What a view | The best shows this week: Twenty Five Twenty One on Netflix, Earth Day specials on BBC Earth
- Netflix K-drama Twenty Five Twenty One is an endearing, nostalgic fable about the importance of holding on to one’s dreams
- BBC Earth celebrates Earth Day with an all-day marathon of landmark series including The Green Planet, as well as The Mating Game: The Making Of
When the hero of a romantic comedy-drama rides in on a newspaper delivery boy’s bike instead of a white horse, you know times are hard.
So they prove for Baek Yi-jin (Nam Joo-hyuk), whose father’s companies have fallen victim to the 1997 Asian financial crisis in Twenty Five Twenty One (Netflix; first series now available).
Into his life, and reduced circumstances, comes Kim Tae-ri, looking something like half her age as adolescent schoolgirl and sometime fencing prodigy Na Hee-do.
Her gold-medal dreams have evaporated partly because of her youth, a disapproving mother and a lack of funding for school sport – another casualty of the crisis.
Mature, conscientious Yi-jin is desperate for any work – hence, for a 22-year-old, the unlikely paper round – which facilitates his improbable meeting with Hee-do.