowth of a past insult. Her rivalry with Sim Sung-hee further intensifies when she manipulates the schoolgirls, reassigning them to her class, and both run a volunteer loan business to make money, posing as Kim Jae-oh, causing Sim Sung-hee’s downfall by framing her for theft. Ultimately, Ah-jin confesses at the end of the episode that her “Xs” are those people she’s choosing to destroy, and her first was her own mother.
In Dear X Episode 2, the story hypes Ah-jin’s screwed-up origins further. Her father comes to live with his paramour, who is Jun-seo’s mother, following the death of her mother, plunging Ah-jin into another nightmare. Ah-jin, having learned that her new stepmother will use her for money, makes a deal with Jun-seo, who used to be her only friend. But after the woman tries to drown her in a bathtub, Ah-jin runs away and barely survives by jumping from a window as Jun-seo watches in horror.
The trauma ties them inexorably, accounting for his lifelong adoration. Furthermore, since Kim Jae-oh accidentally kills his abusive father in a fight defending his younger brother from him. He’s sent to prison, and Ah-jin loses another of her small number of allies.
But as the years go by, Ah-jin’s father keeps pressuring her for money, even while she tries to concentrate on school. Once she’s finally accepted to Hanguk University, he takes her tuition and beats her savagely. Alone at her graduation, Ah-jin radiates quiet fury and determination — until she meets Choi Jeong-ho (an ex-baseball player who excels in both strength and kindness).
Dear X Episode 3 is a game-changer in Ah-jin’s shift from being the victim to becoming the manipulator. She ends up working for one of Jeong-ho’s cafés and wins his trust, while Jun-seo settles in closer to her. When one of Ah-jin’s photos becomes an internet sensation, a Longstar Entertainment talent agent sees it as her pathway to stardom. Yet behind the scenes, turmoil simmers — Ah-jin’s father resurfaces, demanding money and endangering her newfound stability.
She schemes something deadlier: She’ll frame her father as her stalker, and arrange for Jeong-ho to come just in time to fully “protect” her. During the tussle, Jeong-ho cries out Father while hitting her with a bat, which leads to the death of his father. Cool as a cucumber, Ah-jin tidies up the crime scene, gets rid of evidence and silences them both. To the world, she’s an abused daughter; in reality, she is the puppeteer holding each string.
Lies start to unravel as investigators get closer in Dear X Episode 4. Her father’s death is ruled as self-defence, and Jeong-ho is held in custody while Ah-jin becomes the innocent victim. Blinded by love, Jun-seo covers for her, even confessing to striking the fatal blow himself. But Ah-jin’s coldness emerges… she puts both of them through their hardship while creating a new image for herself through Longstar Entertainment.
The company’s CEO, Mi-ri, sees potential in her and brokers a deal: freedom and adoration in return for severing all ties with Jun-seo. Ah-jin agrees without hesitation. As the detectives begin to discover their own corruption, Ah-jin’s power expands, and now she has her face across the billboards of Seoul. The woman who was once abused in the shadows is now the star of a blood-soaked drama, born from coercion.
Collectively, 2025 Korean drama Dear X Episodes 1-4 chronicle the creation of a new kind of anti-heroine, a young girl forged through cruelty and weaponising trauma into empowerment. But underneath her glamorous facade, there’s an icy hollowness, and anyone who gets close to her will end up as the next victim. With a history buried and her career blossoming, Ah-jin is at the apex by herself, evidence to her world that love isn’t weak – it’s the most dangerous of all.
2025 Kdrama Dear X Review
The ground set for the first four episodes is one of fear: it’s dark, methodical and emotionally layered. Kim Yoo-jung delivers a powerful performance as Baek Ah-jin, portraying a woman who is simultaneously delicate and terrifying. She takes us through Ah-jin’s quickly changing moods with chilling precision, her pointed pauses and cool glances far more revealing than any words could be. Her presence haunts the screen from episode 1 of Dear X till the end; she has fully become this unstoppable force, her calm exterior barely covering a seething mixture of rage and calculation.
This is what distinguishes this drama, its refusal to dumb down its characters. Ah-jin isn’t penned as a one-note villain — she’s a deeply human creature, shaped by hurt and desperation. The series that she would be both reviled and feel sorry for, which is what makes the series emotionally rich. Each supporting character, from Jun-seo’s tragic devotion to Jae-oh’s broken loyalty — reflects another aspect of her fragmented psyche. We see through them how Ah-jin’s machinations are based not just in ambition, but in survival.
The cinematography deserves special mention. The visually stunning world that veers between glamour and decay. Each frame, from the muted pastels of Ah-jin’s childhood home to the high-contrast beauty of her celebrity life, emphasises this push-pull dynamic within her. And she pulls us further into her disordered but brilliant mind with mirrors, reflections and long silences. Even the violence seems purposeful — it’s not so much there for shock value as to demonstrate how cruelty begets more cruelty.
Emotionally, this drama is not an easy viewing experience. Every episode, but especially episode 2 of Dear X, reveals how ugly the adults in these characters’ lives are. The series is unafraid to acknowledge the uncomfortable truth that abuse, neglect and moral decay shape identity. But as grim as that may be, there is an odd beauty to watching Ah-jin retake control. Her conduct is unforgivable, but also oddly relatable, and it’s the moral clash between those two attitudes that keeps the tale interesting.
Dear X Episode 1-4 Review: Summing Up
Overall, the Korean drama Dear X already looks like it will be one of this year’s most intricate psychological thrillers. It raises the question of whether monsters are born or made — and indeed, if revenge can ever serve as real closure to the love in one’s life. As Ah-jin becomes even more famous and her web of lies continues to spin, the hype is real for future chapters. If the remaining episodes of the season keep up this level of creepy coolness and emotional complexity, it will certainly land on my list of 2025′s top shows.
