Variety is the spice of life

What makes a drama series tick, in OTT, that too in Tamil? The question should've been pretty straight forward and not as difficult as it is for making a successful movie, for drama series are dime a dozen across scores of TV channels and none of them are found wanting for audience. The more the cry the merrier the TRP. In that context, the only challenge that OTT platforms might've had while streaming tamil series must've been to choose the path - either the well trodden and worn out cryathons aligning with Satellite channels or try for something genre specific like how they do across English and other foreign languages. This is where Heartbeat series in Hotstar finds the fine balance between being a soap oppaari (no pun intended) in tv and carving a niche OTT audience.  While the setup might've been familiar one for Hindi audience with so many series happening on hospital based storyline, i guess this is a first for tamil. The first season was more on establishing the...

With Junior entering the next stage of his schooling life, it is all the more emotionally tumultuous period for over enthu pattani parent like me, who often compare their own childhood for reference in handling their kid, either to follow or digress from what they went through. It made me realize, how much of a "Santhosh Subramaniam" Prakash Raj i am turning into when it comes to dealing with Junior. On one hand, i want to make sure his path is devoid of any trouble and has a smooth take off, i contradict myself at every step of the way, not realizing that take off means, spreading wings to fly and not remain on the palms of your hand! The other side being not knowing when to let go! When it comes to junior, even slight things that deviate from expected results tend to throw me off handle for it induces the kind of panic reaction and response solely out of guilt of not doing the right job as a parent. I often look back at what my dad would've done and it makes me wonder, ...

This book by Rollins is not part of the famous Sigma series and is a standalone one. It has all ingredients of a typical Rollins novel in a lighter dose. More of Rollins latte i would say. The book begins in the usual template format of Rollins, with a situation involving a famous historical figure and a real one at that, with a slight dose of fiction in such a way that, you wouldn't be able to differentiate between fact and fictitious account of that incident. Count Saint Germaine, a supposedly controversial figure, capable of performing magical things and always had a mysterious aura about him, leaves behind a book with one lady, who was the assistant to the famous queen who was executed during French revolution, something that was predicted by Germaine several years before. She doesn't seems to be a big fan of him but still keeps up her word in securing the book, which becomes the bone of contention between two groups, one of whom are followers of the cult or Germaine himsel...

Again, another book of Crichton that i felt had read long before but forgot about it. In fact, whenever i re-read such books, which i am sure had read before but not able to remember anything about the plot or storyline, reminds me time and again that, there was a reason why it wasn't so memorable. Either the plotline would've been too confusing and for someone who hop-skip-jump read such sections very frequently in the past, i would've either lost interest in the story and would've dropped it half way or would've finished it quick, without actually liking anything about it. Sphere, for what its worth, is somewhere deep in between. The premise is fascinating with a group of academic scholars, being air dropped into middle of ocean, and then deep into the ocean to study about a wreckage, that later turns out to be an alien craft. While there is continuous debate till the end, whether it was something sent from the future or from a far away planet, the situations invo...

Self peethal time again. Crossed a kutty milestone of 1 million hits and is more than half way into the next 100k by the time i posted this. The trend of the hits and views increasing when i don't post and the same decreasing whenever i post continues well into this cycle as well!! Enna thaanya solla vareenga. Post podrana iliayanu paathu pogra gumbal post padikaratha vida jaasthiya iruko? Oru vazhia kadaiya mooditana nu check panrathukaga athana per visitinga?? :D :D Hehehe..either way. Varugaikum tharugaikum nandri.  Anaithu creditsum Thalai Rameshkay urithaaguga. He is the foremost inspiration, perspiration and respiration behind all these posts. Thanks Thala for regularly commenting and unga comments vandhurkanu paakrathukaga naan selfa adichay visit countay oru 40% hits ethirukum nenakren. Mikka nanri for all other regular and irregular visitors as well. Intha milestonelaam indha blogspacela activea iruntha palar reached decades back. Like the proverbial tortoise, it has liter...

When i saw the trailer of this series, i was so curious and was eagerly awaiting the launch for the very concept of a series involving Sherlock being awesome, the one tracing his origins or young self would surely have been a fantastic premise to explore. True to the expectation, the series began with a bang, involving a jailed Sherlock being rescued by Mycroft and the first episode runs away to a finish like a 1000 wala cracker with several characters mushrooming at every turn and most of the main players already getting established, including Moriarty(!) and a Chinese lady. Pretty soon the crime gets established and Sherlock, for a change, is on the run as a suspect/fugitive from law for a murder he didn't commit. The story goes steadily and speedily downwards from then onwards and the climax resembling 1970's Bollywood movies, involving the hero and his dad and their sacrifice!! It could've been a hat tip to the very similar setup involving Sherlock/Moriarty at the Reich...

 I vaguely remember reading about this book a long while back but wasn't sure if i had finished. When i started reading again, i couldn't recollect any major situations or plot lines except for the fact that it was a medical thriller. After finishing the book, i realized why i hadn't bothered much!! Michael Crichton is one of my favorite author right next to Arthur Hailey. They both have penchant for doing deep dive into the respective genres which would put a PhD scholar to shame. There will be way too much information that would be bombarded on the reader, page after page, that at times it would feel as if you are reading a theory paper on the subject, albeit presented in an interesting manner! Wiki says Crichton was about 26 years old when he wrote this story, under the pseudonym of Jeffrey Hudson. May be he predicted his fame down the line and despite winning awards for this book, he knew the topic was at best controversial. The book deals with the big taboo in American...