Drama review – Descendants of the Sun

By Gulsameen Nauhani

Descendants Of The Sun is a 2016 South Korean television series that tells about the love story between a surgeon and a soldier. Descendants of the sun refer to the reference of the sun that shines to warm others and provides ease and robustness to them. Similarly, the South Korean series represents the sacrifices, bravery, and their life long service of soldiers and doctors for their country and people within 16 episodes.

The series mainly revolved around the life of doctors and soldiers who left behind their personal life for others’ safety. The main roles were authentically played by ‘Song Joong Ki,’ as captain ‘Yoo Shii Jin’, ‘Sang Hye Kyo’ as doctor ‘Kang Mo Yeon’. Another bravely solder ‘Jim Hoo’ as ‘Seo Dae young’ and an army doctor ‘Kim Jo Won’ as ‘Yoon Myeong Joo,’ with plenty of other roles played by well-talented Korean actors that made the series both heart-wrenching and hilarious at the same time.

This series is based on a secluded lifestyle of a doctor who spent most of her time in a surgery room than with her family. The drama is about a soldier who continued risking his life for promoting peace, happiness, and prosperity in his country, just like the descendance of the sun that is genuinely sparkling for others. The drama even gets more exciting when both doctors and soldiers work together to protect people.

The most enthralling part of the series was the unity of the soldiers and doctors to defend the hostages and the victims of a deadly earthquake. One after the other deadly disasters approached, testing the bravery and patience of them but yet they fought with enthusiasm and rescued most of the people except few.

When the wrecks of the earthquake almost finished, a virus impacted most of the patients, doctors, and soldiers, but there was another successful triumph of the struggle of the unity which dwindled the cases from surging.

The main theme of drama was that no matter how worse the situations gets, doctors and soldiers are never off to their duties, they will always give first priority to their patients and people as per the oath they take before initiating their new journey. Therefore, a doctor will treat his patients, no matter how sick he is, and the soldiers will go to war, no matter how sick they are, just to protect the people who always pleases them.

I was more concerned to know how a doctor and a soldier will live a thrilling life together despite serving in the most prestigious and grueling jobs. Each time when they had time to catch up, they were compelled to head off towards their duties. This hit them hard sometimes as they thought it would not be possible for them to be together in the future. But as it says, ” Where there is a will, there is a way.” They were always struggling together to be honest with themselves and their jobs, that’s why they always supported each other in their jobs.

Their support and affection for each other helped their love sparkle in earthquakes, wars, and in a phase of a deadly virus. These 16 episodes covered up realities that soldiers and doctors faced. How they do not get beautiful moments with family while fulfilling oath and promises. Both doctors and soldiers are serving till their death unlike other professions, as other professions have a time limit but when it is on health and life, it is always being conscious and struggling to live healthy and working all day. We must respect the professions people have who are served for our safety.

Furthermore, I enjoyed this series, but for me the most miserable time to watch this series was in the last two episodes where I almost could not accumulate the guts to bear the truth about how a soldier’s life actually ends. Fortunately, everything got settled with the surgeon, and the soldier became together again. The soldiers survived in those deadly situations where they were almost killed. It is a fact that soldiers are trained to kill and to get protected from dying because they live to let others live peacefully.

The drama is mainly based on the reality, the reality of every doctor, and the soldier belonging to every country. Each country has been shielded behind the sacrifices that most soldiers gave on their way to duty.
It is about doctors who are honest with their duties and when unfortunately they end in smoke to protect their patients, they become fragile and continue sobbing. Therefore, we must appreciate their daily life struggle and should be thankful for a life they are living for our prosperity.

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