Friends, yesterday's episode of Jodha Akbar seemed on the face of it to give viewers a little bit of the "romance" we were craving. But on dispassionate observation I have to conclude that it was just one of those lollipop episodes of slight romance usually sandwiched between weeks of non-progress of the romance front. A sort of palliative effort to keep viewers temporarily satisfied while the Creatives get on with the tracks that really bring them the TRPs but irritate us ... tracks such as naagins, vishkanyas, palace intrigues, hordes of sworn enemies giving all sorts of lalkars, a hero in revenge on a heroine, and a heroine stubbornly supporting whatever is sure the get the hero's ire!
Chalo, at least there was a feeble attempt yesterday to get some eye locks and "loving glances" between hero and heroine into the episode, even if the episode was very thin on actual substance. Eventually when you look at it, we had just three scenes. One, we had Hakim take Shivani to the masonry being done by Tejwant and giving us a moment's doubt whether he was talking of Shivani loving the masonry or the mason! Two, we had a mega scene of the endless engagement jashn of Hakim and Shivani with Jodha dressed in Mughal attire and wholly attracting Jalal's eyes on her almost all the time - much to the chagrin of the Ameris and Agraites for the large part, but for a few supporters like the ever-pleased Hamida and Jodha's tittering sisters. And three, we had that garden-payal scene between Jalal and Jodha where for the first time Jalal seemed to have doubts on Jodha spurning him that night ... he was seeing that she always said one thing and did the opposite so was she then feigning spurning that night while that actually meant she wanted him? For a moment there it looked like he was trying hard to find excuses for her spurning him that night!
In fact folks, there were four separate instances in his dialogue where he looked like he wanted Jodha to admit she was doing things just to please him, but Jodha wouldn't relent! I've covered these in the detailed analysis below. He then gave her a missing payal ... and then I wondered if that was that, and he had sealed all hope of romance for us viewers for another couple of weeks? Maybe we'll have to stomach another two and half weeks of intrigue and snake bites while we wait for another small lollipop scene of Jo-Ja romantic contact?
Rahim appeared oon the scene, but flattered to deceive. All those who had seen spoiler pics of him being at the sets on Friday hoped he was there to read the Jodha paigam to Jalal by Monday. Alas, Rahim was only there to shoot for the jasdn dance, and so Jodha's paigam remains where it is ... unseen by Jalal and only promised by the Creatives that it will be read soon (to keep quiet all those who telephone them). Ben, the other hated soul, who is also the butt of mmany a telephone call to the Zee office was also there in the jashn, although Jalal barely looked at her, thank God. On these crumbs we exist.
The other odd thing was that while the Creatives took trouble to bring Sukanya for the Shivani wedding, both Abhay (History_Geek) and I have been waiting for Hakim's mother to turn up for his wedding but she's strangely gaayab! She apparently is as vile as Maham, so I am guessing even the Creatives feel they have brought enough villains to Agra already and do not want to add to the traffic.
Taking stock of where we are now in all these intermingled tracks ... we have about two kilos of paigams, about 100 kilos of villains and villlees, and about 5 misunderstandings already floating round the Agra countryside. How many more do we need before resolution phase starts ... that is if the Creatives remember even where to start the resolution from?
By the way I have just for timepass been wondering why Jodha wore those Mughal clothes. In keeping with my usual belief that the Creatives never do something without reason, here are some four reasons that occurred to me as possible reasons why Jodha may have worn those Mughal clothes:
Reason 1: To give the Creatives an opportunity for Jalal to eye her and thus satisfy the audience somewhat - and also to create more enemies like Ruq and Maham who see this as "challenge to audha".
Reason 2: Jodha seemed genuinely conflicted between wearing Dadisa's clothes and Hamida's clothes, and seemed to have opted to dress more like the "ladke wale" group ... maybe that's why Hamida gave her those clothes in the first place, to show her the side she was on for this wedding?
Reason 3: Maybe the idea was to give Jodha a cover when later she is blamed by Maham etc. for Shivani's elopement. Jodha can say she was in spirit always part of Hakim's team and is as shocked by Shivani's duplicity as anyone else and thus exonerate herself?
Reason 4: Could be the exact opposite of Reason 3 - Jalal may think Jodha deliberately dressed up in Mughal clothes so that suspicion would not fall on her when Shivani eloped! This is after all a season of misunderstandings. So what are the odds that Jalal, instigated by Maham, may not read an ulterior and unsavoury motive in Jodha dressing in these clothes?
These are just four reasons I could think of. Probably many of you may have many more reasons why Jodha needed to be shown in the Mughal style clothes. Let's have some fun trying to guess, because otherwise there was nothing in the episode to hold our attention spans!
Anyway, here goes my slightly deeper analysis of the only three scenes of this episode!
Hakim was talking of Shivani's love of the masonry ... and Maham had forty six ears!
The opening scene of the episode showed Shivani gingerly making her way to meet Hakim by the stone masonry works going on in the palace. She was trying to dissuade Moti from going with her saying it was OK to meet Hakim alone as he had Jodha's prior permission for this meeting and had arranged a palki and courtiers for her (Shivani). But Maham overhearing this dialogue made sure she followed Shivani.
