The Indian counterpart of America’s hit series’ 24 premiered to a grand response on Colors TV
After watching teasers and first look of the show for months, Anil Kapoor’s 24 finally premiered last night. The show received immense response on micro-blogging site Twitter and not only fans but celebrities from the film industry couldn’t stop raving about this game-changing show. Well, after seeing my Twitter Timeline filled with such lovey-dovey tweets I couldn’t wait to watch the episode. Sadly, I missed it on TV but hey now we live in a modern world so off I went to check on Youtube only to realise the show isn’t available on the video site but only on the channel’s official website. Ah well, a video is a video right?
So let me get this straight. Since I have never watched the American ‘24’, so this review is then from the point of view of a first-time viewer of this series. While I confess I didn’t have huge expectations from the Indian version considering the Jhakaas Anil Kapoor was playing the main lead. In fact, I even asked you people if you think the show would live up to its standards, if you don’t remember then go ahead click here.
To begin with, the experience of watching this show was beyond great. I now understand why everyone was going so crazy about it because the show actually managed to set new standards, forget living up to expectations. The storyline is intriguing, impactful, the production value is par excellence and such a brilliant set of actors who in the first episode onwards set their characters firmly. I really liked Tisca Chopra in the first episode and the way she played the quiet wife of Anil Kapoor and the tensed mother. Made me think how difficult family life must be for our cops.
Secondly, I am really happy to see Mandira Bedi back on TV after such a long time! Playing the senior officer in ATU (Anti-Terrorist Unit) Mandira underplayed her character developing that she shared a love interest with Anil Kapoor. The point was made so subtly that you instantly want to know more. The Singhania family, especially the PM-to-be Neil Bhoopalam played his character well and right from the beginning their plot focused on the dirty politics. Quite interesting. Anupam Kher’s role was short but I am actually looking forward to see him in the coming episodes.
And then we come to the man of the hour, Jai Singh Rathod a.k.a Anil Kapoor. Looks like he was desperately waiting to play his character because he was flawless! He had the right kind of attitude to be the ATU head, little bit of drama that just comes along with his personality and a humble family man running between his duties towards family and the nation. He definitely exceeded all my expectations and now I don’t even mind if he turns a bit a filmy in one of the episodes, I already love Jai Singh Rathod!
The show is being directed by Abhinay Deo and he’s done an impressive job with the premiere episode. My friend actually told me the plot of this show is exactly like the American one and since he has watched the complete series of original 24 I’m going to believe him and hopefully rest of the season follows suit and each episode turns out to be better than before.
I am just confused with the whole clock thing. See the episode is suppose to show the happenings that take place within an hour and like this they will complete 24 episodes, showing 24 hours in a day. In the beginning of the episode itself Anil Kapoor tells us about the format but they show the clock only before taking a break, kind of making you think if so much time has really passed. It would be great if they could just place the clock on top of the screen giving you the feel of ‘real time’.
And also some dialogues are really cheesy and not to mention cliché. But the cutest one was when Anupam Kher tells Anil Kapoor, “dosti ki hai toh nibhaani toh padegi!” Filminess is just in our blood!
Other than receiving great reviews the show is already being called ‘The biggest dawn on Indian Television’ and ‘the new face of Indian Television’ and what not. Point being that audiences think this could be our revolutionary show which will change the fate of Indian TV, out will be your dose of daily soaps and we will be soon welcoming different genres on TV. Well, as good and ambitious as that may sound I still think it’s a far-fetched idea. Yes, 24 is a step towards evolution of TV but there’s a reason why daily soaps are running with such high TRPs. Today many of us may not even know if an American 24 even exists plainly because we aren’t even exposed to world television that widely.
So let’s celebrate this small victory for Indian TV and kudos to Anil Kapoor and Colors CEO Raj Nayak for making this happen. It was even said that both these personalities put in their personal money on stake to get this show to India. Well, I say it was totally worth it!
The first episode has me so hooked that I am totally going to watch it regularly now other than my dose of Comedy Nights with Kapil, our local ATU guys CID (duh!) and obviously Bigg Boss – Saath 7 because life is nothing without a little dose of mindless TV!
