Singham 3, however, is an empty vessel that makes noise—a lot of noise at that. The incessant background score is so filled with shlokas, if one wants to learn Sanskrit, you just have to play the soundtrack. If one half of the film is loud, ineffective background music played to slow motion walks from its stars, the other half of the film is absurd comparisons to Ramayana. This is not Shetty respectfully referring to the epic; it is him trying to make up for the lack of effort in his script. The bad news for me was that I grew tired by the third or fourth Ramayana parallel. The worst news was that there were hundreds. 

This is not something Shetty is incapable of pulling off: His better movies are carefree entertainers that don’t try to do much. And there’s proof of this here as well. The best portions of Singham Again are when Ranveer Singh makes an appearance as Simmba. The actor hams it up like nobody’s business, but many of his lines are genuinely funny, and Ranveer brings some much-needed energy into the proceedings. The other parts that work are when Singham Again remembers that, after all, this is an Ajaya Devgn film. In scenes where it’s just his story and not a gang-up of cameos, the actor has a great screen presence. (Genuine question to Ajay though: when will you stop comparing yourself to Lord Shiva? First of all, why are you doing this here? Aren’t you supposed to be Lord Ram?) In the rest of the scenes, he seems to have been handed over a sheet that says: WALK. 

Singham 3 is an easy festival watch, and there are no dull moments. It seems to be made solely to entertain, no matter how little sense it makes. At times, it also feels to be made to prove the existence of the Ramayana to people who question its reality. There is literally a line that goes something like “a lot of the people in the audience believe the Ramayana is fiction.” I felt bad for poor Kareena Kapoor, who is handed scenes like this and worse. I felt even more terrible for Deepika Padukone, who seems to have been handed over a sheet that says: ANNOY.

The film begins with a disclaimer that goes on for like fifteen minutes, and then, there are logos of so many companies, you wonder if you’re in an ad for the stock exchange. And it ends with an unnecessary cameo (even by this film’s standards). I read a report that said this cameo was shot just days before the release. It’s almost like the makers were wondering, “Hey, something is missing,” and decided, “Ah! Another cameo!,” instead of “Ah, the script!”

But no amount of trashing the current times could have prepared me for the shock of seeing a gray hair in my head for the first time. My days are numbered. Will I get to watch the debut of AbRam Khan in Student of the Year 18? 

I shared this fateful incident with my friend, and he started giving me advice. Imagine we are in a temple in Mount Kailash, and he is sitting on a seat 5 meters above ground wearing layers of viboodhi on his forehead. “Society makes you feel old irrespective of your age. When you turn a teen, they tell you, you are a teen now. When you turn 18, they tell you, you are an adult. When you turn 25, they tell you, congratulations on your platinum jubilee. So no matter how old you-”

“Dei, platinum jubilee is for 70 years,” I intervened. I understand he was making a bigger point about life that I would now never hear, but hey, I corrected his grammar. I don’t need to hear no philosophy from a 80s kid. 

I have a set of ideas to combat the situation. Dying my hair burgundy (dying it black means they’ll figure it out), clean shaving my head (people will think I am The Rock), moving to a country where everyone’s hair is white. Mathematically calculating, I believe half of my life is over. I am GenZ, which means I treat my body the way GVM treats his climaxes: I have no idea what I am doing about it, I just hope it all works out. 

In a few months I’ll turn 26. I’ll be old enough to get a license that allows me to abduct the tennis balls of the kids in my flats when it comes my way.You called me an uncle, I’ll be an uncle. So what, my head hereon is going to look like the Himalayas? My inspirations hereon are going to be Indian thaatha and James Cameron? How bad does it get from here? Where is that pension scheme? Age is just a number, but surely, I am very bad at numbers.

I say, let us up the game

It’s a case of neutralization. Every brand is now backed by not one, but two celebs. So how do you make sure yours is the one people will buy? How will people differentiate?

1. Avengers Assemble. Two doesn’t cut it. See what Farah Khan did with Om Shanthi Om 15 years back. 2 is rookie numbers. Bring together at least 30 stars. A photo of them together should be so big that customers will buy two packets to just view it fully. 

2. Go the Rajamouli way. Your ad should have Virendar Sehwag dressed up - as a Pan-diya Warrior in a battlefield. He gets punched brutally in his face by his opponent Sunil Gavaskar, and he spouts blood. But, he still continues fighting like nothing happened. Gavaskar is confused. So are the audiences. Turns out that the red liquid was not blood, but it was… 

    We cut to Sehwag saying - 

Kamla Pasand. Confuse your opponents 

3. Let’s be Pan Indian. What is stopping you from bringing in stars from all over the country? Do you think people down south don’t consume pan masala? We have tons of paint brands here, but ever wondered why they don’t sell red paint? Because they don’t need to. We paint the buildings red ourselves

4. Audience Pan-dering. Start mentioning that your ingredients are hand-picked from the Himalayas and your product contains immunity boosting herbs. Don’t forget to add stuff like “Loved by Indian mothers” or “Get a chance to win a free frying…pan”

5. Partnerships. There’s a lot of potential here. Partner with toothpaste brands and give out free samples with a purchase. Partner with insurance companies and hospitals that offer attractive discounts and packages for those who get cancer using your products. Partner with cricket players - gone should be the days when they used to play with bats that said MRF and Britannia. Their cricket bats should have your brand as the sticker

With these mouth-watering ideas, your brand will successfully give the competitors a pan-ic attack. Don't worry about the pan-demonium that this might create on the internet. Be patient - as your customer also will soon be - with due time, we will all abandon this cancel culture, and progress together towards a cancer culture

Then I suddenly remembered an article I had read last week - if you are sweating profusely, you could be having anything from a panic attack to a heart attack. Or you could be looking at Salman Khan in the mid-90s, I had told myself back then

But this time it seemed like a burning issue. I started feeling like an actress who’s listening to the second-half narration of a Gautham Menon movie - Is this the end of my story? 

