Kakali Bhatttacharya

I wouldn't recommend watching this series. The one star goes to Barun Sobti. Beyond that nothing is good about this show. 1. The writing sucks. The writers were experiencing a plot crisis so they tried to pull in everything like gay marriages, polygamy, adultery, friendship, love, domestic violence. But gave none of these serious issues time to develop. So then it just appeared so superficial that you couldn't root for the story or the people in it. 2. Bakwas ending - Look if the idea was to show a grown up romance that doesn't end in a marriage, that's fine. But the narration was all in the flavor of Jane Austen and Pride and Prejudice, but they never really showed how the romance was developed between the two and when they asked us to believe in the romance by doing time leaps like 6 months later, or one year later, that the main leads were together, they would manufacture some crisis that was difficult to follow. For example, how can a long distance couple ask, "What time it is over there?" when they should full well know the time difference in a long distance relationship. And what's the point of showing an elaborate framing of will they or won't they to end on the note of will they or won't they and call it adult, complicated romance. Take it from someone who made an active choice to choose her partner everything for well over a decade before getting married and it was not this complicated. 3. Barun Sobti's acting was wonderful as always, but I didn't feel the chemistry between Karan and Liz. That's the writers' and the director's fault, because most of the time they showed these two characters in conflict, or not with each other. So where would we see this chemistry? 4. If I were to do this in 10 episodes I would have shown more bonding scenes when they stayed together. I would have shown how much more Barun and Liz knew about each other than their corresponding partners via a double date scenario. I would have chosen how both of them realized that they made safe choices instead of following their hearts. And I would have made it powerful when they agreed to do the long distance and kept their flame alive. But no the writing just focused on conflicts between them even when they came together, so the actors could never develop their romance chemistry. Please save your time and don't watch it.

I know this is rated really high but for me, it was pretty horrible. First the good points. Kerem can act brilliantly. Beside him, Hande's acting fell flat and was one tone. The writing was so ridiculous that it was hard to believe half the stuff shared in this dizi. Most importantly, I don't think the writers respect women or know how to write women characters. The women characters are written from the perspective of 11-year old boys who think women are hard to figure out and at best they are annoying, stupid, hysterical, illogical, irrational, with sudden bouts of anger outbursts. The only time women can be soft and sensible is when they are lovesick. The way Eda treats Serkan is actually abusive. Expecting him to trust her who hasn't even finished her education without reading important business documents is nothing but a cruel move. If Serkan did it to Eda it would be considered abuse. None of the stuff Eda did is cute. But because the writers don't know how to write women's characters, they think playing games is all that a woman know how to do to be cute. So if we flip the script and have Serkan do all the things Eda has done to him what would this look like? 1. Lie to Eda about a business sabotage and not take responsibility. 2. Ask Eda to sign a contract without reading and intimidate her that wanting to read is a character flaw. 3. Ask Eda to not look at a business document when she is in charge of the whole company and when she wants to read it, shame her for not trusting him and force her to move through with the contract without reading. 4. Continuously play games instead of communicating directly. 5. Any communication where Serkan is angry would be done via throwing things around Eda's house and breaking her stuff. 6. Angrily handcuffing Eda after damaging her property when she wanted to call the police. And there is more. This is all that Eda did to Serkan and none of it was cute or would have been cute if Serkan did it to Eda. People would have read it as toxic and abusive moves. But the writers are so lazy and immature that they think this is what creates romance and love sparks. This is just glorifying patriarchy at best and disrespecting women at worst. I would have loved to have seen Serkan with someone else for Eda to realize how selfish and bratty she had been. Even in the end where Serkan was sleeping outside and catching a cold, Eda went on punishing him. Yet she didn't tell him that he had a child for half a decade. If she was so righteous about why did Serkan lie earlier in the series then why would it make it okay for her to lie? Regardless of whether Serkan was ready to be a father, good or bad, he had a right to know. So every toxic move Eda did is right and everything Serkan did is wrong. By the end, Serkan changed so much, he was emasculated. Eda, on the other hand, had zero change. She was selfish, bratty, manipulative, immature, and cold-hearted whenever she wanted. This is bad storytelling where one character has all this development, and the one that is continuously making toxic move stays constant. What I don't understand is how can people turn off all of their rationality to find such behavior cute or romantic or desirable in a partner even if it is fictitious.

