YOU NEED TO WATCH THIS
No matter if you have been spoiled already, you just need to watch this drama. Everything is just so perfect and so refreshing. The love side is well structured we can see how the characters are developping their feelings for each other. And also if you want someting with memorable, cute and refreshing scene it’s just perfect. I think at first the age gap can be disturbing for some people. But it’s not very unhealthy in reality it’s not that disturbing. The characters are not in a relationship when na hee do is still a minor. Maybe some people will think it’s still weird but i think you should maybe watch it first cause it’s not unhealthy, really. On the friendship aspect, everything is just so cute, and so warming. And also the characters of na hee do is very endearing and admirable. Her personality, the way she always surpass herself, the way she is always trying and never giving up even when it’s difficult, even when she had nobody to cheered her up. The fact that she is the one that usually cheers everyone up so naturally! everything is so incredible and warming about her character while the characters of seung wan is very naturally funny and super relatable imo. And also the hidden messages behind the series. I think it helps a lot with confidence and self esteem , it’s kinda a boost for everyone. And there is also sad messages or sad things but it’s naturally the truth of this world we are living in! Everything is not perfect and how we want it to be but we should always go forward and keep trying and fighting for our dreams.SPOIL ⚠️!! :
And also the relationship between na hee do and yi jin is litteraly « good person wrong timing » unfortunately. The last scene BROKE MY HEART.
PS: THE SOUNDTRACKS ARE SO FREAKING GOOD. LIKE, VERY SLOWLY BY BIBI OMG
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"Let's suffer together when we're in pain. It's 100 times better than being lonely alone."
A wonderful story with amazing acting from the characters. The flow of this drama from them being immature, young, stupid, broke kids to being mature, full of understanding, grown adults is lovely. I like the story of each character; they really portray the life of a teenager perfectly. You can connect with and appreciate all the individuals in this drama, from the main leads to the parents, coaches, friends, and more. This show deserves all the hype it received.Out of all the characters, the one I love the most is Na Hee Do (Kim Tae Ri). A girl who does everything recklessly just to get what she wants and has everything in her way. She is the one to whom I relate the most. Seeing her personality grow makes me cry. Her friendship with her classmates, especially with her rival Ko Yu-Rim (Bona), and her relationship with Yi Jin (Nam Joo Hyuk) are wonderful.
Youth will always be the best stage to try and be recklessly stupid. You will cry, laugh, and learn a lot from this drama. Worth watching and a 10/10.
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This drama should come with mental health trigger warning
What I like about this drama is the journey that I experienced watching from eps 1-14. We learn about how to not lose hope when we are facing with obstacles in life. How each of characters grow to became better person with each others help. The friendship they had is endearing through their ups and downs. Until suddenly came two last episodes with major heartbreak and betrayal.I disliked how the writer seemed to dead set on making the ML relationship ends at any cost. The story is heading towards destruction of character building the ML build through out the previous 14 episodes. I personally don't mind a sad ending since it obviously a major hint from early episodes, but not that way. The ending has caused personal trauma that 3 weeks seems not yet able to forgo my heartache.
I felt betrayed by the writer. How could she made a potentially classic drama in the making to become one with depressed ending? A character with strong personality to be the first to run when facing the first, albeit major, obstacle in their relationship? Yet still cling onto the feeling she obviously still has after years passed? Even after 20 years, she looks miserable. No friends around, no loving husband.
In the world that is currently on depressed mode, drama is an escape and a thing that could help us to keep sane. Unfortunately, this drama fails to help me so. This is still a good drama, I would still recommend to watch it until episode 13-14. If you decided to do it, please proceed with caution. I hope you will have better experience than I do.
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Good Enough
Korean Drama "Twenty Five Twenty One" is a story rather watched for the leading lady and her struggles rather than the romance.The drama starts off with a youthful note, which maintains till the very end. And by going back and forth through time, keeps the suspense high, though it reveals a lot about the story's outcome.
Now, for the main plotline, the story is clever, with well-filmed sports scenes and intense chemistry between the two antagonists. The main girl's story is another plus, with layers and layers of family drama, character development, and a nostalgic vibe.