As my dying wish, I wanted to try reading the newspaper for once in my life. I wanted to know how it feels to not just use it to absorb the oil in the vengaaya bajji. On opening the newspaper, I got to know that I could be feeling like this because of the heat wave in India

It is true - the Sun is going to release its dream project for the planet in these coming months. I remember going to the motta maadi (Bald Terrace) the other day to pick up clothes, and wondering why they felt like they landed straight from Santhosh Sivan’s camera in Thalapathy. These days, even listening to Pudhu Vellai Mazhai hasn’t been making the room any cooler

I started drafting an action plan to combat this. After several heated discussions within my head, here is a Summer-y:

1.     Drink so much water that if someone cuts your skin, you should bleed H2O. This will mean a lot of trips to the restroom - but you can reach your daily steps goal that way

2.     You’ve been doing this well already - stay indoors. Don’t even look outside the window until it is 5pm

3.     Don’t watch Sun TV, Sunrisers Hyderabad matches, and Sun-dar C films

4.     Watch movies that are set in winter or snowy places. Go on a Yash Chopra songs rampage on YouTube. Rewatch Hardhome from Game of Thrones every single day.

5.     Avoid foods from sunfeast

6.     You should have two layers of physical existence. One should be your normal body covered with your normal skin. The next should be sunscreen. Bury yourself in a mountain of sunscreen. Wear it even if you look like Ramarajan from Karakattakaran

7.     Hereon, the earth is going to behave like Ram Gopal Varma’s career trajectory. It’s gonna do as it pleases, it’s gonna be unpredictable, and it’s gonna make you go “I liked you better before”. So be mentally prepared

8.     Be cold to people you meet

If you are living in an Indian city, this should answer some of your burning questions. If that city is Chennai, then I am sorry - the Sun hates you as much as we hated T-Series for remixing Masakali.

One of the foremost non-institutional lessons I learnt in life was that whether you are red, blue, green, ( I can’t include the yellow ones even in a philosophical discussion, sorry), or orange, deep down, we’re all a potato.

I was actually going somewhere with that metaphor, but then I thought why not make it 20% content and 80% empty air.

Instead, maybe I’ll share my two most life defining moments associated with the Blue Lays.

1. Bharat Maata Ki Jai

It was the 2011 cricket world cup, and Lays rolled out a bunch of flavors, each one representing a country. I remember running through the counter in a supermarket, looking at each country’s respective obesity-launchers. I saw that the Blue-colored ones are for India, and a new found sense of patriotism ran down my body. I saw the packet, stood up straight, and saluted proudly.

I finished around 5 packets of Blue Lays that day, doing my dues for my motherland. I felt like a soldier of the Indian Army.

2. This is business

This was when I got to know Lays is owned by Pepsico - which also owns Pepsi. My still-developing (still developing actually) mind was blown. I asked my mother “Imagine how hard the owner of Pepsico must be working. How difficult would it be to manage two things at the same time?” My mom, a working mother of two adolescent boys(three if you count my father), gave me a stare that I’d never forget.

Coming back to the chips

If ever there was a list of products that had a country’s name in it and stayed true to the country’s flavors, the Blue Lays might just be on top. It does taste like something that boarded an Air India flight and caught a Salman Khan movie on route

It is an all-encompassing malleable wonder that can be introduced to any situation and be an able partaker. Want some snacks during the match? Blue Lays. Want something to eat with your rice? Blue Lays. Want to get some cheap accompaniment after you spent your month’s salary on the alcohol? Blue Lays

Creator of social lessons

Back when I was a child, the 5 rupees packet had 10 chips, the 10 rupees packet had 20 chips, and so on. I remember unfriending one of my closest friends in school because he took 6 chips and left me 4. Such was my staunch belief in equality. The next day, as an act of peace, he brought me a packet of Pringles by selling off his PlayStation. Today, I am on my way to becoming the godfather of his child

Let’s try to wrap it up with a Big, Fat joke

I wanted to recreate the Blue Lays for a house party once, and I called a friend of mine who was a self professed expert in making snacks. We tried multiple variations, added everything from chilli powder, garlic powder, even went as far as cardamom powder (someone had to use it before it expired). We couldn’t replicate the recipe. We were wondering what it is that we were missing. We told ourselves…maybe there’s something in the air

P.S: Find that guy who suggests mixing two flavors in order to make things easier during a sleepover, and ban him from society

P.P.S: I like the green ones more

September 1, 2055. She was dreaming about the incidents of the last few days. Life had been more or less boring after getting reincarnated as a human. Then happened the hunger games. Followed by the meeting with a bunch of ghosts (She jokingly called them “Pei Pals”).

She was woken up by the sound of the nurse preparing medicine. She was finally starting to show some improvement after taking a mountain of pills - a pillstation, if I may, so anything that was given by the nurse She took it with the devotion of an atheist student on the day before an exam. However, it was 1am, way past the time to take the pill.

