Raj Nidimoru and Krishna D.K. know very well what clicks with the audience. There were days when use of abusive language or slang was taboo in the mainstream cinema. A special thanks to Vishal Bhardwaj and Anurag Kashyap, the use of slang is now just a regular dialog. Raj & DK have created good story lines with near perfect camera work in the past. Go Goa Gone and The Family Man both had good plots with some impressive camera work.
Everything works more because they choose their actors well. With Farzi, it’s no different. Shahid Kapoor is the perfect choice for a lead negative role. Vijay Sethupathi adds the flavor of the show’s protagonist but gives ample space to other actors to flourish. The smartest move was indeed to involve Manoj Bajpayee’s character, Tiwari, with Vijay Sethupathi’s Michael. Now, the next season of The Family Man might tease us more on that.
The plot details the process of counterfeiting Indian currency and especially emphasizes on the design phase in a first few episodes. But, the story quickly turns into a game of cat and mouse. The first season could have easily dealt with more character development and maybe in the second season, the chase could have been more justified. For this I feel, the script appears to be a bit hurried. The character Sunny (or Sandeep) played by Shahid Kapoor has been given some special skills: sketching and spying to which I feel it’s a bit of a stretch. Then, how he wraps his head around and slide it into a negative mindset is also astonishing. Though the plot reveals some backstory about him, the plot doesn’t seem to elaborate on that. The same goes with the character of Michael played by Vijay Sethupathi. It was indeed a delight to see Amol Palekar reprising with his acting skills. But, again the hurriedness to his backstory is disappointing. The least that could have worked is to show how he connects with his grandson Sunny in the past instead of just showing up at a railway station.
In my opinion, all these loopholes could still work if Raj & DK have something tuned up for us in the upcoming seasons. Adding more to the background plot especially with Michael’s character. I hope that some self-realization is reserved for the character Sunny in the next season because I feel that this could do work wonders for maintaining the emotional balance in the show.
Despite the fast paced nature of the series, the entire season still clicks with the audience in general. Every camera angle reveals something or the other and that works even without revealing much of the backstory. I think that’s the magic of Raj & DK.