Exclusive Interview

‘XO, Kitty’ Boss Explains Lara Jean & Peter’s Shocking Relationship Update in Season 3

Before Kitty Song Covey started looking for love in XO, Kitty, viewers were swooning over her older sister’s romantic journey in Netflix’s To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before trilogy, based on author Jenny Han‘s books. Lara Jean (Lana Condor) and Peter Kavinsky (Noah Centineo) had their fair share of relationship drama — though not nearly as much as Kitty — but we still cheered when they ended up together by the third movie. They’re on opposite coasts for college, but they’re making it work.

But XO, Kitty fans know that the third movie wasn’t technically the end of LJ and Peter’s story. In Season 2, Peter arrives in Seoul for an international lacrosse tournament. LJ doesn’t come with him, but Peter tells his girlfriend’s sister that they’re still going strong. (Warning: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for XO, Kitty Seasons 3.)

However, that all changes when LJ appears on XO, Kitty for the first time in Season 3. Showrunner Valentina Garza explained Peter and LJ’s surprising relationship turbulence to Swooon. “We definitely collaborated with Jenny [Han] in these conversations because Lara Jean is such a beloved character in this franchise, and we wanted to get it right,” Garza said, “but we know that Lara Jean has also been on her own growth in a relationship journey, so she and Peter get into a little bit of a rough patch in the beginning of the season.”

“Rough patch” is right. Kitty’s burgeoning relationship with Min Ho (Sang Heon Lee) is put on pause when LJ calls Kitty, needing her sister’s support while she’s going through a breakup with Peter. Kitty drops everything to be with Lara Jean in New York over the summer. “I think that bond between these sisters, the bond that they have, is just so important and something that the fans really love to see,” Garza explained of the decision to take the storyline in that direction.

LJ says that her and Peter’s lives aren’t compatible, with his work in California and her publishing job in New York. Later, Kitty has some relationship issues of her own — Min Ho breaks up with Kitty when she mistakenly assumes he cheated on her over the summer. As Garza explained, “And so when Kitty gets herself into her own pinch, Lara Jean doesn’t hesitate to do the same thing and just drop everything and come to Korea, and she’s able to really use the growth journey that she’s been on to give Kitty some good big sisterly advice and remind her that she has to be true to herself, first and foremost.”

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Kitty and Min Ho manage to reconcile, as do Peter and LJ. In Episode 6, “Wait List,” LJ tells her sister that she and Peter aren’t back together, but Peter is planning to come to New York and talk about how they’re “5,000 miles apart, literally and emotionally.” Kitty insists that the couple is endgame, and her instincts prove to be right. In the Season 3 finale episode, “Wish List,” LJ follows up on her promise to keep her sister updated: She and Peter still have a lot to figure out, but they’re going to do it together.

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Fans will likely agree with Kitty that it’s the best news ever. “And at the end of the day, Peter and Lara Jean patch things up, so our fans have no need to worry for them,” Garza assured us.

We asked if there were talks to get Centineo back for XO, Kitty Season 3, but the showrunner answered that they wanted to keep the focus on the sisters’ growth. “I think that we really felt like bringing Lara Jean back was just going to be such an exciting thing for our world and for our characters, and we really just wanted to focus on this sisterly dynamic and how they’re able to really impact each other’s lives,” she said. “Because at the end of the day, Kitty really impacts Lara Jean, too, and helps her to be more courageous in her own life.”

XO, Kitty, Season 3, Streaming Now, Netflix