RADIANT is a 2018 television anime series based on a French manfra series written and illustrated by Tony Valente. The television series is directed by Daiki Fukuoka and Seiji Kishi, and adapted by studio Lerche. Staff credits also include writer Makoto Uezu and music composer Masato Kōda. The series first aired in Japan on October 2018, and distributed by NHK Enterprise.
Background:
“Soaring among islands in the sky, witches and wizards fly on broomsticks to defeat Nemesis monsters. But the very sorcerers, who protect citizens, are persecuted by the magic Inquisition. That won’t stop Seth, a gifted young wizard, from seeking the origin of it all – the Radiant.”
Plot Synopsis via Manga Entertainment, March 2020
So as you may have noticed, we have another anime adapting a non-Japanese property. Japan has done this a fair amount for over 30-40 years now, from British source materials (Arrietty), Korean manhwa (Freezing) and even French novels (Gankutsuou). RADIANT is a French manga, known as manfra, and there’s quite a few released in France.
Crunchyroll acquired the English-speaking rights for the series and as part of their now-defunct partnership with Funimation, has the latter release the series with an English dub during broadcast and a home video release. The show was released on Blu-ray & DVD for the US & Canada as well as UK & Ireland through Manga Entertainment on behalf of Funimation. So far only the first season has been confirmed but Manga Entertainment was able to release a UK version of the Funimation limited edition with Part 2.
On-Disc Contents:
Distributor: Manga Entertainment
Released: 2nd March 2020
The standard edition release for RADIANT Season 1 Part 1 contains episodes 1-12 across two Blu-ray discs using the Funimation author. The audio options available include the Funimation English dub and the main Japanese audio with English subtitles. The white subtitles are unlockable during playback, and the region is locked to B.
Blu-ray Specs:
| Languages | English, Japanese |
| Audio | English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Japanese Dolby TrueHD 2.0 |
| Video | 1080p High Definition Native format 16:9 aspect ratio |
| Region | B |
| Subtitles | English |
| Locked Subtitles | No |
| Discs | 2 (1 BD-50, 1 BD-25) |
Blu-ray On-Disc Extra Features:
Disc 1:
- Episode 1 English Dub Commentary
Disc 2:
- Episode 12 English Dub Commentary
- RADIANT: A Sorcerer’s Tale
- RADIANT: Behind-the-Scenes
- Textless Opening Song “Utopia”
- Textless Closing Song “Radiant”
Unboxing Photos:
Final Notes:
RADIANT Season 1 is available to own on Blu-ray & DVD from Manga Entertainment. You can order Part 1 on Amazon UK.
The Normanic Vault 
Leave a comment