Originally posted by: sashashyam
Folks,
🤗
The Entry of the Emperor: Oh, all right, emperor in the works. Never mind. At the risk of displeasing a whole lot of you, I must confess that Rajat's fantasy intro - for that is what it was, complete with incredible leaps and twirls and spinning in the air that would have won any contestant the top award in Jhalak Dikhla Ja - seemed to me to be rather underwhelming. It was all wonky camera work, and the mid-air creation of that seven-spears-turned-into-one-lethal-wheel was less than convincing.
@bold: 🤣 🤣 Seriously I could not get anything about that scene. What the hell that happened, how he managed to make that special spiked wheel from those spears with the help of the ropes while jumping and spinning like superheroes did not get into my head. 😆 I must admit that I enjoyed the scene- it came amusing to me, just the way we can get free laughing session watching Rajnikant movies, but a least real approach is needed as well! Is Chandra going to act like a super human in the whole show, sometimes Krishh, sometimes Batman and spiderman or will he do any real fighting scenes too without much use of visual effect! Better to say nothing about the camera work!🥱
Why the devil, since Chanakya is clearly training his students in sword fighting, did they simply not cut Chandra loose with his sword? Then it would have been like a deadly, literally, combination of balletic grace and lethally swift and unerring swordsmanship.
Instead, we got this bizarre fight choreography where all those seven thugs, soldiers, mercenaries, bandits, whatever, stood stock still, their spears all extended to almost touch Chandra, without moving to attack him till he dropped to his knees, preparatory to attacking them. They could have reduced him to a pincushion if they had all moved in unison at the first moment itself. Ratna, my Bahubali encylopaedia, where are you? Do tell me if this too was an inspiration' from rBahubali!😉
The action direction of Balaji's Historicals is really bad!🤢 I just hope we are going to see some better action scenes afterward, and not like the 'mirchi war' for heaven's sake! 😆
The soldiers (thugs/mercenaries/bandits) were such callas!! 😡 Can't even manage their spears and have come to fight! Huh!😆😆 And suddenly so many dusts and smoke spread over the screen just the moment Chandra stepped in! Ajeeb!😕
Never mind, Rajat's Chandragupta compensated for all this to a large extent. During the fight, his eyes were grimly narrowed under straight brows, with the sharp planes of the face heightening its already hard look. But once it was over, his whole aspect changed. Not to a smiling pleasantness, but to a relaxed stillness.
Actually I hardly could concentrate on Rajat's expression as the camera's angle was changing it's direction every moment and was roaming here and there and I was confused and busy in laughing. 😆 🤣
The face, framed by an abundance of wavy curls, looked more like the head of one of the statues in the Athens Museum than anything Indian. And unexpectedly young. He could have been eighteen instead of the twenty four he is supposed to be.
The most that I liked in this episode is Rajat's hair. 🤣 And such an eye-soothing change of his get-up after horrible degradation of his looks in bearded Akbar time. 😆
A unique equation: Chandragupta's whole body language throughout that segment is superbly fine-tuned. When he is addressing Chanakya, his eyes are lowered out of respect for his guru, and the voice, though firm, is never raised. He takes the slap without flinching and without protest. When he disagrees with the guru, this too is done with all possible respect, eyes still lowered.
But he is totally matter of fact in his recital of how things happened, neither striving for effect nor trying to convince Chanakya. It is clear that he is sure of how Chanakya will receive what he has to say. What all this shows is the unique relationship the two of them share, a relationship of complete mutual faith and trust, but not one of equality, which is how it should be.
👏Loved reading this part aunty. Your deep observation and deduction of the single expressions leads my mind to think differently about the scene again. 😳 After reading this part I am loving that particular segment too much... I would not be able to understand the unique chemistry between Chanakya-Chandragupta shared in this scene without your vision 😳
But bechara Chandu got a slap from his guru for nothing!😭😆
Rampant nepotism: I got an unpleasant shock when the gigantic Chetan Hansraj, aka Malayaketu, hove into view without warning, Chandra's sword at his neck in a lightning defensive move. Does Ekta have to thrust this chap down the gullets of the viewers in every historical of hers? I only hope she does not have Ashwini Kalsekar and Lavina Tandon too waiting in the wings, ready to bounce into this show at the first opportunity. That would be really too much!
🤣 Chetan, who looks even elder than Mr. Nand, is the classmate of Chandra! 🤣 I suppose he is the super-senior student of the university, who is unable to complete his degree over years, and trying to pass with all his tenacity since the year when Chandra was born! 😆 We may see some scenes of ragging by Senior Malayaketu to junior Chandra's friends, and Chandra to confront him with his 'mastishk' a.l.a 3 Idiots. 🤣
For Ashwini and Lavina, I can't hope anything. Anything can happen anyday. 😆
Now I suppose we shall have to endure this Malayaketu for God knows how many dozens of episodes. He looks far too old to be any kind of shishya, despite all the efforts of the Balaji makeup department, with a clean shave and what is undoubtedly the application of a lot of face cream, face powder and the rest of the works.
