‘Zindagi Kaisi Hai Paheli Haye….’
It’s the sound of this evergreen song from Anand that acts as a ‘sutradhar’ of sorts in the 10 episode web series Crashh that has just arrived on ZEE5 and ALT Balaji. It is remarkable to see how Yogesh’s lyrics from half a century back could end up leaving such an everlasting impression in this Ekta Kapoor created show that throws a pleasant surprise. More so because it comes across as one of those rare offerings on the OTT medium which is made for the family audiences.
Think Waqt, Yaadon Ki Baaraat, Amar Akbar Anthony and more such ‘lost and found’ epic tales from what used to be in vogue in the 70s and you realise that there was unabashed entertainment in the offering. Now place the genre in today’s time and you come across characters that range from being a tough cop to a stand up poet to a social media influencer to a driver. Each of them has his/her story to be told after being separated from each other in childhood post a car accident that took away the lives of their loving parents.
Kunj Anand (superb again after Your Honour and Dark 7 White), the cop, is the eldest of them all and is craving to be back with his siblings. It’s his efforts that drive the whole show. His younger sister is Aditi Sharma (assured), the girl who practically adopted her mother who has tried 7 suicides after being hopelessly in love with a married man. Then there are the ‘judwaa’ kids who don’t quite look alike. The girl is a drama queen (Anushka Sen, very confident) who doesn’t mind acting dumb as ‘being dumb with a pretty face’ allows her to earn as much as 5 lakhs for a social media post. On the other hand the young boy Rohan Mehra (fresh face) wonders that if he could somehow bag 5 lakhs, his entire life would be set!
It is characters like these and those around them which come together and make Crashh a very likeable web series. It is credit to director Kushal Zaveri that the show starts well and then makes good progress as well one episode after another, each of which lasts only around 15-20 minutes each. The characters are fleshed out well and the good thing is that the writers don’t take much time to establish how the lives of each of these siblings is intertwined with each other. However, one would have expected Zain Imam’s part to have been written with more exciting elements. Here, as a friendly surgeon and a family member, he is peripheral at best.
Of course, just as is expected out of ‘loss & found’ genre, there are a lot of coincidences and serendipities coming into play. However the conviction with which the story is narrated makes it all entertaining indeed. What makes Crashh stand out though is the immense emotional appeal that it carries. Watch out for the scene in which first of the two siblings end up eventually meeting and you would indeed have moist eyes. Such is the way in which the series is written that you actually crave for all four siblings to meet in their grown up years.
This is the reason why one wonders why the show was stretched to 10 episodes when it could well have concluded after 8. The best part is the middle portion of the series when siblings start getting closer to each other and hence post eighth episode it seems like a drag. Moreover, there is a major turn in the tale which somehow comes out of nowhere and though it does bring with it immense drama, there is no culmination per se, which makes one look forward to how the questions will be answered in the next season. For the sake of completeness, it would have helped had the core story been concluded.
Still, what makes Crashh work eventually is its emotional appeal. It keeps you engaged, entertained and emotional, and that’s where it’s key strengths lie.