I still need to finish the series. But what I have seen so far has been disappointing. For example, I don't understand why Haziran reacts so angrily to Poyraz for no reason. All he did was tell her to leave when he found out she was trespassing on his factory, and she did more than trespassing; she stole financial details and created a hardship. But then Haziran feels guilty and, to make up wants to build a hotel, and they get into a partnership. But no matter what Poyraz says, in the calmest of all manners, Haziran reacts wildly. I wonder why the writers wrote Haziran's character in that manner. Do the writers not think that women can be rational, logical beings? Then Haziran says, at one point, I feel guilty and hate Poyraz. As a viewer, I wonder where these intense feelings come from, especially after Haziran discovers how well-loved and respected Poyraz is. If Poyraz treated Haziran the way she treated him, people would think what a horrible person Poyraz is. But when Haziran does it, then it's cute. This is such a toxic dynamic to normalize. The writers portrayed Haziran as so entitled that she thinks when she is trespassing and playing corporate espionage, the person whose privacy she is violating and their representative should be sweet to her. When she bribes someone to do her work first, and the person is offended, she thinks what she has done is okay and having integrity is not okay. When she cannot cook, and Poyraz says he will cook for her, not only is she giving him attitude, but also demanding that he brings the food to her soon because she is angry. How can someone who claims that they have hate in their heart for another person demand that they feed you and then require that they provide you on your schedule? Why do the writers think this is cute? No matter what Poyraz says, Haziran barks at or jabs at him while he is calm. Under these conditions, no emotionally healthy man with self-esteem will fall in love with a girl like Haziran or tolerate her. The actor who plays Haziran and the director made too many bad choices, along with the lousy character development of Haziran. No matter what Poyraz says, Haziran reacts like he said the most vile thing in the world. Why such overreaction and overacting? Haziran has a message from Nehir to go to the sun cave. So did Poyraz. Haziran gets catty and jabs Poyraz as to why he is there. Does this woman have no ability to ask a question first instead of jumping to the worst possible conclusion about Poyraz? And if she is so quick to judge so poorly, how or why would anyone develop feelings of love for her unless they like dysfunctional dynamics? Even when he realizes Poyraz must have had a complicated past, or when everyone else says how decent Poyraz is and how he has helped people, what do the writers make Haziran say, "Part-time human and full-time rude person." So, it doesn't matter what Poyraz does; Haziran will continuously bash, jab, attack, and yell at him, and according to the writers, Haziran's character still thinks Poyraz is rude. In what universe does this make an iota of sense? I am suspending my judgment a lot, but even within this storytelling context, it makes no sense that a human would act so offensively and rudely and have no self-awareness but call someone else rude who has done nothing rude to them.

Zoya misses the mark I have been a fan of Zoya Akhtar’s films because she brings an emotional intelligence to her storytelling. Up until now, her casting in her prior movies was stellar. In DDD, I believed that Ranveer and Priyanka were siblings in a dynsfunctional family who finally had the courage to have a difficult conversation. In ZNMD, I believed the three friends who went on a trip and created a lifetime worth of memories while moving out of their comfort zones. Zoya’s movies have always had a sensible emotional arc that this one completely misses. The positives: Cinematography was wonderful. I was fully convinced that there is a town like Riverdale in northern India and it looked like what Zoya presented. Knocked it out of the park, hence the 1 star rating. The not so positive: The cast had no chemistry with each other. The Archie comics took the time to develop the characters to make them endearing, so much so, reading the comics I wanted to be friends with them. The characters in this movie did not inspire friendship vibes at all. Also I understand it is difficult to have the kind of character development the comics had versus portraying that in a movie. But Archie came across as a two-timing jerk that played like a lost puppy when he got caught instead of taking responsibility. He even justified being deceptive and playing with people’s feelings just because he can because he was single. This is super emotionally unintelligent and different from Zoya’s earlier movies. Agastya Nanda, with all his resources, was at best a mediocre actor, but realistically a very poor actor. His Hindi diction was cringeworthy. Suhana…sigh. Given that SRK’s production company was part of this movie, I am not surprised that nepotism got Suhana the role of Ronnie. But she acted so poorly that I had to wonder how bad her other takes were that they decided to portray what they did on the screen as her best takes. She can’t act. She has no screen presence. They dressed her in unflattering outfits. And most of the time her makeup was so off, that not only did she not have the glamor of Veronica, she appeared to blend in with the background. Not for a minute could I believe that she was Veronica. At best it looked like someone doing a TikTok video of saying some lines and filming it. It was HORRIBLE and she is unwatchable as Veronica. The storyline was all over the place with plot holes, abrupt jumps, no proper character development. So everyone appeared to be a caricature or a faint resemblance of a human. The lines were so ridiculous that at many points I wondered if any human being would ever say them out loud. Khushi was okay but none of these star kids showed any kind of talent to deserve these roles. I am sure that if nepotism wasn’t at play here, this would have been a better movie. Sometimes bad storytelling can be really saved by good acting. That wasn’t the case here. If you’re bored and want to kill some time, watch it. But manage your expectations. Zoya missed the mark hugely on this one.