As for the romance, it was okay, but it wasn't the highlight of the drama. Rather, it took the passenger's seat, as it ought to consider that there wasn't much to work with.
Unfortunately, the ending episodes of the drama were messy and the time skipping got tiring. Hence, the ending didn't feel cohesive.
So, overall, 7 out of 10.
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Slice of life
Every moment in life is precious and nothing lasts forever, so enjoy these moments to the fullest before they fade away. Because even when everything you thought would be permanent changes, the memories you created will stay forever.I've watched this drama twice already, the originality, the characters and the chemistry between friends and lovers is insane. There is no bad character in the drama, just everyone had their own issues and their own ways to get over them.
Na Hee Do, is my inspiration to lead my life, to love myself and my team more than anything. Her definition of love is what I will seek for myself and even try to find something of my own.
Although the ending is not the same as every drama, but then Twenty-five Twenty-one has never been anything like other dramas, I enjoyed and accepted that sometimes Time has it's way to play.
I laughed, cried and related to every emotion they were going through individually and as a couple and I couldn't have enjoyed the drama more. For me this The "Drama".
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Nostalgia, youth and love
Note: this made me ugly cry. What can I say, I love me a sad ending.Favourite quotes:
In 1998, the year when the whole world was shaken, twenty-two and eighteen met. The two called each other by their first names.
They became twenty-three and nineteen, and the two depended on them.
It became twenty-four and twenty, and both
of them were hurt.
When they were twenty-five and twenty-one,
they fell in love.
You always lead me to do what’s right and to a good place. That’s my definition of our relationship. Also known as a rainbow.
… love. It’s love. I love you, Na Hee-Do. I don’t need a rainbow.
Rowdy friendship and passionate love are brief moments that make your long life shine.
Whether it was because he was running or because he was excited, he was out of breath. The wind blew and the green leaves rubbed against the body. It was the middle of summer.
Everyone has a first time. Since today is the first time, I will be clumsy until today.
From now on, when you hang out with me, you can become happy and keep it a secret. When it’s just us two, let’s be happy when we’re together.
Our friendships are always excessive, we’re helpless in the face of love, and our failures are passionate. Anxiety, grief, jokes, and smiles come together to form a strange and irregular shape. Perhaps we’re currently standing at the center of our youths.
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one of my top 5 kdramas
It seems quite a few people didn't like the ending. i thought it - and the show - were great. for me there has never been any filmed entertainment (movie or tv show) that has so perfectly explored and explained the phrase "it's better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all". I have no idea if this was in fact the goal of the writers, but that is what I took from this series - and I thought it was brilliant. the bottom line is that both of their lives were better for their relationship, even if that relationship ultimately ended.Was this review helpful to you?
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Amazing high school romance that goes nowhere
Great performance by Kim Tae Ri, Nam Joo Hyuk was my dream boyfriend, lovely directing, but I'll never forgive the show for being such a huge bait and switch. Maybe I'm wrong but I have a theory, and suspect that two ideas were at war for the script : someone wanted this to be a sublte queer romance paying hommage to yuri stories of the 70's with rival lesbians fencing, and someone else wanted this to be a straight romance spanning decades and crises paying hommage to The Way We Were and the Before Sunset/Sunrise/Midnight trilogy. I think both ideas were good, but obviously doing them at the same time is a huge challenge and 2521 is no Rose of Versailles, so as a result the story ends up somewhere in the middle, cutting both stories short. The ending is also a big middle finger to those of us who were invested in Baek Yi Jin's story arc as he ends up after so many hardships and heartbreaks being reduced to a side-note and memories. You can also make a case of the show trying to be : a "Reply" like romance that kept us guessing about the future (that went nowhere), a social commentary on the 90's crisis and the evolution of sports and journalism, a friendship is magic tale, a family drama...and in the end it all crashed with a tepid conclusion, leaving me wondering what was the point. I still adore the Na Hee Do/Beak Yi Jin high school friendship and romance but I can't ignore how the drama *completely* wasted the potential of their adult relationship (I didn't even need them to end up together, I just needed their adult story to make sense !).Was this review helpful to you?
