Father-son feuds are legendary, and at times, it takes on a menacing form. In Indian history, we have seen how a few Mughal rulers tortured their fathers and even imprisoned them. Emperor Shah Jahan was one classic victim, who was jailed till his death by his own son. Outside the realm of royalty, there have been innumerable cases of cruel sons.
The 2013 American television series, Roy Donavan, also talks about this. I did not get a chance to watch this. But here is the storyline. Set in Los Angeles and New York, Donavan is reportedly a professional “fixer” who arranges bribes, payoffs, threats, crime-scene clean-up, and other illegal activities to protect his (usually) celebrity clients. But, he is also devoted to his children and brothers but has a complicated relationship with his wife. He encounters problems when his menacing father, Mickey Donovan is unexpectedly released from prison. The FBI attempts to bring down Mickey and his associates, and Donovan struggles to escape the undertow.
Rana Naidu follows the same plot, though it is set in Hyderabad and Mumbai. Co-written and co-helmed by Karan Anshuman, though entirely created by him, the 10-episode Indian series in the Hindi language (some speak Hyderabadi Hindi) takes a yawningly long time to warm up. It is in the last few episodes that Rana Naidu perks up and grabbed my attention. Till then, it was plodding!
Warning: Spoilers ahead:
The Telugu star, Rana Daggubati, headlines the series as a fixer, who has a solution for all the problems of all his “clients”. But none for the troubles his father, Naga (Venkatesh Daggubati) causes. So, Rana packs off his dad to jail, foisting a false case of murder of a girl on him. Actually, it was committed by Prince (Anuj Khurana), a Bollywood star. Later, we learn that Prince had accidentally killed her.
But the fact remained, Naga spends 15 years in jail for a crime he did not commit. And when he walks out before the actual sentence of 20 years, Rana and his two brothers Tej (Sushant Singh) and Jaffa (Abhishek Banerjee) are shocked. The father feels that he is clearly unwelcome.
Though Rana’s relationship with Naga (and the son calls the father by name) is hostile, the young man is warm and loving towards his brothers and children. Yes, Rana’s relationship with his wife, Naina, (Surveen Chawla) is a bit of a touch-and-go.
Actually, Rana Naidu focuses on the cat-and-mouse games between the father and son, and there is one occasion when we are led to believe that Naga is killed. But he emerges unscathed in what I felt was so unbelievable.
As the series waddles along, we are fed with a variety of incidents in which Rana tops. He has to, after all, he is the hero and Anshuman’s work has all the look and feel of a Telugu drama. It is loud and garishly colourful. Some of the colours hit my eye, and I found there was very little aestheticism.
The story in 10 episodes could have been easily condensed into five; this way, Rana Naidu may have held a semblance of interest.
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