Dear X Episode 1-2 Recap: A Dark Tale of Control and Revenge

In Dear X Episode 1-2, Baek Ah-jin’s story starts with pain. As a child, she watched her mother drink and hit her often. Her father does nothing until one day, he drags her mother outside and throws her down the stairs.

He tells Ah-jin to say her mother fell while drunk. Her mother begs for help, but Ah-jin just walks away.

Years later, Ah-jin becomes a famous actress. Cameras flash as she walks the red carpet, cold and elegant. But she isn’t normal. The screen tells us she has an antisocial disorder.

She uses people for her own gain. She has caused two deaths and will soon be responsible for another.

The story jumps to 2016. Ah-jin is now a high school student. Her class plans a birthday surprise for their teacher, Ms. Kwak. Things turn ugly when photos of Ms. Kwak’s affair appear on the school board.

Ashamed, Ms. Kwak resigns. Ah-jin quietly asks if she liked her “gift.” It’s revenge for when Ms. Kwak once called her an orphan.

Her classmate Sim Sung-hee becomes angry. She’s always been second to Ah-jin and hates it. She once saw Ah-jin talking to the art teacher, and when she asked about it, Ah-jin warned her to stop being nosy.

School Drama Turns Ugly

Another student, Joon-seo, clearly likes Ah-jin. He even gives up his debate team spot for her. This forces Ah-jin to work with Sung-hee. Sung-hee vents about it to her mother, who promises to take care of it.

Ah-jin lives alone in a tiny apartment. Joon-seo visits her, and they find a love letter from Sung-hee in his bag. The next day, Sung-hee spreads word that Ah-jin is an orphan. Her mother also complains to the school, and Ah-jin gets removed from the debate team.

Ah-jin retaliates by giving Sung-hee a fake letter from Joon-seo filled with cruel words. Later, the debate contest was canceled after a bribery leak. Sung-hee blames Ah-jin and dumps a bucket of water on her.

Ah-jin secretly runs a small loan operation with another student, Kim Jae-o. He once stole AirPods, and Ah-jin caught him. Since then, they’ve worked together. Jae-o visits a restaurant and threatens a student’s mother for repayment.

When Joon-seo finds Ah-jin drenched, he takes her to the nurse’s office. She pretends to be scared of Sung-hee and asks for help. Meanwhile, Jae-o is caught by a teacher with his loan book. In the confusion, Sung-hee grabs his phone.

The Final Blow

Jae-o later reassures Ah-jin that he didn’t reveal her name. She hugs him — but Sung-hee sees this. She now knows Ah-jin is behind everything.

The next day, Sung-hee spills juice on Ah-jin’s lunch and mocks her. She threatens to expose Ah-jin’s loan business. But Joon-seo steps in and tells Sung-hee to stop fighting. He pretends to like her just to calm her down.

Ah-jin and Jae-o plot again. She spies on Sung-hee’s locker code while Joon-seo distracts her. Sung-hee gets a note calling her to the art room, thinking it’s from Joon-seo. She walks in and sees Ah-jin holding hands with the art teacher.

At the same time, Jae-o sneaks money meant as a teacher’s gift into Sung-hee’s locker. When the money is reported missing, students find it there along with Jae-o’s phone.

Sung-hee accuses Ah-jin of dating the art teacher. But the homeroom teacher, who’s engaged to that same man, gets furious. Ah-jin plays innocent and claims it was all counseling talk. Jae-o posts a video of everything online, causing chaos for Sung-hee’s family.

Ah-jin’s final blow comes when she reveals that Sung-hee’s father had an affair with the teacher from before. Sung-hee’s family reputation crumbles.

Episode 2 – The Past Comes Back: Episode 2 Breakdown

Episode 2 starts with Ah-jin visiting her mother’s grave. She admits she once faked an injury to gain sympathy. That’s how she got connected to the counseling center.

Flashback to 2007. Ah-jin’s mother forces her to steal alcohol from a store. Later that night, her mother dies. Her father, Baek Sun-gyu, soon marries Hwang Ji-sun, a woman whose husband also died mysteriously. Ji-sun’s son is Joon-seo.

Joon-seo’s grandfather controls his inheritance, and Ji-sun can’t touch it. One night, Ah-jin overhears her father and Ji-sun plotting to sell videos of her to make money and then dump her at an orphanage.

In 2016, after the chaos at school, Sung-hee meets Sun-gyu outside and brings him in to humiliate Ah-jin. But Joon-seo steps in again, offering Sun-gyu money to leave.

Ah-jin then “drops” Sung-hee’s secret notebook, where she labeled classmates with cruel nicknames. The others find it, and Sung-hee gets beaten.

Soon, Ah-jin catches the attention of Seo Mi-ri, a talent agency CEO. Joon-seo gives his grandfather’s money to help Ah-jin pay her tuition, but her father finds out and steals it.

A Past That Refuses to Die

The flashback reveals how cruel Ah-jin’s childhood was. She once told Ji-sun she knew Joon-seo’s real father was Mr. Kang, not Ji-sun’s late husband. She blackmailed Ji-sun into keeping her around.

Ji-sun tries to kill her in a bathtub, but Joon-seo sees it and stops her. Ah-jin runs away and jumps out a window, but survives. Later, in the hospital, Joon-seo promises to never let go of her hand.

In 2017, Ah-jin woke up after being unconscious for three days. She’s missed her college admission deadline. The next day, she attends graduation, looking lost and angry.

While walking home, she sees a man chasing a thief. She watches him, and her narration says that if she hadn’t met him that day, his life would be very different.

The episode closes with Jae-o sketching Ah-jin’s portrait from his prison cell.

The drama Dear X uses calm pacing but carries deep tension. Each scene shows how manipulation becomes Ah-jin’s survival tool. Her intelligence feels sharp but broken. Every person she meets either gets used or destroyed.

It’s not easy to feel sympathy for her, yet it’s hard to look away. The show mixes tragedy, revenge, and moral confusion. It asks one simple question — when pain becomes power, what’s left of innocence?

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