You & Everything Else
은중과 상연 (Literal: Two Women)
Netflix (Late 2025) 15 Episodes
Female Friendship, Grade: A+
Korean Drama Review by Jill, USA
(End Spoilers)
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Beautifully filmed with two of Korea's top actresses as its stars, You And Everything Else (2025), is a Netflix series based on the story of an old female friendship that is re-established after several years apart, with new secrets revealed, including one in which one of the ladies is suffering from a life-threatening illness. What occurs as they grow close again cements their enduring friendship as an eternal one. Very spiritual and quite unforgettable in the K-Drama World.
Stars Kim Go Eun (Goblin) and Park Ji Hyun (See You At Work Tomorrow) bring out a dynamic, realistic relationship on screen so much so that the viewer really believes they are true friends in real life as well. Some of these sublime emotions just can not be faked for the camera! In fact, famous actress Ye Jin Son publicly stated that she was so impressed with this drama and the actresses' profoundly realistic performances that she hoped it would win an International Emmy.
Directed by Jo Yeong Min (Do You Like Brahms?) and penned by Song Hye Jin (unforgettable film Love, Lies) and with gorgeous cinematography and wistful OST, about the only criticism I can give this beauty is that I feel it would have been even better if they had taken it to the typical 16 episode K-drama length instead of just 15 episodes. By the end I just didn't want to part from these two fine lady characters / actresses who played dear friends so magnificently.
The Story:
This is the story of Ryu Eun Jeong (Kim Go Eun), a successful television writer whose rather routinely safe life is shaken up when a childhood friend, Cheon Sang Yeon (Park Ji Hyun), a successful movie producer, reappears into her life with no warning after several years. The story goes back in flashbacks to their childhood friendship, showing us that Ryu Eun Jeong came from an ordinary middle class family but was attracted to friend Cheon Sang Yeon's intelligence and good nature, and also intrigued by her family background of wealth and privilege. There are also supporting characters that emerge, like Sang Hak, Cheon Sang Yeon's brother who gave Ryu Eun Jeong an unusual, expensive gift that had sparked her love of photography, but the true strength of this story is in the developing relationship between these two women.
Over time several misunderstandings pull the two ladies apart temporarily, although they sometimes reconnect briefly in their twenties and thirties, usually professionally, since they are in similar entertainment fields and often thrown together through those venues. Now in their early 40's, the two women realize they yearn to spend some quality renewed time together, to try and recapture their childhood friendship as best they can, but in new ways.
However, as they reconnect personally, and spend more time together socially, instead of just professionally, it is eventually revealed that Sang Yeon is sick from a life-threatening cancer. Eun Jeong is traumatized by the news and wants to spend as much time as possible giving her old friend moral and physical support.
When Sang Yeon learns her cancer is definitely terminal she decides she wants to end her life in as much physical comfort and peace as possible, and she arranges to go to a part of Europe which oversees terminal cancer patients ending their lives in a beautiful scenic countryside setting, with as much autonomy and pain relief as is available medically. Sang Yeon requests that Eun Jeong accompany her on her final journey in life. At first Eun Jeong isn't sure that is wise, but eventually agrees to her best friend's passionate request. They travel to Europe together and settle down into a cottage to enjoy as much as possible Sang Yeon's final moments in life. (So well done, I found myself thinking that everyone on earth should be able to leave their lives in such an exquisite way!).
You and Everything Else makes us question friendships and real-life decisions. The series shows us that often our main problems as humans are in understanding and forgiving each other; we need to do that far more than we generally do in life. When past secrets are revealed, and emotions erupt, the drama reminds us that we humans are complex individuals, but that we can also heal and move on, even eternally! Check out this mystical drama on Netflix and see if you are as moved by its story as I was. Enjoy!
