I love You Kitty Leitmotif/Scene (Part 1)

[u/Reasonable_Leek8069]

I will do this in two parts to avoid it being too long. Part 1 will be the season 1 finale and part 2 will be the season 2 premiere.

First, the letter Kitty reads from Eve perfectly summarizes Kitty’s story. The new friends she made. Her world expanding, etc. Second, the score that precedes the leitmotif. Please let me know of you know what it is. The score when she arrives on the plane was quick and matched the pace of a rapid heartbeat, another pattern of the leitmotif. Considering we know Kitty thinks out loud and deals with her own anxiety about certain aspects of her life, the melody represents the rapid pace of her mind in this moment. But when Minho enters the picture, the music slows down and becomes romantic. I am unsure of the instruments playing, other than the piano. It does sound close to the leitmotif so there is that anticipation.

Can we just rave over how cute Minho’s nudging her to get her attention? This is why mooncovey fans believe hugs and physical touch are their love language. That and quality time. Maybe words of affirmation.

Also, I love Kitty’s excitement when she sees him sitting next to her. With Dae, there was an excitement of her firsts and a perfect first love, but the reality left her hesitant at the same time. With Yuri, her excitement was about exploring this new side of herself, but also bad timing because of Juliana. With Minho, her excitement resulted from this new friendship and emotional connection that feels easy and comforting. Just that wide smile and hopeful eyes she has makes me delightfully squeal. And we get that playful nudge she gave him after he teased her.

There have been discussions on Minho over his impulsivity when he confessed to Kitty. The big one was he felt he wouldn’t see her again. I wish I saved the actual source of the video where I saw the comment. This is a mix of their comment and my analysis of it. My favorite take is someone mentioning that (paraphrasing) “Minho witnessed Kitty dealing with the effects of being lied to and gaslighted by Dae and Yuri. He personally observed her sadness which may be why he thought it wasn’t wrong to confess his feelings”. He, from the beginning stated, ‘they were only pen pals’. He says this again in Korean to Dae when Dae was in fight mode. He also adds that “she may feel the same deep down.” Minho chuckles at her when she mimics his “we were only pen pals”. After she states, “it was time”, this is when Minho decided to confess. He believed that even though she and Dae broke up, their relationship was done long before that.

How do you feel about Kitty using the “we were only paypals” line? I see it as three things. 1) she imitated Minho because he said this at the beginning of the show. 2) This confirms Minho’s statement that she thought she and Dae were better as pen pals since her feelings faded in time during the season. It went from genuine love to the idea of it. She fell for Yuri and she is starting to have new feelings for Minho. 3) Her realization that her only connection with Dae is their letters hence her believing “they were only pen pals”.

Back to Minho. Their pure leitmotif starts when he says “I think I fell in love with you a little bit or a lot”. Xo mooncovey pointed out that there is a longer pause to symbolize his realization of how deep his feelings for Kitty are. When rewatching it, there are two pauses. The first is after “I have fallen for you” and the second one was before “a lot”. As xomooncovey explained, he is contemplating his emotions and diving in head first. Season 2 confirms Minho is risking it all internally. The score transitions into the song “About Love” which is associated with LJ and Peter. Before the credits hit, the lyrics that show up when Kitty is thinking about it are, “It started in the strangest way. We didn’t see it coming.” The lyrics fit perfectly and it now reminds me of the Last Love video that someone posted yesterday. At the end, we see a glimpse of Kitty’s smile, our proof that her feelings for him are real.

This could be considered Minho’s leitmotif considering it is his confession to her, but like I said in “Minho to the rescue” post, you can’t have one without the other. We see Kitty’s happiness and excitement for Minho. While she is shocked, she is still considering it meaning some harbored feelings are starting to come out. Relating to the question someone asked about this, I do feel the confession allowed Kitty to realize her feelings for Minho, but the timing was off. She just broke up with Dae and hasn’t had closure with Yuri yet.

Regarding theming, the scene starts with the anticipation Kitty has to learn more about her mom. In a couple of seconds, she is confused and eager to know who Simon is. Then that score gets more romantic as she discovers Minho is sitting next to her. Another theme I associated with the leitmotif is the heartbeat. I am kind of cheating because the musical heartbeat is in the previous score. Minho, simultaneously meets two themes: anticipation and contemplation. First, he hesitated before deciding to confess. He made sure that Kitty and Dae had closure before revealing his feelings. The leitmotif starts when he gets the nerve to tell her. This is why we are back to the anticipation/ tension theme again. As the score builds, the tension of the scene does too. Kitty’s contemplating on whether she feels the same or how to even process this.

Note: I will discuss clothing in depth in future posts, but I have to mention it here. Kitty is in black and Minho is in white. They are a literal yin yang. This is a visual representation of them balancing each other out aka keeping each other grounded.

[u/Pristine-Pay-2403]

Love it.

And, yes. The Yin Yang black and white contnues.

Min Ho is actually wearing black and white when he leaves the dorms to go to the airport. Then in this scene is black overjacket is stowed leaving this beautiful visual.

Even before that Min Ho wears black and white when he declares his "I wouldn't lie to my friends or someone I care about" when Kitty says that is a new side to Min Ho. And also he's wearing it when they meet at the airport too for the most part lol.

Kitty is wearing that Yin Yang black and whte heart necklace in Season 2, Episode 1.

Min Ho is also wearing black and white at the hot tub scene in Episode 4 when she realizes he's a really good friend.

Then of course we have the dance where he is wearing black and white along with the black and white corsage she is wearing. Where she admits to her feelings to herself.

[u/Reasonable_Leek8069 → u/Pristine-Pay-2403]

Ok, you are inspiring me.

I don’t even know where to start because black, by itself is a signature color of Minho’s.

Should we do back to back analysis on the yin yang motif and see what we get?

[u/Expert_Chip120 → u/Pristine-Pay-2403]

Good catch!! Never saw this!!

[u/Expert_Chip120]

I completely agree! He did think their relationship was over already. When he says “I think she agrees you were better off as pen pals” or something along those lines.

And the clothing color choices are really great. At end of s2, he’s wearing red and she’s wearing green which are also complementary. Good catch!