Folks,
Don't worry, I am not back already! In fact I have not yet gone, and this is a long goodbye, like that of an opera diva retiring by instalments.😉 Only I am not retiring, at least not before July 9, or whenever it is that Mahakumbh downs its shutters.
Incidentally, I am quite pleased that the (prematurely announced ) extension has been turned down. However, seeing that Life OK kept on turkeys like Laut Aao Trisha on oxygen for months after the show should have been decently buried, it is odd that this extension was refused after being at least seriously considered.
Now I suppose the fancy tracks planned for those 32 extra episodes will be either junked, or tacked on here and there, willy nilly. In the end, the show is likely to resemble MB in the toils of the nagapaash, trapped and flailing about to no purpose.
Now for the title. I do not know what is the Hindi term for scrambled eggs, possibly ande ka bhurja, but this sounds better! I do not know about you folks, but my poor grey cells have been so maltreated by this travesty of a plot that they are not going to recover till well past July 9. Shivanand ka to pata nahin, but to say that hamara dimaag now closely resembles scrambled eggs in a masterpiece of understatement. Just look at all the junk we have been subjected to this last week and more!
-Shivanand: from Dr. Jekyll to Mr.Hyde: Some might argue that this is a marvellous plot twist, and Manish Wadhwa does do a superb job of putting across the sustained, malicious and alarmingly effective deviousness of the garud brains trust gone over to the dark side. But it leaves a very bad taste in one's mouth to see this degradation of a great man and a great mind, now so far gone as to be almost irredeemable. It is as sad as looking at the wreck of an imposing monument, gone to rack and ruin.
Shivanand was maddening throughout , beginning with his insidious subversion tactics and his attempted bullying of Thappadiya Mai , like a mohalla dada enforcing his diktats, and, for Rudra, emotional blackmail: of his wanting a normal family life with grandchildren- when it came to Rudra.
When one thinks back, this is a man for whom the amrit mission always counted for far more than his family, who, in all of 24 yeasr of tortured isolation in Poland, was never shown thinking of his mother or his wife, only of his kid Rudra, the Garud Pramukh in the making. Whose moolmantra was Rakshakon ke parivaar nahin hote. And now he is doing a Goebbels on them all, and talking of the need for a family for Rudra and himself.
Goebbels is really a good fit, for Shivanand now sounds like a Nazi theorist of Aryan superiority when he declaims about only the achche aur sachche being saved from the halahal of course with no indication of how he proposes to effect this selective rescue programme As for the weeding out, one presumes that it is he alone who will be doing the selection!
Drastic inconsistencies: He says one thing one day and a radically opposite thing the next. After the activation of his shaktis, Shivanand tells Rudra that his fear was the fear of losing him his beloved son. At the Sangam, after he has personally dispersed a few patches of the poisoned clouds with his shastra, he proclaims solemnly Is badal ko nasht karke amrit ki raksha karna, aur use dobara nadi mein samarpit karna hum garudon ki zimmedari hai.. And he pushes all of Thappadiya Mai's right buttons to get her to use up her shastra to check the halahal for a day or so, this ensuring that his sole, vocal opponent within the garud ranks is rendered powerless.
The next day, he goes back to his pre-activation line that the garuds have been always cheated and that now they should take the amrit for themselves. But he is careful not to do that till he has done a Dansh on poor Thappadiya Mai and turned her garuda chinna too that livid nagvish green, bringing her too finally in line with his ideas, whatever they are.
And why is it that when he insists that the powers of all the garuds have to be united for them to see the path ahead clearly, ONLY he and Thappadiya Mai sit down to meditate? Why not the other three as well? One knows why Shivanand arranges it that way, but how come Thappadiya Mai does not insist that the rest too should be there meditating?
Don't even ask when and how Shivanand got the neat naga monogrammed box, with the solid carbon dioxide evaporating in clouds and the standard blue vish vial, the syringe, the works! Or that uniform that makes him look like a Nazi gauleiter, complete with his bald head and his hooded sinister eyes.