I think Malayketu may stay with us in the whole show as a permanent villain, as Nand and his sons will die soon before their marriage...😕 If Malayketu had to be there only for the role of arrogant rich classmate of Chandra in collage, they could have hired a younger and less-known actor for the role...🤔
Plus the punishment for his misbehavior is ridiculously light - one missed meal?. That too is dodged, thanks to the pathetic disciplinary follow up system in this ashram. At the very least, he should have been made to run 10 kos, with a large backpack.😆 And why is this chap allowed to wear silk and zari clothes and jewellery, instead of the regular saffron outfit of the other students?
🤣 🤣 I am amazed at Chanakya's injustice! A slap for Chandra for no reason and one skipped meal for Malayaketu! 😭 I actually expected your punishment; in Dharam-Veer, Veer was given that punishment in his gurukul for fighting with classmate but Chanakya is too much a kind teacher! 😆
Malayaketu is wearing casuals without wearing the uniform and all are okay with it. So good are the teachers! Even in my collage of this time we are not allowed to do this! 😡😭😆
Beyond the script: There was not much scope of emoting last night as far as Chandragupta was concerned, but still Rajat produced two delightful titbits. One was the slight smile and pitying headshake with which he greets the smouldering Malayaketu in the bhojanshala. It dripped with relaxed, amused contempt.
I loved that. 😆
The other was the absolute insouciance, the total denial of attention, with which he dealt with the snide remarks of Malayaketu and his chamchas during the dinner. He looked up at them, his face and eyes still and placid like a lake at dawn, then reapplied himself to the meal, eating it steadily with every evidence of enjoyment.
Yeah that one was another little but great instance to notice!. 😃
It was a fascinating instance of an actor going beyond the script.
👍🏼
Kautilya Neeti: I almost regretted it when the light eyed, skinny young Chandra finally passed out of our ken. He was no actor, all things said and done, but I had grown to like his steady, clear-eyed look, and the sudden flaring of anger in the thin face, as also the steely determination he could summon up at times.
I loved the way in which he took leave of his foster parents, with his grim warning to that scum of a Javali sounding almost like a slap in his face. I have absolutely no confidence in that dumb woman, his foster mother, hanging on to the dhan that Chandra hands her, but at least he has done his best.
The whole sequence that follows, when Chanakya and Chandragupta are looking down on their ultimate target, Pataliputra, from their position on a hillock, was wonderfully scripted and the lines wonderfully delivered. Chanakya's plan for this brahmastra that he has chanced on is crystal clear: total control by the guru, and total samarpan from the shishya.
Main hi tumhara pita, tumhara guru, tumhara swami, sab kuch main hi hoon. Bhujayein tumhari hongi parantu mastishk mera hoga. Shastra tumhare haathon mein honge, par unhein kis para chalana hai , iska aadesh mera hoga. ..
Then the warning against the least softness creeping into the warrior's make up, and the confident assertion that the guru's Kautilya Neeti would, one day, make Chandragupta the Magadh Samrat.
Finally, the ringing declaration of their shared destiny, and that of the land they both love, that almost gives one goose pimples. For it was as if one could hear, in the wind on that hilltop., the rush of the footsteps of history.
Hum donon milke a naye Bharat ka nirman karenge! Aaj ke paschat, Drona aur Arjun ki bhanti, Chanakya aur Chandragupta ke naam sadaiva saath liye jaayenge!!
I liked the scene. Though melodramatic, but yet significant. Though Drona-Arjuna is an ideal example of teacher-disciple, I always can find similarities of Chanakya-Chandragupta in Krishna-Arjuna. Chanakya with his wit and knowledge show Chandragupta a path, and Chandra won his fights riding on the chariot of his guru's wisdom... like Krishna and Arjun.
The training sequences that follow, with the repeated emphasis, and this even more on Chandra's side than on Chanakya's, of the mastishk ever prevailing over the hriday, were all too brief. I for one would have liked at least the rest of the episode, if not another whole one, to have been devoted to these lessons. Since that was not to be so, I hope they will at least have extended sessions at what could be called the senior level between the guru and his shishya extraordinaire. The precap, with a grim faced Chandragupta, brows drawn into a straight line, listening intently, in the pouring rain, to Chanakya, might be one such.