That’s when She realised that this nurse was not the one who usually visits, but……

This was not even a nurse, this was the assassin Whyshnavi dressed up as one. She could remember her face from the news. Her photo popped up in between TV shows, especially in between the scenes where the viewer can’t wait to see what happens next - hence, she was a serial killer in more than one way. The woman was carrying a gun.

“Why-” before She could complete the question, Whyshnavi took her aim and She ran down the hospital room into the balcony. She looked down the 100 storied building. It was a matter of seconds before the assassin struck a bullet, and hence She did the most logical thing anyone could possible ever think of -  jumped.

He was no normal human. And his tummy was no normal tummy. He hit the floor with his belly leading the attack. Due to the extraterrestrial fat in it, once he hit the floor he was sent flying upwards like a spring. Overjoyed at converting the road into a goddamn trampoline park, he took some time to realise that his upwards spiral didn’t seem to stop. He kept going up. And up. Till he crossed the zone where there used to be atmosphere. And he still didn’t stop. He could now see the guy who was sent flying because of Salman Khan’s punch. “Why?!” 

She crossed several planets and was now barely conscious. That’s when She heard the voice behind.

“Welcome to Whykuntam, She Laa.”

She turned to see Lord Wish-nu standing with his wife, Luck-shmi. 

“Why am I here?!”

Looking at the perplexed expression, the Lord smiled.

“You ded.”

The Lordess elucidated. “You are now in afterlife. We thought circumstances were unfair to you. Hence we give you two options - you can either return to 2055 alive as a genie, or you can go to 2020 which was when you got reincarnated, and spend the rest of your life as a normal human.”

She gave it some thought. The world at 2055 was really horrible. Pollution everywhere. People killing each other. Going there as a genie would mean fulfilling the wishes of terrible humans. She said She’d rather go to 2020 as a normal human and enjoy a simple life. After all, when She was a genie, it was not because of choice but because “It runs in your genies”, as She’s dad used to say.

“As you wish”, they said together, and She blacked out.

September 1, 2020. Amazon Forest. She Laa was standing in front of his parents. Only, he wasn’t a genie. Like the gods had promised, he had been reborn as a human being. In 2020, the year his dad sent him to the future after removing his genie powers. 

“And that, my son, is the future.”

“Why didn’t you just show it to me? Like a movie? Why did you have to reincarnate me?”

“You love Om Shanthi Om. We thought we’d let our child get a glimpse of it.”

“Why? Do you know what all I went through? First I got my genieric nature scraped and was reincarnated as a human in the future. Then I barely survived the hunger games. Also, I’ve only heard of the term ‘ghosting parties’, I had no idea it would be this horrific. Not to mention an encounter with an assassin. Are you even my parents?

Su Shee La and Ra-Genie-Kanth looked at each other and laughed. “ You couldn’t figure out it was us in spite of us both changing just our costumes? What have we given birth to! You didn’t meet two gods, you idiot. It was us out there in ‘Whykuntam’. You’re so pathetic we should name named you Chi Laa, lmao”

She Laa was enraged. He stormed out, never wanting to see his parents again.

“Hey come on!” his dad ran behind him trying to catch up. He slipped over a stone and fell on She Laa, full on. It was a giant getting squished by a really big giant. She Laa got paralysed , he felt like his brain stopped working( which was already true anyways).

“April 9,2055. 11:45am. Name She Laa. Age 50. Nationality Chinese. Gender Male. Got into coma following an accident at the Amazon forest 35 years ago.“ She was woken up by the sound of the nurse reading out the report. The nurse, Ni-Why-Dhitha, saw him and jumped up.

“He finally woke up!!!She Laa has finally woke up.”

She dialed a number. “He’s up. And yes, enrol his name into the hunger games. It starts in two months, right? Also, does the candidate’s size matter?”

“Why?!?!?!?!?!?!”

Aladdin takes the lamp out, rubs it, and boom.

A cool idea in theory, I wouldn’t disagree, but that’s not how things work in real life. Yes, I’m really fat, and yes I do make wishes come true. But I have just as much authority as anyone else regarding who I’ll service. The thing is, I once met a poor hungry kid who had written this C program to predict random numbers. I didn’t C the point behind it, but this kid badly wished someone used his work. I like kids, and I made this kid’s first wish come true by using his program to decide the next geographical coordinate I’ll bless with my noble self, and I fed him Musk Melons. The kid went on to become Elon Musk. 

My next destination was somewhere near the North Pole. I was surprised to know that standing there wouldn’t make me lose my balance and fall down to the South Pole.  As I neared my coordinate, the surroundings got extremely deserted. Even the polar bears (who due to global warming are turning into Solar Bears) were not to be found here, and my path eventually led me to a cave.

At the exact point sat the weirdest thing I’d ever seen. It was too big in size for a Walrus, and as I went nearer to it I could see it had the features of a…….wait

“Dad?”

The creature turned around.

“She Laa! What are you doing here? No job down South?” With that he came and hugged me. The hug would have probably resulted in a Tsunami down the Arctic Ocean.

“I don’t get it. Weren’t you supposed to be with Mom in the Amazon Forest? “

“Let’s just say things are not great right now between me and Su Shee Laa. And Jeff Bezos owns Amazon Forest now.”