Now he is arguing with Rudra claiming that he wants to establish a world awash with sweetness and light, based on manushyata aur nyay, in tandem with the nagas ( the very idea of Dansh being committed to these ideals boggles the mind!😉) who, he lies to Rudra, would be the only ones able to take the halahal when the clouds split. But just the day before, he wanted a world anyayheen, naagheen!!!
I could not agree more with Dansh when he says, in the precap last night, that inside the so-called rakshak, there now resides a bakshak. My heart already bleeds for poor Rudra when he realises this.
Plus I cannot believe that Dansh is so accomplished an alchemist that he can calibrate a vish preparation to act the way it is presumed to have acted on Shivanand, adjusting itself perfectly to every new circumstance like an elastic band ! Dansh may boast to his guru that it was all his doing, but one wonders if perhaps Shivanand always had these Nazi-like tendencies, and whether he did not always have a hankering after the amrit for its own sake. I remember him saying once to Rao, when they were planning the investigation of the Saraswati Kund, Humein amrit milega! Not a word about amrit ki raksha.
Plus, I do not see how anyone, Rudra or any of us, can ever trust Shivanand again, seeing how cunningly he acted out the part of a vishmukht garud, only to display his true colurs as soon as he could. By now, I am almost past caring!😲
The despicable threesome: No prizes for guessing who these are: DM Tiwari, Charles and Katharine, of course. I have no words to describe what I feel about them.
Tiwari is always hesitant. and pedestrian ; one can barely recognize the proud, assertive Dronacharya of the Mahabharata. A captain at sea goes down with his ship if he is unable to rescue all the passengers and crew from the shipwreck. And here is Tiwari, the over all in charge for the Mahakumbh, ready to run away out of fear for his life, and abandon his charge! It was unbelievable. Then again, he seems to have no ideas to offer when they are all at a dead end, nor does he step forward to offer his shastra to hold the halahal at bay for a while till they discover the Teesri Kitaab.
In fact none of the three volunteers for the task. So much for the courage and nishta of the garuds!
As for the tapori Charles, all he can think of is using his shastra to rule the world and amass its riches, and the amrit be damned! His very shaky and flaky character apart, the actor is a ham of the worst kind, and there is not one scene of late in which he has been even passable, the worst being his rolling of the eyes and waving of the hands when he is arguing with Thappadiya Mai.
Ditto Katharine.
And now, when Shivanand is propounding his predatory plan of action, and is caught red-handed injecting Thappadiya Mai with something, not one of the three objectsto it and demands a credible explanation. Tiwari's question is half-hearted and is immediately abandoned when Shivanand produces some gobbledeegook about acquiring a special drishti to go with their new shaktiyaan. Why does Tiwari not demand that the rest too be given this drishti? .
Kaise garud evam rakshak hain yeh teen?? They are such a depressing watch that it is an effort to sit thru their scenes. I never dreamt that they would be so watered down and reduced to junk. 😡
The wannabe villains: That is Rao, Greyerson, Devesh and Balivesh. I have written enough already about the suspension of disbelief needed to accept Rao as the Master Criminal and head of the Syndicate (which is what the erstwhile Secret Society has been renamed now😉). His shoot first and ask questions later persona in this last episode was more comic than scary.
The Veshes were always like jackals trying on a lion skin for size and fit, and nowhere was this more in evidence than in the scene where Dansh descends on them to mete out summary punishment for their having instigated the naga vasheekaran yagna. The spectacle of a bereaved and distraught Devesh swearing that he would wreak condign vengeance on the Nag Pramukh was surreal. The only good thing so far this week is that we seem to have finally seen the last of the oily, bald-pated Balivesh!👏
In fact, these four looked most convincing when they were scurrying around like rats outside the perimeter of the Hairy Face Sadhu's sector in the smashaan, half expectant, half fearful, ending by scooting with their faces muffled when the police siren was heard. 😉😉
So much for grand villainy, or rather our hopes of it!
