When a criminal breaks the law, it makes headlines but does not catch your fancy. When an ordinary man is pushed to the brink and breaks the law, it makes for fantastic engagement. Director #MayankSharma uses this insight to great effect in the #Breathe series. In season1, the question was “How far will you go to protect your loved one?” while in Season 2 he states, “A father’s love can save a life … and take one too!” When the question of morality seeps into a criminal act, the impact can weigh on the mind.
ASHOK’s FIVE reasons to watch #BreatheIntoTheShadows, produced by #AbunduntiaEnteratinment for #PrimeVideo. The series marks the digital debut of #AbhishekBachhan as well as #NithyaMenen. Abhishek plays Dr Avinash Sabharwal, a psychiatrist with a troubled childhood and Nithya, his wife Abha Sabharwal. Their six-year-old daughter Sia (#IvanaKaur) is kidnapped and the best of efforts from Delhi police is to no avail. Enter the troubled cop from season 1, Kabir Sawant (#AmitSadh) and the plot unravels over 12 long episodes. Yet another crime drama – did you say? Yes and No. I do not wish to indulge in any spoilers, but the premise is interesting, the plot does build up but once the villain is revealed in season 5, the juice runs out and the screenplay becomes repetitive, meanders into the lives of some inane characters and reaches a finale which could well have you wanting to murder someone!
1. Season 2 took a long time coming. Big Spoiler alert, but I must confess that I found #RMadhavan’s Danny Masarenhas very compelling in Season 1 and the finesse with which he plays a helpless father was endearing. The big hook there was that the victims where all innocent; there is no attempt made to rake up any past history of sin and therefore punishment. Danny himself is innocent and often tendered his apology before killing his victims. He did not kill them directly; each one was made to look like an accident or a suicide. He did this to bump up his son on the list of organ receivers. #AmitSadh the cop with a history of losing his own daughter to negligence comes after him and the face-off between the two troubled men was a compulsive narrative. There was one brilliant scene where Danny and his mother Juliet (#NeenaKulkarni) look at each other and silently acknowledge the dreadful secret. As Maddy says “Burai se aur bura kya ho sakta hai? Sacchai !!” The vulnerability of Maddy’s Danny is what made season 1 stand out.
And that exactly is what falters in season 2, titled ‘In the Shadows’. Here, both Avinash and Abha are partners in the crime and the murders they commit are direct killings, albeit the brainchild of the kidnapper. Each incident though is revenge for a past wrong-doing. The story is then linked to a story of Indian mythology about the ten human emotions. All this looks contrived and you get a distinct feeling of déjà vu.
2. #BreatheIntoTheShadows does have its bit of interesting twists and turns and is goaded on by some fine acting. #AmitSadh is bulked up but comes into his own finally and is relatable. The women characters are not sketched out well and is a wasted opportunity. Besides Nithya and #ShradhaKaul, who plays the police officer Zeba, there is a glamorous looking escort, Shirley played by #SaiyyamiKher. She does have a part to play in the unravelling of the story, but the part is too little too less. The sidekicks Prakash(#HrishikeshJoshi) and JaiPrakash lend some moral support to Kabir Sawant but Prakash’s romantic detour is badly done and an absolute waste of precious talent. Then there is Meghana(#PlabitaBorthakur) and the build-up of a romantic angle with Kabir but the abruptness with which she exits the story and her contrived emigration to Canada makes for irritating viewing.
3. #AbhishekBacchhan brings the same qualities that #RMadhavan did to the lead of the show – soft spoken, friendly face, refined and cultured. Season 1 does an excellent job of depicting the moral dilemma that Maddy is confronted with – on the one hand he is god fearing and the repeated sequences of him hanging the cross with the necklace in front of the Jesus portrait is symbolic. On the other hand, he transforms into a desperate but not mercenary killer. In Season2, the premise does not do justice to the acts of violence and the past sins tend to look very flimsy at times. #AbhisekhBacchhan looks uncannily like his dad in many scenes and I found this quite fascinating. He bursts into polished English many a time and looks awkward when it comes to small talk. Very rarely does he let his guard down from the intense gravitas with which he carries himself. It is refreshing to see Nithya’s pronounced Malayali accent left as it is although the couple of Malayalam words exchanged between her sister could have been eschewed.
4. The actual reveal of the kidnapper in season 5 is so lame it will have you wanting to execute the ‘ragged doll treatment’ on yourself – essentially holding your head by the sides and shaking it vigorously as if trying to uproot it. Some of the dialogues are also quite lame. “Dilli toh gol gol hai” says Avinash trying to justify his alibi. “Haan, magar Mumbai ekdum straight hai” Kabir responds. Writers Mayank Sharma, Bhavani Iyer, Vikram Tuli and Arshad Syed do manage to bring out some aspects like the failure of marriage well in the way the screenplay is written.
5. The final episode is almost an hour and perhaps the most exasperating. The manner in which Kabir chancing on the murderer is thwarted by an elderly lady in the elevator. The DNA details are erased by a hacker hired fortuitously. Some of these sequences look so contrived, the scenes are almost childish.
#BreatheInTheShadows is yet another instance of a sequel based on a premise that works. The new cast does bring in a fresh perspective and the initial episodes do set up intrigue but the clear lesson is that you cannot dilute the basic premise and expect it to work.
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