A new season of XO, Kitty has arrived, and with the arrival of the new season on Netflix has come the return of the characters we love as well as some new faces entering the mix. Among the new characters we meet in the season premiere is Stella, a new student at KISS who has been assigned to the same living quarters as Kitty, Yuri, and Juliana.
Warning: Spoilers ahead for the season premiere of XO, Kitty as well as for the full season.
When we first meet Stella we learn that she’s come to KISS via an exchange program through her church and that she hails from a small town in Ohio. Our first impression of Stella is that she’s a fish out of water excited to experience Korea, but as the season premiere nears its end Stella gets a text from her parents in which they refer to her by an entirely different name.
“Esther, we’re worried about you. Please come home. You don’t have to do this,” reads a text that comes through from Stella’s mom and dad.
Shortly after seeing the text, Stella excuses herself from a conversation with Kitty and goes into the bathroom which she calls home. We only get to hear one side of the conversation, but it quickly is made clear to us that Stella is hiding something from her classmates and isn’t exactly who she’s claiming to be.
“For the last time, my name is Stella. There is no more Esther,” Stella tells her parents on the phone. “And I do have to do this. I’m here to get what I deserve. Now leave me alone.”
The conversation seems to hint that Stella has come to KISS with an ulterior motive, but what exactly is she hiding?
What is Stella’s secret in XO, Kitty?
Following the season premiere, it’s made clear that Stella is not who she claims to be and as the season progresses we quickly come to see her as a foil of the season, one who seems to take particular pleasure in creating drama for Kitty.
Early in the season, we learn that Stella was seen snooping around in Min Ho’s dad’s office while on a ski trip but our suspicions are shelved when she shows Min Ho a box she found in the office containing mementos from Min Ho’s past to help show him that his dad cares more for him than he lets on. Just when we thought perhaps the premiere was a misdirect, we discover that Stella brought a letter Kitty had written to Yuri to express her feelings about the ski trip which led to it being discovered by the rest of the group.
It’s from that moment on that Kitty begins to question her roommate’s intentions and rightfully so! While Kitty might pride herself on being a matchmaker, she’s certainly good a reading people and getting her detective on. Kitty’s suspicions continue to grow during a dinner party hosted by Min Ho’s dad in which several red flags are sent up including a hint that Stella had a nose job and her being triggered by Kitty inviting her up to join her during some karaoke.
After Stella’s odd reaction to karaoke, Kitty decides to do some internet sleuthing which is when she uncovers that Stella once went by Esther and tried out for Min Ho’s dad’s reality competition show Rising Star when she was younger. While Stella had an incredible voice, Min Ho’s dad rejected her from the competition by making fun of her appearance which resulted in Stella having a very understandable emotional breakdown. Sadly, the internet was not kind to her at all and her comments about beauty coming from the inside turned into a viral meme with Stella being ridiculed as a result of Min Ho’s dad all so he could make “good” TV.
Kitty pieces together that Stella clearly has been cozying up to Min Ho in an effort to get revenge against his dad, and that she was likely responsible for leaking rumors about Min Ho’s dad which had come out earlier in the season about him being hard to work with and creating a hostile work environment.
After making this discovery, Kitty tries to warn Min Ho, but he refuses to believe that Stella isn’t who she says she is and that she wants to bring down his father. Sadly, that’s exactly what Stella wants and she takes things to an extreme when planting a bug in a clock she helped pick out for Min Ho to gift his father which helps her gather the intel she needs to blackmail them. So what is her master plan?
“My original plan was to destroy his empire. But when I heard about the tour with Joon Ho, I had an epiphany. You know what they say. If you can’t beat them, join them, right? Your dad’s gonna make me a star and you’re going to help,” Stella tells Min Ho at the end of episode 7 after he realizes Kitty was telling him the truth when Stella shows up to the school dance after going through her own She’s All That type transformation, leading Min Ho to recall the remarks Stella made in the video Kitty had showed him.
It seems that Stella came to KISS in order to seek revenge against Min Ho’s dad for ruining her life through his harsh commentary, and honestly, we sympathize with her motive as no one deserves to be bullied over their looks or made to feel lesser in any circumstance. What we don’t agree with is her dragging Min Ho and Kitty into her revenge plan when the pair did nothing to her, and revenge is never the answer.
Unfortunately for Stella, she underestimated Kitty and her friends.
Min Ho tells Kitty about Stella threatening to release the story about his brother and frame Kitty for the leak, and they fill in his dad about the whole ordeal. Joon Ho tells his dad that he loves the backup dancer and that he wants to be in his kid’s life, which is when Kitty gets an idea for how they can thwart Stella.
At the Shoot for the Moon showcase, just before Stella is set to go on stage to perform, security stops her from taking the stage. She threatens to ruin their lives if they don’t give her what she wants which is when she watches her blackmail go up in smoke as Joon Ho announces to the world that he’s going to be a dad and he proposes to his backup dancer on the stage for all those watching around the world to see.
With her leverage gone, Stella has no more moves and Kitty has helped save Min Ho’s family from a major scandal. Min Ho’s dad apologizes to Stella for how he treated her in the past as he informs Stella he’s making sure to send her off on the first flight back to Ohio.
This seems to bring an end to Stella’s storyline on the show, but who knows whether she might pop up again in the future. We’ll just have to wait to see, but honestly, we can’t think of a reason to bring her back for season 3 as the character served her purpose as the villain of the season so to speak.
XO, Kitty season 2 is streaming now on Netflix!