The special effects, anything but: Apart from the cloud effects, which too are getting to be repetitive by now, the major scenes calling for special effects, especially the naag vasheekaran yagna sequence, left a lot to be desired. Even allowing for the low light, something should have been done to make the goings on comprehensible. For example, when MB punches a hole thru the invisible barrier, what she has done is hardly clear, and one is left to infer it from the way in which Rudra climbs out thru the gap and then Dansh enters thru it.
Then there are the glaring illogicalities.
Rudra screams at the Hairy Face sadhu to stop, this just as his sword is about to descend on Leela's neck. He stops. Well and good. But for the next minute and more, as Rudra is making his way in, he does nothing! He could have chopped off her head a dozen times within that interval. Presumably he was waiting for Rudra's Janam se, dharam se, aur karam se declaration of superior rights to Leela! 😉
The Hairy Face sadhu flings stuff at the fire with such force, and at such an angle, that 90% of it must have been scattered in the wind!
Leela is half naagin one moment, when Rudra is holding her just inside the barrier, but normal the next, when he lays her down!
But the worst bloomer is when, after hearing the sadhu proclaim that as soon as he completes the next mantra, Leela will become a snake for good, it never occurs to Rudra to put Leela down and go after the sadhu and stop him. Instead, he wastes precious time kicking ineffectually at the barrier. In fact this goes on for so long that I concluded that Mr.Hairy Face had forgotten that last deadly mantra that he was boasting about!😉
Again, when MB is trapped in the naagpaash ( similar to the one in which Mahadev trapped Tarakaasur but much less impressive), there is no way, if one did not listen carefully to the recap on Wednesday night, that one would grasp that the naagpaash was that of the Mahaguru Takshak. Nor is it clear why he goes after her, seeing that he is shown as being puzzled about the changes in the environs because of the baboot evaporating into the atmosphere.
It sounds harsh, but the tale is beginning to resemble any of the standard issue horror series that proliferate on TV these days.
As for the sheer ridiculousness of Maya's escape, and even more so, her managing to evade a whole horde of pursuers, including Greyerson, by setting bees about their ears and then running away into a sparsely wooded forest, the less said the better! 😉
The naga trio- a study in contrast: It is hard to believe, but the naga lot seem to be far superior in characterization to their garud counter parts.
Leaving aside his icky, over long forked tongue, the naga Mahaguru is very impressive, and could stand in for Gandalf quite easily. The revelation that he is Takshak, the Nagaraj, came as no surprise. His scene with Dansh, when he took him, and his ghamand, down several pegs with effortless ease and unshaken dignity, was a class act.
The mystery of why he wants the tunnel to Sector 53 dug so deep, and why he has its direction changed (to what?) remains. Like Maimuyi to Dansh, the Mahaguru too dismisses Drish's question about the tunnel by citing samay. Great minds clearly think alike!
Drish is like a yo yo, swinging from extreme parental fretting to almost passive acceptance of Dansh's scheme to pack Leela off to the garud headquarters as a sort of naga Mata Hari. Now that she seems headed for the chopping block, he is raving and ranting at a Dansh already rattled by the Mahaguru's sombre pronouncement Jab tak Leela hai, tab tak tum ho.
There was a nice little touch of jealousy when Drish learnt that the Mahaguru had not let him know about his arrival in the Mahakumbh but had instead accepted Dansh' s seva.
As for the Naga Pramukh, he was so remarkably consistent, right down to the bird-like twist of his neck when he is boasting to Drish about his total domination of Shivanand, that I even forgave him his forked tongue display. At least the tongue was not too long, and it was over in a moment!😉
Incidentally, according to a NatGeo documentary on snakes that I watched, that is how snakes locate objects, admittedly not those as far away as Leela is!
In his encounter with the Mahaguru, where he came off distinctly the worse, Dansh displayed a whole range of expressions with competence - from smug satisfaction to alarm to picking himself and his ego up, and finally, rank incredulity Yeh kaunsi ladki paida ho gayi jo hamari hifazat kar sakti hai? And when told that it is Leela, a single word that speaks volumes: Wo??
