Taaza Khabar

The makers try to be inventive in the first three episodes. Vasya might know what is going to happen but how and when it does escape him. He might know the future but can’t shape it. The ‘businesses’ are also varied and range from getting a vase—which might contain gold—from an antique store, striking a deal with a quiz show contestant in exchange for the right answer or investing in bitcoin before it shoots up. But the ideas dry out eventually and the show resorts to the tired theme of rags to riches to ashes. The series is basically what you get if Sacred Games’ Ganesh Gaitonde was the protagonist of Gully Boy. The fever of the Zoya Akhtar directorial is high in this one.

The small moments, punctuated by streetwise wisdom and profanity, work better than the overall plot, which staggers about in expected fashion (this isn’t a prediction Vasant can claim for himself). You know exactly where you are when Mahesh Manjrekar snarls his way into the frame, playing a gangster named (what else but) Kismat. It’s preordained, but it needn’t have been.

Taaza Khabar is a typical rags-to-riches story ending in a life lesson about how undiluted power and money can often lead to ruin. It’s a return to the most basic of Bollywood storytelling which is also the show’s fatal flaw – it doesn’t add anything new to the template. For instance, with the power that Vasya now wields, isn’t there much more good he could be doing? And yet, we only see him deal with this moral question once when it has a direct consequence on his life and on his story. Taaza Khabar is let down by its writing not being as immersive and its story and cast. The writing by Abbas Dalal and Hussain Dalal, who truly brought forth how important dialogues can be to a story with Brahmastra, is much better here but still, rather shoddy in places.

Bam has a presence about him and blends well into the part as well as its rags to riches surroundings, but his character's disquiet and flare ups do not convince in the least. Contrivances mount up as the writers give Vasya a free rein of his destiny, conveniently forgetting the phone is not a wish-granting device but a forecaster of news that may be used to one's advantage. Between random flashbacks of childhood underscoring him as a boy from the backstreets to his meteoric rise in status and society, Taaza Khabar never quite becomes the cautionary tale it sets out to be. Humble beginnings discovering power as a tool of corruption is a done-to-death premise, but Vasya's jumbled mind and depressing lack of humour mechanically ticks off the plot points without ever making the spectacular events in his life seem like a journey.

Directed by Himank Gaur, the screenplay of the series has been written by Hussain Dalal and Abbas Dalal. It is the screenplay that you might have a complaint about, as it seems not-so-genuine. What was very important for the series to achieve was empathy for its lead character, as well as the friends he has. However, it is this that is not well established, which in turn creates this gap for the audiences to stand with Vasya in whatever he does. The series would be a treat for Bhuvan Bam fans, who would get to watch the YouTube sensation play a completely new character for close to three hours. But beyond that, the show might not hook you on to its narrative. It’s a 2.5 out of 5 stars for Taaza Khabar.