I didn’t really like my dad. It was because of him that I was born a Genie and had spent all my life listening to people wanting to mix cow dung in their bosses’ breakfasts and reserve their next births to be born as dogs. Among the genie community he was infamous for being notorious with people. He often spoke in a twisted manner making the person come up with a wish that would most certainly backfire. Once a man told him “Make me rich”, and he woke up the next day to see people call him by the name ‘Rich Riordan’ instead of ‘Rick Riordan’.

So I wanted to leave this place as soon as possible without inviting any trouble, and I gently tried to end the conversation. “Okay dad, nice seeing you, I really have to get going now-lots of people to make happy”. You may think I was being a female dog, but the last time I was with my dad he was compelling the whole family to play ‘Geneeya Naana’, a new game he had then created.

“What’s the hurry for, my boy? It’s been ages since we last met. This Ra-Genie-Kanth seldom gets to spend time with his son. Also, don’t forget to perform your genie duties. I may be a genie myself, but the rules apply to all. ”

“Well if we’re following rules, then aren’t you senior to me? Shouldn’t you be acting as the genie then?”

“Sure. Go on. Make them.”

“Make what?”

“The wishes, what else?”

That’s when I had my Oops!!! moment. All my life I’d existed making wishes of stupid people come true, but I’ve never wondered what would happen if I was geniealised myself. 

“Give me some time to think.”

“Are you dumb? You got only 60 seconds. Actually only 30 more.”

“Why haven’t we done this before? Why now suddenly?”

“Before you were just big. Now you’re old. Twenty seconds. You wish or you die.”

I wished I died. My mind was as blank as Katrina Kaif’s face.

“Come on. This is part of our life. We’re genies. Genie us.”

“I……wait, can I ask you to die?”

“There’s nothing this Ra-genie-can’t do. But no. Kid’s these days!”

I then said the most generic and disappointing dialogue ever, one that I make fun of when heard from my clients. 

“I wanna see the future.”

August 31,2055. She Laa woke up and sat on his hospital bed .A memory so old, yet so strong in his mind. He could have asked anything that day. And his dad could have just showed him what happens in the future. Instead of making him get reincarnated as a human being. With one allowance - the two remaining wishes could be used in the course of his lifetime. 

The ones he had exhausted to survive the hunger games and the bullet wound inflicted by The Godfather. That meant he can’t go back now. Not unless his dad came and took him. The chances of that not happening were fatter than him. 

To be concluded here.

So I won the Hunger Games. I got heavily injured and had to be shifted to a wheel chair; and they had no wheelchairs to suit my size( I guess XXL applies only to clothes and burgers). I began to exist like the suave guy from Me Before You, only there was no Emilia Clarke. Also, I wasn’t suave.

The best part about winning the hunger games was that I got to meet five celebrities. They’re not actual celebrities, but characters from movies who were cloned based on how they behaved on screen. But they were very popular and stuff like #duplikatewinslet and “Leonardo Die Caprio“ were trending on social media. And to be present in the same polluted air as five of them was a dream I wouldn’t have experienced if I’d slept for 20 hours.

The meeting place was a joint called “Man Serves Wild - Bear Grills”. It had almost all the animals you’d see in a zoo (to eat of course  - we’re Chinese). It also had board games.

“They still got those things?” asked the Godfather. He didn’t have his trademark accent- he either visited the dentist finally or his clone was yet to get a software update.

“As long as people are foolish enough to believe in ghosts, Ouija boards will be present” declared Tony Stark. He was not in his Iron Man suit, he said it was hard to pee while wearing it. 

“From where I come from, ghosts actually exist. So do dragons, though I’m afraid if they ever visited China, they’ll start being included in the menu.” This was Ned Stark, the guy from Game Of Thrones. 

“Can we just start playing?”, said Kalpana. You might know her as the Asin character from Ghajini.

“Why, are you in a hurry to go get your head hammered down?” Meghna was being rude. That was unprecedented. I thought she’d behave like she did in Vaaranam Aayiram.

It was my turn to play first. I asked the question “Do ghosts exist?”. Everyone else sighed heavily. “YES”, answered the board. Seeing me get uncomfortable, The Godfather assured me that it’s an Ouija board, of course it would say yes. He also made me an offer I can’t refuse- he told me to take his turn.

I noticed Tony Stark starring at Ned Stark. Two people from two eras. This is what you’d call a Stark contrast, I reckoned. 

“Did you really get your head cut because you just weren’t smart enough to think properly?” he hissed.

“Beg your pardon?” Ned was confused. He was being Ned.

“Like you begged for Joffrey’s pardon in front of everyone? You idiot. Because of what you did, people associate the name Stark with someone who’s dumb.”

“Why are YOU talking like you’re some saint, Tony Stark? It was the bomb from YOUR company that killed me. I would have gotten to live with Surya if not for you.” Meghna was looking furious.

“JUST STOP IT. Let me have my games night for God’s sake. I don’t care what you guys did to each other. You are all clones. Don’t behave like clowns”. I was proud of myself for coming up with that.

The ruckus died down a bit. I continued playing, annoyed. “ Is there any ghost here right now?”. I don’t know why I asked that. 

“YES”.

There was pin drop silence in the room. I looked at The Godfather for help, and he looked as clueless as the person who’s wondering where this article is headed. All the five of them were characters who died. ANY of them could be a ghost. 

And that’s when it hit me. All the five of them are characters who died. ALL of them could be ghosts!

They had good reason to kill someone else in the group.

Tony was mad at Ned Stark for being dumb. Who didn’t like Meghna? Meghna was pissed at Tony for making the bomb that killed her. And who was Kalpana killed by? A Don! Like The Godfather. Who would the godfather want to kill?

