If Indian TV programming was a country, I suppose the letter K would go down as a combination of Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Idi Amin and Ivan the Terrible. A ruler loved in his rise, only to be hated for eternity once its designs were revealed.
If Indian TV programming was a country, I suppose the letter K would go down as a combination of Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Idi Amin and Ivan the Terrible. A ruler loved in his rise, only to be hated for eternity once its designs were revealed.
The K programs provided an interesting dimension to a scattered realm of programs we had, heading towards the end of the last millennia. And boy! Was it not a scam! One crying bahu after the other, day after day after day
What did those TV writers sustain on? I bet they shared diets of those fallen rulers I listed above, for such was the horror they lashed upon us all. They could mould any given story line and pull a saas-bahu saga out of thin air from it.
The Indian audience, specially the younger lot (which was only growing by the day and restlessly so), needed a rebel, a messiah, a miracle. And Spartacus happened to us! God after all had mercy. There was light at the end of the tunnel. To counter the fury unleashed by the cruel K, God sent us seven super-hero alphabets. F.R.I.E.N.DS
They were our true Avengers.
It was love at first sight. Personally speaking, it was Phoebe for me. And I bet all six of them had millions thanking them for saving a lot of lives in this country. There was no more crying, no more plotting, no more reincarnation. K wasn’t the only option any longer. There was a party in town.
And as is appropriate at a great party we met some great people. We met Seinfeld, there were Will and Grace in the house (checking out the same guy though), we liked Frasier and everybody just loved Raymond! We never knew the light at the end of the tunnel would actually be the gateway to TV heaven. The Indian audience couldn’t just have enough. The K was now a subject of mockery. It could do us no harm any more. The heck! In TV heaven, they also pulled out Fresh Prince of Bell Air out of the closet for us.
Why these international sitcoms work is primarily because the young Indian viewer is increasingly living an internationally influenced life. You have guys and girls renting apartments, in the same city as their parents. All independent, loaded with ambition, connected to the world, going at a pace that’s matched to the worlds MPH (miles per hour) on life, travelling the world.
We don’t have the time to curse the evil saas over a week to uncover her sinister plot. We connect more with the goofy Sheldon (I hope he doesn’t read this article!), the lovable Ted, the crazy Dr House and the angry Charlie. They are more like us or vice versa.
We connect with the apartments, the parties, the mixed gender groups and the implying love triangles. And all of it under 22 minutes of run time and refreshed everyday!
The loyalty and love gets us dividends in TV heaven. We see an increasingly pleasant rise in Indian characters on these sitcoms, in regular or recurring roles. I suppose it’s their way of telling us “I do”.