I too agree with you that the training session should have been emphasised a bit more. It would be great if they show the whole episode of training boy Chandra before showing his grown-up phase. A lot of time has been wasted in the dil-dimag gaga- specialty of Balaji🤢- rather than that I would have enjoyed Chandra's methodical training by Chanakya which was made in hurry! However, waiting to see some lecturing session between the duo on Chanakya-neeti... I will be happy with the popular ones, but please not only the rants on "forget heart and use brain"- wala most common topic anymore! It stings me literally and sometimes make nostalgic! 😉 🤣
But today sometimes I find Chanakya too ordinary to be unique.Hope this will go with time. 😔 His advice of overlooking heart's call looked forceful to fit the story of the same heart-vs-brain... Cvs should think seriously about it before driving the story in the same flow of JA with the angle of heart-vs-brain... Even though the genre and the male protagonist are same for both, the background is completely different so this dil-dimaag is absolutely irrelevant according to me.
Princess nonpareil : That is to say, without an equal. To wit, Rajnandini, the apple of her father's eye.We are thus treated to extensive sessions of pita-putri bonding between Padmanand and his darling daughter.
First when she is a cutesy cute, nasally challenged little girl of 5, outdoing her clumsy brothers and scoring a bullseye in true Arjuna style. Then delivering an impeccable mini-bhashan to a bewildered but proud Padmanand about how prem is the greatest shakti there is, and how she will always fight from the heart. Just as she earlier informs Acharya Rakhas that she hit the bullseye because she had aimed with her heart. I have no idea what she meant in either case, nor, I suspect, did the scriptwriter. 😆
😆 This is ridiculous! Just to force on the bakwaas theory of 'dil vs dimaag' implemented by cvs they had to include such useless dialogues. Now how on earth one can target from heart and not with eyes and concentration from brain? 🤣 She is trained by the mini-monster Padmanand but fights from her heart and her greatest strength is Prem... as she is the heroine of-course! Btw, did the bramhin amatyas were used to be the weapon trainers of the princes also that time? 😕 Chanakya was training Chandra physically and Rakkhas too... I used to think them as only academic teachers!
Later when she, presumably now 16,rushes headlong out of the palace to get - hold your breath ! - imli for daddy dearest. The look of cloying affection on his face as he contemplates this proof of daughterly love is a sight to behold. No, I am not being sarcastic. In fact , but for the overkill, these father-daughter scenes come off quite well, and Arpit is surprisingly good at them.
The father-daughter scenes are warm and soothing, and the reason of nandni's revengeful attitude is looking normal now to me; after the first release of promo, it was coming to me like a forceful implementation just to fit in a hate-to-love saga...
But I am getting the sequence all wrong. First, we see Nandini cutting a dash thru the palace grounds like a combination of Usain Bolt in the 400 metres race and Paro in the last scene in Devdas, trailing about 40 yards of fabric on the ground.
😆 🤣
Next, after a tantalizing muh dikhayi for the benefit of the viewer - and she does look quite pretty then, and even more so later when she is dripping wet - she makes a dive into a well for no visible purpose.
The whole scene was peculiar. She was literally running in that way, dashing and colliding with everyone and breaking the things, to find Imli for father? 🤣 🤣 🤣 Couldn't they find any better excuse? 😆
It turns out that she was saving a baby goat, though there was no indication of any struggling animal in the water when she dived in, nor of any unheroic bystanders either. But let that pass. At least the object of the compassion of Ekta's latest heroine was a more unusual choice than the standard issue wounded pigeon saved by her last historical leading lady! 😉
Pigeon was a better choice and the scene looked better too. 😆 But it seems Ekta's historical ladies can't help but to entry with a running and chasing sequence which lastly comes out to be a part of 'nirdosh prani bachao'- movement. 😆
Besides, she does not deliver bhashan No.2 on the quality of mercy which is not strained, which droppeth like gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath, a la Portia in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. For which, though there is no surety that she will stick to this sound practice in the future, I was devoutly grateful. 😉
She will do it very soon and I am quite sure about it!😆 Let his dady darling to go away first, she will start her bhashan's on prem and hriday to her hubby. 😉
Now if she would only go a little easy with the perennial hand on the heart gesture, clearly meant to drive home to us that is her hriday from where all her actions spring! We have all got it, sweetheart, you can relax now!
OK, folks, this is it. With her Tun Tun clone of a sister-in-law nagging at her, Nandini has now agreed to marry the veer who can defeat her brother in a duel with swords. I suppose the CVs hopes we will all be on pins wondering about the candidate favoured by Padmanand. But I for one am not holding my breath!
The brother's name was Dhananand!😳 Is Chandu going to dethrone him only following the history?😛
Maybe this condition of marriage will lead the first meeting of Chandra and Nandni or may be not!🤔 Did you notice a classmate of Chandra was telling him about the musical institute of girls near Taxila? Maybe Nandni will go there and then... 😉 O no I am thinking too much. 😆
See you again soon. For now,please do not forget to hit the Like button if you think that is warranted.
Is it necessary to mention how much I loved this review? 😃 🤗
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