“Anyone would be fine. I just want to kill someone the way my son killed that police officer. It was really cool”. The Godfather was replying to what I was thinking! How did he know what I was thinking? Of course he did! These are not hosts, these are ghosts!

Don Corleone took out a pistol from his suit and pointed it at me.  I tried to break free from my wheelchair, but Kalpana held me from behind. I desperately wiggled my belly in vain. The trigger got released and I went flying down the hallway. “Now that he’s dead, let’s decide which one of us gets to kill whom”. 

In my last moments I could hear Ned Stark’s sword slice through something. Someone screamed in agony, and I could hear him saying “Told you winter is coming”. They were going to kill each other.

There was a loud thud at the entrance. Everyone looked sideways at the creature galloping down the café swiftly. Two swords at his back. Covered from top to bottom in red.

“August 31,2055. Name She Laa. Nationality Chinese. Gender Male. Winner of Phase one of The 19th Revised Hunger Games Fifth Edition. Saved from the hands of five severely malfunctioning clones by DeadPool. Bullet injury to stomach, but organs stable because of large tummy”. I sat up in my chair and saw the girl, younger than me making my medicine.

There and back again.

Read part 3 here

She stopped recording from the device and looked up. It was almost midnight. This was probably the last one She would ever see. “duck it, let’s just die as early as possible, be reborn and win this the next time.” She was a big fan of Om Shanthi Om .

She didn’t exactly say duck. I use Autocorrect. 

“August 1, 2055. 11:45am . I’m blind. My disability is that I can’t see. Others had it worse I heard. One guy couldn’t move his legs. Another one couldn’t pee. They gave us our tablets and the next second our whole neural system changed. The task was simple. We had to wade through the forest. It was like a maze. The person who makes it outside before anyone else went to the next round , out of the pan into the fire.  Others will die or get recruited as slaves to whoever wants to buy them.“

It was barely noon, but She felt like the day had already gone on longer than The Irishman. She was halfway through the forest, and had already gotten bruised, beaten, bitten, and broken a billion times. “Duck this”, said She. The 120kg body was no longer able to run (remember ‘big’ fan of Om Shanthi Om?). 

“August 1,2055 . 11:45pm . I can feel it. There’s a waterfall ahead. I need to cross it and I’m almost through. But crossing it is impossible. Wish my life was directed by Rajamouli, navigating between waterfalls would be a piece of cake. And most of my competitors would have also probably completed this much, at least those who are still alive. Someone’s probably hiding behind this tree waiting to pounce in a minute and stab me. Or not even hiding . I am blind . The attacker may as well be listening to all this sitting next to me.”

She was embarrassed at that thought . Even in such a situation, She feared being judged. “Whoever’s hearing, duck you”. Being blind seemed to be the least of concerns.

There was a sudden noise to the right. Like an arrow . She got up and started running towards the waterfall. It was a question of whether to die at the hands of the Arrow dude or by the waterfall. She considered jumping off the waterfall and landing down safely. Sadly, She wasn’t Aishwariya Rai from Raavanan. The sound of the footsteps behind got louder. This is it, She thought. This is how it ends. She darted through the terrain, and after a point could feel the water currents getting stronger and the water level getting deeper. “Duck my life”, She said before diving.

“August 9,2055. 11:45am. Name She Laa. Age 21. Nationality Chinese. Gender Male. Was found lying down the foothills of Hair Falls. Winner of Phase one of The 19th Revised Hunger Games Fifth Edition. Unable to proceed because of multiple injuries throughout the body with damages to an already damaged brain.” She was woken up by the sound of the nurse reading out the report. He sat up in his chair and saw the girl, younger than him, making his medicine. “What the duck……”

Continued here

Corona virus made me do, as Randeep Hooda said, the one thing I thought I’d never do - clean my room. While navigating through mountains of clothes, gadgets, question papers and books, I had a near-Imtiaz Ali moment - I made shelf discovery. In it was 4 of the seven Harry Potter books - the 2015 floods borrowed the other 3 permanently. Looking at them after years made me realise what Shraddha Kapoor feels every time she sees raindrops - an irresistible urge. 

Abandoning my room purification I started to re-re-re-read them. There was practically nothing else to do during these times; I had even tried watching some of Netflix’s original Indian content. But Alas, all these years of gobbling up college pdfs and binge watching TV series had left my reading instincts numb. I couldn’t read more than 10 pages. I remembered reading Deathly Hallows in half a day back then. Switching on TV, I decided to watch K3G for the next 2113778 hours, its aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa BGM supplementing my already depressed mood. 

Then, a brilliant idea struck me - I had my friend’s cousin’s neighbour’s Amazon Prime account, which had all the Harry Potter movies. Considered to be a sin among many hard core Potter heads to watch the adaptions instead of reading the books, I dared to decide that I’m going to watch all of them, continuously. 

I was pleasantly surprised and even mildy shocked at how well made most of the movies were. The first two movies were embarrassingly faithful to the books(though as adventure movies for kids they were competent enough), but after Prisoner of Azkaban, the tone gets darker, the atmosphere grows quiet, and I noticed that the movies exist in a parallel dimension to the books. 

The inevitable problem with this was many scenes which I expected to see were not there (the final face off in Deathly Hallows especially was underwhelming), and those alien to the books will find it impossible to connect the dots. For instance, someone who didn’t read Order Of Phoenix will think how the hell did the good guys arrive to save Harry and his friends from the Death Eaters? The movie never mentions that it was Snape who called them. Similarly the movie never mentions why the Half Blood Prince is called so.

