Variety is the spice of life

Other than cop/crime thrillers and family sitcoms, the most favorite theme of any channel producing drama series, would be medical field. There are several super hit series on this field and it continues to provide never ending stream of premises and situations for script writers to explore. Having binge watched a couple of them, my favorite of the lot would be House M.D, for its unique and probably the first ever medical series, to feature diagnosis of a disease like a crime thriller. The entire setup resembled a sherlockian mystery and it was clarified by David Shore, the creator as well, of his love for that fictional detective. Even the names of the characters carried strong relativity with House for Holmes, James for John, the erratic, eccentric, brilliant, arrogant but golden hearted nature of House and so on. Grey’s Anatomy was another such series based on doctors and hospital. But the similarity ends right there, with this one focusing more on human emotions, love and probably ...

Netflix, true to its logo is dark black and blood red in its content curation as well. Most of the hit drama series of Netflix have all been dystopian, exploring darkest nature of human mind bent so much that it raises not just fear but also slight wonderment on how different it works. If not for the wonderment quotient, which one may feel ashamed to admit, these series would’nt be such blockbuster hits. The biggest revolution or change that such streaming platforms have made is that the entire world or wherever they are allowed to stream, now has a common viewing platform, where irrespective of the culture and background, stories can be told and understood. Subtitling is going to be such a roaring business in coming days. Learning multiple languages and understanding the essence of the dialogues written, will definitely pave way for language specialists. Trusting the texts as much as the contextual meaning derived, Money Heist (Spanish) made such a big splash in India that for its rec...

I’ve mentioned about “Tamizhachi Aandal” series that is presently coming on “Kumudham” (tamil weekly magazine) a couple of times in this space. It is possibly one of the best written devotional series I’ve ever read. It doesn’t fully go overboard on philosophical stuff and is very smartly written, with clever intermixes of “paasurams” by the aazhvaars, the history of the place where it was sung, the story of the deity on whom it was written, mixing it with the main story of Aandal. The entire episode is narrated by Periyaazhavar, Aandal’s dad at his house, along with the company of their neighbours and friends. The story has grown manifold in dimension, having started at the time when Vairamuthu (cinema lyricist) defamed Aandal’s birth and fame. Every week, the story covers one or other aazhvaar and their interactions with god, narrated as a story, worth made into multiple movies. As I mentioned, the narration is strictly simple. There are no over the top philosophical teachings, with ...

Expectations – that is the magic formula for box office I guess. The hype that people create about heroes, heroines, directors, comedians and possibly some other technicians as well, makes the movie and many a times break it as well. But those that are seen without any expectation, often have a higher probability of success. Agreed that it may not pull crowds from day one show one and it may not reap big time money on the first day itself. Such movies often have the cushion of being low budget and hence can sustain for a lengthier period to recover the money invested. The only strength or USP of such movies are their content and presentation. It need not require a multi crore budget or high profile cast but decent presentation and likeable chemistry between the characters. Edhukuda ivlo peria buildup!! Pathu line aaidchu innum enna review nu sollavay illangaravangaluku…adhaan matteray. It is a simple story and I actually wasn’t much interested in watching it for the reviews posted prio...

This series is a light hearted take on a theme popularized by “Angadi theru” movie. As the name says, its about events happening on a supermarket on the lines of Walmart, the day to day activities of the staff and their personal life. Its heavy duty communist/socialist message, surviving for six seasons, makes one wonder about the present leaning of the American public. The USP of the show is, it never takes itself seriously enough. The topics of minimum wage, racism, corporate exploitation, over worked staff, stereotyping, every single one of them have been spoken about in a light hearted way and never preached as a solution. It is just dealt with it as how it is being dealt with in daily life. The minimum wage call which leads to unionism and how it is underplayed to the point of being forgotten actually shows at its heart America will always be the capitalist dream land and in a way it works for the show as well, for the lead character herself, who is also the producer, turns a self...