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A Beautiful Telling of the Complexity of Love
I'm late to the Twenty Five - Twenty One party but I found it at the perfect time. Easily one of the best Kdramas I've watched in a while.I've read a number of reviews for this series - quite a few viewers feeling disappointed with how the story culminated, some lost interest in how the story progressed. I found this story to be such a beautiful telling of love and care in its most raw, complicated, exciting, delightful, difficult, painful, wonderful way. Love for your passions and the willingness to fight adversity for it, love for your family and the lengths you'll endure to protect and save them, romantic love and the way it can heal and break us and, perhaps the most important to me while watching this series, love for your community and your friends and how they can carry you through both the darkness and the light. With this in mind, how could I not love it?
Hee-do is by far my favourite character in of all time. She's brash, aggressive, so tender and sensitive. And at no point does this characterization get maligned in favour of a more palatable one. I'm grateful to the writers. The love story between her and Yi-jin was also one of my favourites of all time. The love that they share feels deeper than romance. It felt like something far reaching and soulful. It feels down to their spirit and I believe that even as adults, they love each other in a way that is less desperate, more soft and constant.
Yu-rim and Ji-ung are so special to me! Seeing their love story blossom in the ways that it did was incredibly sweet.
I will absolutely be rewatching
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A beautiful love story destined to end before it even began.
Twenty Five Twenty One” is not just another school romance — it’s a delicate portrait of young love painted with nostalgia, longing, and the quiet ache of knowing it was never meant to last.At first glance, the story might seem familiar. But the way it unfolds — so gentle, so intimate — feels like slipping through time itself. That’s why I call it a time travel story. Not because anyone jumps through years, but because we do. We’re pulled back to a moment that once was, a love that bloomed between twenty-five and twenty-one — not to witness its beginning, but to mourn its end.
Even from the title, we were warned. This wasn’t a story of “happily ever after,” but a memory preserved in amber — beautiful, untouchable, and gone. And still, knowing the ending didn’t stop my tears. Because it wasn’t the farewell that shattered me. It was the quiet cruelty of one word: Destiny.
In other stories, destiny means soulmates. It means fate pulling two hearts together. But here, destiny is what brings them close only to pull them apart. Every moment — every smile, every heartbreak, every choice — was guided by something greater than them. And though they couldn’t change the course they were given, they chose to love anyway.
They turned a doomed love into a cherished memory — one that would hurt, but also heal. Because some love stories don’t need a future to be unforgettable. They just need to have been real.
And this one was. So heartbreakingly, breathtakingly real.
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You can't watch this drama without tears)))
Twenty-Five Twenty-One is an unforgettable drama that beautifully captures the struggles and dreams of youth. It tells the story of passionate characters who are chasing their goals while learning about love, friendship, and themselves. The drama mixes lighthearted, funny moments with deep and emotional scenes, making it feel very real and relatable.One of its strongest points is the amazing cast. Every actor gives life to their role, and the chemistry between the characters feels natural. The cinematography and soundtrack also add to the emotional atmosphere, making each scene more powerful.
What makes this drama so special is how it speaks to the viewer’s heart—it’s not just about romance, but also about growing up, facing challenges, and remembering the precious moments of youth. It leaves you with both warmth and a little sadness, but most of all, with inspiration.
I would recommend Twenty-Five Twenty-One to anyone who enjoys heartfelt stories with strong characters and meaningful life lessons.
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I can't put into words how magnificent is this
Its my first review ever cuz I feel betraying this masterpiece if I don't talk about itI can't put into words the amount of joy, love, sadness, happiness and despair I felt watching it
The production is perfect, photography, OST, script, acting... agh, everything is so well done that teleports you to another space-time
it's surely one of the best productions I ever watched and days after finishing it I can't spend more than 1 hour without letting my mind fly to Beak Yi-jin and Na Hee Do and their story
Their love, their pain, the reality that knocks on your door, the end of things that should be eternal, the glory of the youth and the painful choices of life
It was worth every second I spent watching
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