But for someone who is well versed with the books, the movies offer a LOT of satisfying things. Like the scene in Prisoner Of Azkaban where Nearly Headless Nick is seen chasing one of the ghosts running off with his head. Like the wondrous stretch in Order Of Phoenix where the Weasly Twins unleash their carnage but the fun is short lived as Harry sees a vision and drops in the floor. Reading something and imagining them in your head is one thing, watching them unfold with terrific visual effects and back ground music is at another level. It is like watching a Samuthirakani movie after reading social studies.

I was only 7 when the final book released, and I still remember the crowds in the nearby bookstore - crowds that were hitherto unseen except at the Puliyodarai counter in Parthasaradhy temple. When I saw Goblet of Fire at Sathyam, I was so scared that during every scene Dumbledore wasn’t present, I’d half-close my eyes. Heck, I even used to think Dumbledore was Gandalf from LOTR, a misconception that was rectified in Chamber Of Secrets when he says the opposite of You shall not pass- “Exams have been cancelled”. 

I feel that the kind of Universal effect Harry Potter had will never be matched by the likes of Game Of Thrones(try watching it with a family member in the vicinity), the MCU(try watching them without the gobsmacking special effects) or the new Star Wars movies(try watching them). Harry Potter was such an inseparable part of my childhood. And it will continue to be so. Whenever I see a mark on someone’s forehead. Whenever some girl raises her hand in the class. And whenever I see Sun News(they kinda ripped off the theme music).

To me, it has always been an unholier counterpart to Cadbury’s tastier and simpler diabetes-generator, Dairy Milk, and its numerous siblings. Are there more varieties of Silk than there are of…plants? I think they crossed the line - I am silk of it now, it’s high time they (cad)burry this and move on

I am a fan of the supremely better Twix – whenever any generous US-returned soul is kind enough to get me a typical chocolate box, I head straight for the Twix, and as the caramel hits me, my inner voice is always mumbling “Hmm, now I know why five star is not sold in the West”. Who would want to look at a deer when you have a kangaroo?

5 Star is like that student who sits next to the topper of the class, tries very hard to be like the topper, mimics the topper, and ends up barely passing. And then goes “What the hell does he have that I don’t?” 

Okay, it is not THAT bad

It does feel extremely soft, like a chewing gum had a glow up after going through a period of significant personal transformation. This could explain its loyal and huge fan base, such as my ex-girlfriend.

And it inevitably takes me back to my childhood, oh the days when we used to post-mortem the shit out of everything (thinking back about it – it is disturbing, yes). If you had 5 Star as a child, you would have most probably tried eating it layer-by-layer, and told to yourself “Hah! This is the science behind!”

It also feels like it is priced lesser than it should be, despite the ever-decreasing size (one day, we will be eating chocolates the size of grains, but hey, it’ll be the same price). That’s a rare feat to achieve in times where we are selling our great-grandfather’s real estate to buy a meal.

But it could easily be so much better – perhaps just by adding a layer of biscuit. I know, I know, that’s Twix – but, this isn’t new – we buy Munch and Perk with equal joy, despite knowing that one of them copied the other’s homework and just put a different label. Except for that short phase when Perk was really becoming something else – before it decided “Nah thanks, I’m good with my previous version” - the opposite of self-improvement. So yes, like I was saying, maybe 5 star just needs some small…twix

However, I do love their ads

Dairy Milk ads typically either show good looking people doing cute things or emotionally manipulate the viewer with dramatic stories (the latter is honestly getting out of hand – which afternoon-TV-soap director is making these ads?), 5 Star ads are creative and quirky – they don’t really me want to ‘buy’ the product, but they are at least fun to watch.

So, what’s the verdict?

I wanted to give a star rating out of ten – I decided I will give it…five stars. My ex-girlfriend would disagree. 

If I am hungry and I had to have something, I wouldn’t mind it. I wouldn’t run for my life like if I saw a Bounty. But I wouldn’t be erupting with joy like I found a Perk (let me exclude Munch here on behalf of the previously mentioned Great Phase of Perk)

P.S: We’re doing okay now, I married her

P.P.S:

I get paralyzed for a second, my face giving an expression as that of a batsman who got hit in his balls in the first delivery.

“Umm…I’ll just have beer”, I say, because it’s the only thing I can think of. 

As soon as the words escape out of my mint freshener-powered mouth, she starts profusely laughing. “It is ‘be-yar’ and not as ‘beeeer’, your English is so funny!”

I had scored a point, but at what cost? 

“Which one do you want? Just beeeer?” she brushes her long, golden hair off her forehead, and I locate a wink in those brown eyes. I tell myself, Okay, there is actually a chance she might like your stupid ass, don’t mess this up. 

“Arghh…yeah…I’ll have…McDonalds?”

“Broo that’s McDowell's!! Soo cuteeee. You don’t know shit about drinking, do you?” she was in splits. 

Cuteeee okay, but Broo? One step forward, two steps down.

Panic mode on.

“Okay, see, I have had a crush on you since first year but at that point I’d spoken more to posters of Trisha than to actual girls, and then after that literally every guy in college wanted to date you and I thought I didn’t stand a chance. So when you actually asked me out after the exams I decided I will learn every trick in the book, do everything that a man should do to make a woman like him, at least according to hotmalesgetgirls.com. But I have not had even a drop of alcohol in my miserable existence, nor is my English good, and the perfume I’m wearing right now is my grandfather’s”.

