Kankhajura

And the sutradhar of all this is Roshan Mathew. The actor breathes new life into this thriller genre, which is almost at risk of oversaturation on OTT. His performance, already one of the best this year, makes you feel everything for Ashu - from sympathy to disgust to rage. And therein lies the beauty of what Roshan has achieved here. The actor, a famous babyface, has hardly ever handled something this dark and devious. But he coasts through not just the role but the setup, quite flawlessly. Kankhajura is a good show based on the story and the technical aspects alone. Roshan makes it great.

But when the show unravels its mystery, which happens quite early on, there is barely any impact or surprise as the following scenes only confirm our assumptions about what we earlier saw. Roshan Mathew, with his creepy demeanour and an obvious grudge, tries hard to make the character appear mysterious and disturbing but the tension never builds because of the constant predictable beats planted by Director Chandan Arora and his writing partner Sandeep Jain. For the narrative that delves into themes of manipulation and deceit, the show lacks the taut writing and clever deceptions as it meanders through twists and turns that can be seen miles away. The unnecessary sub-plots don't add much to the central story either. Trinetra Haldar's trans character Amy just feels like a bait for inclusive casting rather than an organic need for the story.