Hello everyone!
I had been suffering from a withdrawal of a good historical show, the last one I watched was Jodha Akbar (the initial few months only!) so of course when I heard about Chandra Nandani, I was over the moon. I love Rajat Tokas's portrayal of historic figures and for all their inaccuracies; Ekta's shows do make a decent watch.
Here are my thoughts on the show so far. Let me just preface what I'm about to say with the fact that I'm not an Indian and therefore have no background information whatsoever on who Chandragupt Maurya actually was. Everything that follows or will be said in further discussions will be based solely on the fictional realm of this show.
So without further ado, here I go.
The first three episodes have done a good job in establishing the basic background and bringing in all the parallels we will be shown through Chandra and Nandani. Parallels like destiny and consequences, revenge and redemption, nature and nurture, perceptions and reality, and kismet and karma.
Let me talk about that a little more. Though over the top, Chandra's parents were shown madly in love and very possessive about each other. A trait that I'm sure Chandra has inherited. You can already see it with the way he deals with his adoptive mother. He is willing to sacrifice his body and go through any hardships for the sake of her happiness and to ensure her safety. Even when not explicitly asked. There are character traits that shall stay with him well into his adult life. That's in his nature. His perspective on love however, is a result of nurture. He's seen the destructive side of love and is repulsed by it. I thought that was a good point to note here. Because now he consciously sees it as evil even if he is naturally born to respond to it otherwise.
Then we have Nand and Nandani. Nand is clearly already actively portraying a very different, carefully constructed and consciously virtuous image in front of his daughter. One that is a far cry from who he actually is. Somewhere you get the feeling that Nandani is his morality checker. She forces him to see right from wrong but clearly has no power to sway him from one to the other. Just that she's awakening his conscious, and a very guilty one at that. I don't have an iota of doubt that Nandani will grow up believing her father to be a good, earnest man and much respected king. This sets the perfect stage for her to avenge her father's death and perceive everything that Chandra tells her (if he ever will) to be ludicrous lies.
One thing I am concerned about is the whole nature aspect in Nandani. She is after all Avantika and Nand's daughter, both of which aren't really beacons of good virtues and loyalty. It will then be interesting to see how she in turn is an inherently good person. That's a mystery I'd love to see more of.
Now coming to Moora's prediction. We can already see how that will pan out. But the question is will her flesh and blood be that ruthless? And if so, how will he be virtuously different or better than Nand? Should Nandani really be made to pay for her father's sins? And then there are all the grey areas.
There's a tagline that the Chandra Nandani folks posted on FB that I'd like to draw attention to. It goes like this "The formidable or the wronged! Who would you choose?". The problematic thing about that question is that Chandra from what we can see so far is also wronged. He's justified in seeking revenge and so is Nandani. From what I can see, it seems to be that while his parents did good, Chandra is about to race down a path of destruction balancing out the karmic equation between the two generations. It would be interesting to see if Nandani would do the vice versa, equate her parent's wrongdoings by doing the right thing. That's something I seriously doubt.
All I know is that there are some interesting themes already introduced in the show and it would be really fun to see how the acts of the past affect the future of those that had nothing to do with it at all.
That's all from my side. Over to y'all!
Bindi
Udne Ki Aasha
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