My heart is beating so fast I can hear it with Dolby Atmos quality, my face sweats as if I switched off the fan on a Chennai afternoon. 

Well, at least it lasted for 7 minutes. Back to single lif-

“Oh my god. This is so sad and funny at the same time! Who even suggested those hotmalesgetgirls articles to you?”

“My friend Gilmesh. It’s his blog. He’s had three girlfriends”

“Goddd. Look, I am here because I like you. I don’t care about this bar, we’ll go elsewhere. I enjoyed spending time with you as friends in college, can we please do the same now? Only, you can put your hand over my shoulder”. The wink was back

Okay wow, second chance. Go redeem yourself. 

We spend the next one hour just walking around the city. I get to know that she’s not at all what I thought she is, that good-looking girls are normal and kind homo-sapiens too, as long as you are not a creepy idiot. I’m punching you at least thrice in your balls when I meet you, Gilmesh.

She gets to know what roadside Kaalan tastes like, and that the 80-year old man with his bicycle sells the best buttermilk in the world at 11pm. She also gets to know the Tamil word for buttermilk (“I want mor of this”, she says.) 

At the end of the one hour, it is 6am. We both look at the sun rise over the Besant Nagar beach, holding hands standing near the waves. 

I try my first flirty line. “Why do scientists try so hard to discover time travel, they should just come talk to you.”

She smiles and gives me a hug. “I’ve never felt this with anyone else”, she says. I realise I am in love.

I get woken up by the sound of my alarm. 

I turn to the other side of the bed. I don’t want to open my eyes and face the day. I don’t want to eat my cereal, drive my car to the office, and meet my English-speaking colleagues in this English-speaking country.

I still dream about that first date, almost 6 years ago. The dreams about the good memories make the following day a nightmare. The dreams about the bad memories - the ways I messed up, the times I asked sorry and promised to change, make the following day a nightmare too. My life now goes as a string of days where I spend most of the time thinking about what could have been.

I look at the calendar. It has been 1 year since we ended things. I take my phone, go to her contact. Her display picture is that of her engagement party with her fiancé, in a beach-facing resort in Italy. The last message from her chat reads “Please move on and be happy. This is not the end of the world. Take care” 

The only thing that is worse than not getting the person of your dreams, is to get to be with them and fuck it up

Don’t worry, I am doing fine, this is just fiction

What added to the misery was the absolute misfiring of the Old Guns at the box office – who, given my background, were Rajni, Kamal and SRK. While they were ruling the roost in the 2000s when I grew up watching their films, they all collectively decided to show me a big middle finger in the 2010s that began with What-is-happening movies like the barely okay Kochadaiyan and culminated with What-the-fuck-is-going-on movies like Annaatthe, Jab Harry Met Sejal, and the off-screen outings of Kamal.

One part of me was thinking if it was all over and if I should settle for the politically charged stabbings of Vijay or the uninterested offerings of Ajith (guy makes movies with the attitude of a toddler eating veggies – does it once a while grudgingly and goes back to doing what he actually likes). Another part of me was fed up of getting slipper-shots from parents for being a cinementally challenged loafer, who were pretty confident that I’m going to end up fit only for washing butts in the future (the whole thing sounds more intense in Tamil I swear).

Fast track to today, current me couldn’t be happier seeing the extra-terrestrial success of Vikram, Pathaan, Jailer and Jawan. There is something so personal about seeing your childhood superstars show the world that they have still got it. And now being old enough to just get a sigh from my parents for watching a lot of movies, instead of them giving me an existential crisis, it feels liberating (“En Paisa, En Urimai”). I watched all of them twice in theatre and have probably contributed a lot to India’s GDP through my multiple theatre visits.

Now coming to the movies themselves, I think Vikram is hands down the best comeback ever, period. There has been a lot of talk about mass vs masala and I don’t know which bucket it will fall under, but the way Lokesh teased Kamal’s entry throughout the first half, making the audience wait so much and then …BAMM was brilliant (if it had taken even one more minute and Kamal’s identity was still not revealed after that wedding scene, people would have walked out). Vikram gave us the Great Actor that we all know and acknowledge, but it also showed us what Kamal can do when positioned as a mass action star. I lost my shit multiple times during the second half, so much that my friend who met me the next day said “You sound like VTV Ganesh”

Pathaan and Jawan were both solid experiences as a fan, though I think Pathaan holds better as a film while Jawan is more entertaining. SRK has always had a soft spot towards Tamilians and Tamil (Dil Se, Hey Ram, the scene in Om Shanti Om were he’s playing a Tamil actor, Ra. One, Chennai Express, the list goes on) and it was terrific to see him play a typical mass Tamil hero in Jawan. And in Pathaan, combining his inert charm with that of an action hero was deadly –it was something I didn’t even know I wanted, till I saw it.

And with Jailer, despite its problems, all I could care about was how ‘mass’ Rajni is – I can get cohesive stories and character arcs with other movies, but only Rajni can be Rajni. And these kind of well-done mass moments were absent in his recent movies – though Petta as a film is so much more superior, it was more a homage/best-of-collection. I paid money to watch Rajni be amazing and I got it. My friend who met me the next day said “You sound like Batman.”

