K-Drama Review: Radiant

Sanskriti Pun, Delhi

Radiant, also known as ‘Dazzling’ or ‘The Light in Your Eyes’ is considered as one of the highest-rated Korean dramas of all time due to its unique and genius storyline. Since this masterpiece isn’t known to many people, therefore, I will be shedding some light on this drama so that it reaches more and more audience.

First of all, it stars the brilliant actor Nam Joo-hyuk as Lee Joon-ha and, noteworthy actresses Han Ji-min and Kim Hye-ja for the role of Kim Hye-ja. This drama is about a young and optimistic girl named Kim Hye-ja whose ambition is to become a news anchor. In her journey towards pursuing her dreams, she meets Lee Joon-ha who wants to become a reporter. Joon-ha is an extremely hardworking man, but his life is full of struggles and disappointments. Due to several coincidences, the friendship between Kim Hye-ja and Lee Joon-ha starts to bloom. However, everything changes all of a sudden when Hye-ja turns into a 70-year-old woman due to a magical watch that she uses to save her father from an accident.

Since this event, every incident in the drama starts taking negative turns. Lee Joon-ha gives up on his dream to become a reporter due to the poor circumstances of his family and takes up another job at an old age home. At the old age home, Hye-ja meets Joon-ha but due to her sudden changes in appearance after becoming an old woman, he isn’t able to recognize her but since Hye-ja cares about Joon-ha, she pretends to be Hye-ja’s grandmother and continues to help him out.

After her transformation into an old woman, she realizes the value of time and starts to find the watch, which she eventually finds but is unable to reverse the action or turn back the time. This makes Hye-ja extremely sad but she somehow tries her best to remain positive. She also comes to understand the hardships that old people have to go through such as performing daily routine activities as they become extremely difficult for her to carry out.

Radiant is one such drama that I recommend everyone to watch as it will change your perspective of how you view the world. It made me realize that old people shouldn’t be considered as a burden on society rather should be considered as valuable assets who have so much to share with the world with their wisdom and knowledge. It also taught me the importance of time and that we shouldn’t hold back from doing what we want to do when it is possible at that moment. We all have a very limited time in this world so we should do all those things that our heart desires because there is no certainty that we will be alive tomorrow or not. Overthinking about the consequences prevents us from enjoying our life to the fullest in the present moment. Radiant is just a beautiful reminder in the form of a drama, that has done a great job in delivering this message. It is also available on Netflix! Let me know your comments about this drama!