Originally posted by: Aazeen02
Assalamualaikum and Hello everyone,
Major disclaimer, this post is way long, please bear with me.
Just like season one, I watched Suno Chanda's Season 2 from the very first episode.
I found this season way better and engaging than the previous one, not that the previous season was mediocre, but this season is outclass. Way crispier writing, well edited and beautifully executed. Actors are way into the characters and look more at ease. Special mention to Farhan Saeed's phenomenal acting improvement and his volley of words with Shahana and Jiya. All make us burst out into peals of laughter. But the major shout out is for his emotional scenes, and he is portraying well.
Talking further, the last two days have been particularly heavy and I have been wracking my brain into shredded meat wondering what is right and what is wrong, who is more correct or whose ways are worse. I am eliminating the discussions of the other characters for a moment and talk solely about Arsal and Ajiya.
A girl who amongst the conventional thought process of a family works particularly hard to secure good marks, great ranks, scholarships and an admission into a premium university of the world, is no small feat. She also tries to blend into the ways of her family, does some household works as well, and tries to keep her family, and especially her husband happy. Right from end of season one, her attempts have been to have the best of the two worlds. The two worlds that are polar opposite to each other. Unfortunately, with this it means, she cannot be present in the north pole when she is present at the South pole. And this vast difference in her dreams and reality is actually splitting her apart. Being a thorough feminist myself, I believe in a girl getting equal opportunity as a boy gets, even when career is concerned. And she grabbed it with both the hands. If Jiya wants to study further, there's absolutely no problem in that. I am not being orthodox here, don't get me wrong, marriage is not a barrier to progress, but is also not a stepping stone to move ahead. I know a lot of people say that Arsal has no UK citizenship and she never used his name to her success, but let's get into a flashback of season one, Naima and Nazakat once negated her request for going to London, saying- "Apne shauhar ke yahan jakar dikhaana ye saare UK ke nakhre". Which meant, if and only if she marries will she be getting to go to study further (with a silent term and condition of, if the husband allows). Now she had a full blown opportunity to marry Sherry and to lead a life she had ever dreamt of. He is an open minded, free spirited, understanding, calm and a space giving person, who particularly has a motto of, live and let live. Jiya would have got everything she had ever wanted in her life. She would particularly have a life that she wanted to live all her life. Until an incident happened which shook her to the core of her bones; they were attacked and the life which she wanted to progress merrily in, was at stake. Had it not been for the man that she particularly disliked, her plans to UK and London would have all been cremated into the graveyard along with her body. That changed her perception totally... Apart from a live and let live person, she wanted a pair of strong arms which could shield her in no matter which situation, uncaring of his own life. A person who could give away his own life to not let you get even a scratch, makes that person hold a high pedestal in one's life. And that's exactly what happened to Jiya. Despite knowing that he is a conventional, orthodox and some what a chauvinist, she still knew that he loved her more than his life and that made her melt in front of his love.
Now coming to the scenario post marriage, no doubt Jiya loves Arsal way too much and she keeps on bending here and there to accomodate with Arsal's ways, still her dream to study further in LSE doesn't budge much. I agree, she should not give up just because she got married and she has tried to explain this to Arsal way many times to think that he is somewhat a chauvinist and is tying her back with him. But what has gone wrong all the way through, is the manner in which he is being explained. You can't treat your spouse in the same manner that you did before marriage. You throw him out of the room at the drop of the hat, in a house full of guests, with joint and extended family to keep noticing that the newly wed couple are not on the best of terms on a certain topic of discussion. Then you go about in the house to straight away go to his parents and cry your lungs out about how ill treated you are being felt by their son. You are time and again provoking him to treat you in a similar way that you are treating him. And except for Naima and Nazakat, whose words are not taken much into par; nobody is understanding his actual point of view and hitting him hard on his ego, telling him time and again that he is one chunk of an incapable, failure, duffer and worthless person who should feel thankful that he has got one capable wife like Jiya, who not just studied well, but is the first in the family to get an admission into LSE (Shahana absolutely didn't mean to disgrace her son, but to outshine her daughter in law, and in the process hurting her son like nothing else). He has started to feel unwanted, uncared and unloved, since it's all about Jiya; when in the first place, his issue wasn't his insecurity at all.
All he wanted was to be loved by his wife, to be prioritised by her, if not more than her dream to study at LSE, then at least be equivalently important to her. All he was wishing for was to have her by his side or him being by her side. But one way or the other he was understanding that him going to london is not that easy, and that is why he kept on pulling her back. He tried his last bet by making a try to go along with her to London, but got not just rejected, but also embarassed and humiliated by the entire joint and extended family, making him broken from inside and yet again everyone missed understanding his part of the story, making him extremely volatile and sensitive to the point of just ending everything in a jiffy if his place in the lives of his close family is near to absolutely nothing, Especially in Jiya's life... And that is why he kept on ranting - Chali toh gayi ho zindagi se, aur kitna jaaogi...
Now the million dollar question that everyone's asking everywhere, What is Jiya's fault in all this? Jiya's fault is a tiny bit of understanding Arsal. She is seeing Arsal from the glasses that she saw Sherry in.(She's not comparing him to Sherry at all, but because she is herself a lot like Sherry, she sees Arsal with the same pattern) a practical, pragmatic, broad minded and no emotional strings attached kind of a person, she is expecting Arsal to behave exactly that way. Arsal, a person who is romantic, loving, orthodox or conventional and most of all an extremely emotional person is not able to understand in the way everyone is trying to make him understand, hammering the fact in his head that he has to maintain a long distance relationship with his wife for two years which are going to pass away like a bat of an eyelid. From his point of view ask him how he is going to pass those two years... He will either get very emotionally broken person or totally indifferent. And the fear of losing the touch of love is scaring him.
Now comes the last phase, how would this problem be solved... Well I will bet my million dollars that if just once, just for once only for Arsal's sake, jhoote mooh hi Sahi, if Jiya says that- Arsal, agar aapki Khushi isi mein hai ki main London jaake apne khwaab purey na karoon, toh theek hai, main nahi jaaungi (contrary to her dialogue- Arsal main apne faisle se ek inch bhi nahi hilungi)... The moment she lets him have the priority of her love, I bet, agar Arsal khud sponsor na kar de Jiya ki studies in London toh change my name...
That's all... I wanted to write on this for a while now, and so here it is. Positive and negative both criticisms are welcome, share your opinion.
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