At the appointed place Hakim was already getting to know Tejwant by name as a very talented artisan, and by the time Shivani came there, Hakim was introducing a guilty-looking Shivani to a sad-looking Tejwant as his fiancee ... and saying he could be the artisan appointed to decorate their palace when they were both married. Hakim also invited Tejwant to the engagement jashn and as expected (in the previous precap) gave Shivani a moment's distress by saying "I know of your love". He meant the masonry decorations and not Tejwant of course!
When Hakim then departed after much happiness at having met Shivani, Maham was all ears again as Shivani cleverly arranged to go back to give Tejwant a hug. They both arranged to elope from the Ambe Ma mandir the next day (i.e. the day of the wedding) which delighted Maham. As I said earlier I already knew Maham had 64 teeth ... yesterday I saw her 46 ears!
Four times Jalal tried to make Jodha say she was wanting to please him, but she didn't!
I'll start with the Jodha-Jalal interaction from the point at which Dadisa was distributing clothes to the Agra family while Hamida returned the favour and gave clothes to the Amerites. Jodha got two sets of clothes - the Ameri style clothes from Dadisa (thus placing a claim on Jodha as part of the girl's family) and the Mughal style clothes from Hamada (as if to lay claim on her as part of the boy's family). Which ones to wear, became Jodha's dilemma.
Eventually she stunned everybody, including a genuinely pleased Jalal when she walked into the engagement jashn wearing the Mughal style clothes! Jalal was, as expected, all eyes for her. He could not look straight for more than two seconds at a stretch without feeling compelled to look in her direction and marvel at her beauty. Maham meanwhile was fully winding up Ruq - twice. Once to say she should see how Jalal's eyes were only on Jodha, and the second time, to say Jodha was doing all this to try and get Ruq's audha!
Anyway, there was a moment of extra happiness when Bharmal asked Jalal to participate in some girl side rituals as the damaad of the Ameris. Jalal agreed saying "If Jodha can wear Mughal clothes and be part of the boy's side, why can't I be part of the girl's side?" Then there was a bit of eye-play as Jalal seemed to tell Jodha silently to adjust her jewelry as he distributed jewels to all his Begums courtesy the Amer clan.
After the jashn was over (when dear Rahim, instead of reading the paigam was wasting precious time dancing away!), Jalal was waiting for Jodha in the garden where he had called her. She appeared there, when the first thing he was able to say to her was that she looked extremely beautiful in Mughal clothes. Jodha seemed pleased to hear that, but I was watching his face more. His face was a picture - a bit blushing, a bit mesmerised, a bit silently thrilled with her.
Folks I don't know how many of you saw what happened after that in the same way as I did, but here's my take on what Jalal did next. I thought Jalal tried at least four times to get Jodha to acknowldge that she was ready to make efforts to please him. He desperately seemed to want to hear that she wanted to do so!
First, Jalal said "I think now that you've worn these clothes, you may also consider changing your religion?" Did he want to hear a "Yes" if only as a sign that she wanted to get closer to him by agreeing to convert? (We know Jalal supports Jodha's religion as a Hindu, but perhaps he just wanted to hear her say "Yes" as a sign of being ready to get closer to him?). But Jodha said "No! I only wore these clothes out of respect for Hamida who gave them to me!"
Second, Jalal, still perhaps wanting to hear that she wanted to please him, then said to Jodha "But you've still worn the colour green, so you may have done this as I like it?" She didn't deny it, but she didn't confirm it either. That couldn't have given him too much satisfaction too.
Third, Jalal then said to her, obviously with an intention to rile her into accepting her intentions to please him "These clothes woould have been great on Benazir". Jodha seemed to have lost her recent touchiness of Benazir and readily replied "Sure if you want to give her these clothes, do feel free!" That too could not have made Jalal too happy to hear her brush off Ben so easily, so he said "Whenever you say something like this, I know you mean exactly the opposite!". But Jodha was ready to walk off at that point - well almost. She stopped in her tracks and Jalal got one more chance to get her to accept her need to please him.
Fourth, Jalal said to Jodha "There see, you said you were walking off, but you stopped. This is what I mean when I say you say one thing but do the opposite. Could it be that you were intending exactly the opposite when you spurned me the other night?" What can I say, folks, I thought the poor dear boy was so keen to get that admission from Jodha that he meant a lot more to her, but she wouldn't let him have that satisfaction!
Eventually, as she was about to leave, he picked up her dropped payal (another one of those?) and put in into her palm, closed her fingers around it and said "Keep it carefully!". He looked like he wanted to hold her hands! And he gave a look then at the very end of the episode that spoke volumes of the feelings for Jodha that were churning inside him!
Braver souls than me may be able to determine exactly what is the symbolism of the dropped payal in their lives. It has happened thrice already and thrice he has picked it up. What do you all think the payal symbolism is? Keep thinking and write to me if you have ideas! We all have a lot of time to spend this week as we watch the other palace intrigue-paigam-vishkanya crap being trundled out to us!
Okay, now there's a new promo that shows Sharif telling Jodha than Ben is the baandhi who would try to bite Jalal! I don't mind Jodha knowing this and saving Jalal just in the nick of time, but I sure hate her getting all this news from the lech Sharif!
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