There is the shamefacedness when Drish pummels him with questions about Leela's whereabouts and well-being, then the mischievous tilt of the head with which he passes the buck to MB (who is just waiting for it!😉) .
The instinctive awe and admiration with which he asks MB, who has just punched thru the invisible barrier with her staff:Maana ki aap garud hain, par aap yeh sab kaise kar leti hain? Giving her the opening for the classic retort Aise!
NB: Incidentally, MB's response reminded me of Mehrunnissa (later to become the Empress Nurjahan) at the Meena Bazaar - having let one of the two doves, which Salim had asked her to hold for him, escape - when asked how that had happened, said Aise! And let the second one escape as well!
The sole honorable one: Bar MB and Rudra, of course.
Well, no prizes for guessing who this is. Thappadiya Mai, of course! Her steadfastness in adhering to the code of the garuds as rakshaks, the lucid persuasiveness with which she tries hard, oh so hard, to make the errant quartet see the light, and her tenacity and courage even when she is in a minority of one.
Above all, the simple innocence with which, taken in by Shivanand's devious plan to disempower her, she offers herself and her shastra to stave off the halahal for a while yet, when no one else will step up to the plate. So much nobility and strength of character, yet sadly poisoned and reduced to a travesty of its original self by the nagvish that Shivanand, catching her unawares, injects into her blood.
All those endless, irritating repetitions of narak ke keede are forgotten in the luminous beauty of her character, and the transparent sincerity of the performance.
Rudra: nobility at sea: What I really loved these last 2 weeks was Rudra's coming of age. This is it, the rite of passage which will finally make him a man. It is curious, he looks far younger and more vulnerable these days, but his eyes are almost always clear, and unclouded by doubt.
For though he might be afraid of one thing or another at different times, his fear is not for himself but for those he is duty bound to protect. As that lovely line of his says: Swarth ke liye jeena prakruti hai, paramarth le liye jeena hamari sanskruti, jiske viruddh hum nahin ja sakte.
Gautam got into Rudra's skin perfectly throughout. In his gentle but very firm exchange with his Baba early on, the incredulity at what Shivanand has been reduced to, and the sadness that he feels - which I share - came thru beautifully. When he asserts to MB that he has pura vishwas in his Baba, and she responds, in ironic assent, Humein bhi, there are both puzzlement and dawning comprehension in his eyes.
There is the tenacity with which he questions MB about her having gone over, as he sees it, to the nagas. He does not let go, kalyug or no kalyug, till she is forced on the backfoot and has to take refuge in the overweening importance of their search for the Third Book (which, it is now clear, in not a Hitchcockian McGuffin, but really exists!) His eyes are then angry with unshed tears of disappointment in his Maimuyi.
There is his openness of mind, when, even though it concerns his beloved Baba, he can see, and understand, that all she had warned him about was coming true. The horror as he spots the green luminescence of the nagvish in both Thappadiya Mai's and Shivanand's garud chinna highlights his readiness to accept bad news and then plan to counter it.
For that, he can think of no other support, no other source of advice and enlightenment, than his Maimuyi. So, when he sees her, with his special drishti, imprisoned in the naagpaash, the desperation that pervades his whole being can be well imagined, and it is clearly visible in his anguished eyes and in the sudden droop of his shoulders.
Simple moral certitudes: But the most telling and touching of all was when he overrides his Maimuyi's advice, cloaked in sophistry but essentially amounting to one thing: Let Leela be sacrificed and let the naga vasheekaran vidhi, which would neutralize one enemy of the garuds, go through, for it will benefit the garuds.
Rudra will have none of it, despite the self-evident advantage to the garuds. He has a very simple code, and a very clear perception of what is right and what is wrong, and he will have nothing to do with what is wrong and, in this case, inhuman. So he charges in to save Leela, as MB watches helplessly, like a mother unable to control a headstrong child.