It’s a great time to be alive – yesteryear stars are returning to their thrones and giving us one half of the pie, which is familiar joy, while newer stars giving us the other half of the pie,by experimenting or paying more attention to stuff like writing (Rocky Aur Rani, Maaveeran, etc). It’s a good mix I feel, and as more lackluster movies tank despite having big stars, I hope our movies get better with time.

As I saw the announcement of Salman Khan’s next film recently, the upcoming potential comeback of yet another superstar who’s not-been-so-super recently, I was talking to a friend about these points, and he started saying things like “You can’t watch movies only for entertainment, it is not enough”. I agree that there will always be people who go to movies only for fun and people who analyze it. Though I mostly fall under the latter category, when it comes to these stars who made up such a big part of my childhood, I’m just happy to have a good time. My friend went on to say that Vikram worked for him, Jawan was a mixed bag, and Jailer didn’t come together as a movie. I told him “You sound like Baradwaj Rangan.”

And every time I erupt into a nostalgic zone of “They don’t make music like this anymore”, cursing the ‘fast food’ composers of today, YouTube has been such a diligent agent of telling me “Hey, remember this song from 15 years ago? Wanna watch it? You know what, we are watching it in 5...4...WE HERE”. It also never fails in showing me that I am, indeed, old now. Can you believe it has been SEVENTEEN years since Sivaji the Boss and Om Shanthi Om? What next, am I going to start saying stuff like “I used to travel to school in a van, you guys have it easy in your laptops, with a glorified chatbot as your teacher” to a bunch of unbothered 12 year olds? 

One such nostalgic song that I stumbled upon last week was Baawre from Luck By Chance. I was a child when it released, and to me that song was the equivalent of visiting a circus, with Hrithik Roshan being the godly master of the circus. I remember being wide-eyed with not only the gleeful production of it but also being astounded by Hrithik’s water-like dancing. It was the pinnacle of human ability for me, to be able to dance like that. They would telecast it 298 times a day and I would watch it with the same wonder every time – which is what I was expecting to happen this time as well.

Baawre Video song

But Alas, I found both the production and the dance to be not as exciting this time. The water-like movements just didn’t seem water-like anymore. I started thinking if I am not finding it as astonishing as I used to, because of all the gymnastic and gravity defying choreography that movies have had recently (ex. Mahesh Babu and Sreeleela’s energetic dance in Kurchi Madathapetti, Vijay’s breathtaking dance in Ranjithame. No seriously, the man really runs out of breath in the last few seconds). I decided to watch another similar song whose choreography blew my mind when it released – Bismil from Haider – and I came out with similar results.

Have we increasingly upped our threshold for stimulation through the years so much, that things that seemed awe-inducing a few years ago are now just not exciting anymore? Has reducing attention spans, social media, and unprecedented internet expansion made us numb? 

Think about it – with the Rise of the Planet of the Apps, everything has not only gotten bigger in scale and technology, but also more advanced/next level. Take glamour, for example. Everyone on screen nowadays has a perfectly toned body and a sculpted face (a lot of the actors even look similar to one another?!). It is a question of whether you have 6/8/12/24 packs. There are always exceptions of course, but majorly, the threshold of what was considered ‘an actor’s physique/looks’ has been blown out of (or deflated in?) proportion. 

This is not only for cinema. Cricket for instance has improved so much in terms of data analytics and cricketer’s means to training, that we see way more sixes and runs, way more gravity defying catches, way higher strike rates. 

Some of these advancements are of course fantastic to the efficiency of the artform but holistically, we have been used to so much of ‘enhancement’ that things don’t make me…feel as much anymore. I used to be startled by the action sequences of Anniyan. Now, I have seen the 21-minute single take in Extraction 2. I have seen Tom Cruise jump off the Alps by himself. Five years later, I might see the same stunt and be not as interested, because I would have seen someone pull off a jiu jitsu sequence from a rocket in the stratosphere. 

Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One | The Biggest Stunt in Cinema History (Tom Cruise)

We used to enjoy listening to 7-8 minute songs. Songs where the composer is in absolutely no hurry to get to the next stanza, and the singer blissfully repeats the same line four times. Songs which had one layer of sound design, no autotuning, lesser instruments, and takes a whole 30 seconds to just begin and end. Now, a 4:30 minute song is considered long, and we have multiple layers of sound designing with instruments imported from the darkest corners of the Sahara Desert.

Whether it is the root cause or a means of information exchange, social media has been the biggest reason and the centerpiece melting pot for our attention spans to go down the drain and our stimulus levels to go up the hill. If not directly contributing to this, it has played a big role in bringing everything, good or bad, to everyone.

I see a lot of people taking a break from social media and other dopamine-generating activities, and I see some of them experiencing positive results, while some of them come back. Most of my knowledge and news consumption arises from Instagram and YouTube, as do most of my distractions. 

I used to finish one storybook a day, nowadays I barely cross 10 pages at a stretch before a notification draws me into my smartphone like a magnet. I get a feeling of having to open that notification and go see now the text that my friend has sent me. Only to see that it is a forwarded message on how Ramayana took place in a Maldives beach where currently a JW Marriot is being built with the help of the Chinese Army. Ten minutes later, Zomato sweetly asks me “Are you sure you are not hungry, you haven’t spoken to me today? Is this all I mean to you?” 

Do I own my gadgets or do they own me? Food, Travel, Bollywood – the algorithm keeps creating avenues to gain my time, and I follow it like a charmed snake. The invention becomes the inventor, the inventor becomes the experiment.