I give importance to carefully picking even my entertainments. The practice of watching dramas or shows on cable tv has led to either faithful viewership or disheartened disengagement.
I pick my shows based on my curiosity initially because of the synopsis. The continued watching of the show depends on the show’s entertainment value. Whether the show can keep my mind reverted or not would be the challenge for continued viewership. But the prime thing that gets to me has always been the story.
If the story has caught my interest, then I’m all tied up with the show. I’m usually there, until the very last episode. I watched “Iss Pyaar Ko Kya Naam Doon?” as a recommendation to watch by my flat friend. It was rerun of the show in Zee TV channel.
The first few episodes were a little slow for me, though it caught on after a handful of episodes. Once the protagonist got together with his lead lady love, things kind of spiced up. However, that is not the only factor for sustaining my interest. This show plays with language which was rare for me to watch.
Dialects have played such great part in the show industry. Ensuring that each character had a unique way of speaking which anchored the character in the viewer’s mind. The creators have gone to great lengths to get the exact tone and coloring of each character. That aspect, I feel is an entire entertainment package.
Rags to riches stories are usually very appealing to the general audience. Innumerable fairy tales and folktales carry instances of a poor heroine getting a rich hero. It is not all about making poor heroine rich. But it is all about the small personal stuff getting sorted out between the classes of haves and have nots.
The build up on the pasts of the lead characters was done to almost great effect. The reason that the main characters undergo change because of interaction provides great space to expand the story. The fact that, one character supports another, also add flavor to the viewing.
The choice of background music was okay; but the characters made it beautiful to watch. There is certain typical stuff from the Hindi shows; elements such as various Indian festivals, harping on Karva Chauth ceremony, and the entire marriage of the “rich-ones”. There was a fine line drawn on the modernity and traditional pitch.
I am absolutely in love with Manorama Raizada character played by Utkarsha Naik. This character is the closest to the content heavy Korean Dramas. I am a great fan of Korean Drama wherein even villains are humanized and not completely dark characters. She nailed that role so well that, it is a treasure trove for any language lover and quirky humours. The way she played with languages was such a pleasure to watch.
It is a fact that I love language of any form or type; it adds spice to my watching these shows. I learned Hindi by watching shows from a young age. My Hindi genders get all confused and could be literally embarrassing to hear; but heck man that never stopped me from speaking out in Hindi.
Sometimes, the middle class, a section of the society, is a great place to explore where dream, aspiration mingle into barely achievable realities. The fact this sector of society is much more forgiving of failures and moves ahead despite all that goes wrong with it.
Bollywood has romanticized middle class in many of its artsy or semi-commercial movies. This show also plays on the ethical turn of events, while exploring within the permits of modernity. Pseudo-live-in relationship between the lead characters kind of perks up the main interests of the viewers.
Within the permissible boundaries of societal acceptance the show writers have played with lead roles’ behavior sets. It does make the male lead a little too dark. Other characters were meek supports; but it is a fact that the entire set of characters were in pyramid style.
A wonderful triangle with solid base and sharp apex was the general setup of the show. The kidnapping alone sounded a little offbeat. But the turn of lead male character’s opinion about his mate was excellent motif to work out a different story line.
I am happy that the show creators stopped the show after a point. Honestly, all those four years and five years long shows don’t interest me at all. I am all for short series of 20 episode of sharp focus stories.
That way, I must say this show will hold your interest for more than 10 seasons. But rest of the parts in the season 11 was such a drag. I think once the villain was pulled out, then the story was ready for a closure.
But the presence of language games and social questions made the rest of the remaining episodes interesting to watch. This show was a pleasure to watch because it was set in steady build-up and with right tension factors.
Rating: 4 of 5 Hearts
Itinerant Storyteller 