Then again, the same trait surfaces when Rudra turns down Dansh's desperate and very attractive offer of a sauda. Again, Rudra will have nothing to do with a bargain for saving a life.
Sauda wo karte hain jinme raksha karne ki taaqat nahin hoti. Jeevan kisi ki sampatti nahin jise becha ya khareeda ja sake. He does what he feels he has to do, and that sense of moral fulfillment is enough recompense for him.
NB: Incidentally, I think Dansh would have kept his word if Rudra had accepted the offer. That he later hides, in his exchange with Drish, the fact of Rudra's having been the real savior of Leela's life is entirely predictable, and does not necessarily mean that he would have gone back on his deal with Rudra had it been made.
I loved the unconscious and uncharacteristic arrogance with which Rudra tells Dansh, who is warning him about the invisible barrier, Naag nahin ja sakte. Vashikaran humein nahin rok sakta! As also the fury with which he roars at the Hairy Face sadhu:Janam se, dharam se, aur karam se, naagon par pehla adhikar garudon ka hai!
By the end, my heart went out to the poor boy, now an orphan in spirit, bereft of his sole friend, philosopher and guide, faced with the urgent need to free her from the naagpaash, and simultaneously to leach the nagvish out of the stranger that his Baba has become, and unite him and the other garuds to pursue their goal of protecting the amrit.
It would be a tall order even for the most experienced, and Rudra, for all that he is the Garud Pramukh, is but a boy who has just become a man.
MB: the peerless one: When it comes to her, I again have no words to describe what I feel, though this time for the opposite reason! For watching her in action is a perennial treat.
Mocking Drish and driving him to inchoate fury. The secret smile she indulges in as she says, after having got rid of him in high dudgeon : Yoddha bhi banna chahte hain aur baap bhi.. Mushkil hai...
Trying to get a rise out of Dansh by talking of the activation of the remaining garuds, her mischief suddenly dampened by Dansh's jubilation at the idea of Shivanand being activated.
Trying to discipline Rudra and get him to focus their joint energies on the hunt for the Third Book, but without revealing what she does not yet want him to know about the reason for her parking herself in the naaglok. Trying to get him to be cynically pragmatic as regards Leela and the bali, and failing.
The hidden mischief in her impossibly straight face and eyes as she masks the goings on in the smashaan and hoodwinks the police.
Her desperate command to Rudra to forget about the Third Book for now, and instead to concentrate on uniting the garuds for the common purpose.
And finally, her stout but unavailing struggle to retain her hold on her dand, and her keeping up the struggle even as the naagpaash envelops her. I hope she frees herself soon, for I would not like to believe that anyone, even Takshak, could hold MB prisoner for long.
A conundrum: There now seem to be two parallel, and potentially clashing saudas that Dansh has, one with MB and another with the rakshak turned bakshak Shivanand. Both are about the garuds and the nagas sharing the amrit.
It is not yet clear what MB's real agenda is with respect to her sauda, but Dansh knows that she is far, far more powerful than Shivanand - who is by now more his creature than his associate. Most important of all, she knows about the Third Book and how to get it, thus making her a powerful and crucial asset.
Given all this, which of the two will Dansh want to work with as the battle for the amrit comes closer? That his Mahaguru has imprisoned MB would be an additional problem, for Dansh would then have to persuade him to let her go in the interests of the nagas getting to the amrit.
Also to be noted is that Rudra is still in the dark about his Maimuyi's decision to sup with the devil in the interests of their mission. He already knows about his Baba's turncoat plan, and disapproves of it violently. How will he react when he learns, at some point, about his Maimuyi's plan?
Ok, folks, this is it for the next 2 weeks at least, as I am going in for my knee replacement surgery on Saturday. Make the most of your vacation from me and my marathon posts, for I am going to miss all of you more than vice versa and I might be back sooner than either you or I imagine now!😉Shyamala B.Cowsik
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
