Though the family drama fare has improved unnis bees during the last five years, it’s still quite predictable, and thus boring! There’s no visible variety, for one thing, despite the considerable success of Udaari and Sammi. May be you can name Alif Allah Aur Insaan as an engaging multi-track serial, written well by Qaisra Hayat, but that’s about all. Daldal is good, too, but you can’t say it’s off the beaten track for there are hardly any issue-based episodes. Woh Aik Pal is a case in point. Yawningly boring, and mundane, the writer Samira Fazal shot it dead, point blank near the climax. She didn’t even consider the fact how the actors should be reacting after they come face to face about the main theme that the serial hinges on. When Ayesha Khan finds out her new love interest, Feroze Khan had actually killed her loving husband, she should have sworn off the guy. But, soon, they were married. I tell you, if somebody put me before television, tied to a chair, I would have hit the floor and inched out of the dehleez with my eyes and ears closed. Suddenly, everything became hunky dory, with Ali Khan seemingly probing his zinc-plated zamir, and apologising to both, his wife and to Ayesha. Feroze Khan’s girlfriend also became normal, and things just petered out. The drama should be titled Pal Pal kee Boriyat!

Noor & Wali – She Went tou aisee Went…

It’s not a sureeli kahani… not by a long shot! But, you can give Wali the credit of trying to make sense of this matrimonial union. He dearly wanted a jugalbandi. Unfortunately, the bandi didn’t want it. I mean, you do get tired of the same old life, after all. It was her fourth one, and you can just imagine how one would want to veer off the beaten path; all that lackadaisical stuff of planning the future, having breakfast and lunch together, everyday. Attending parties together. And then some friends getting too invasive, as Wali confided! So, the moment actress Noor could get off all the court proceedings, and biz hounds, and the paparazzi (if not the Apa Razzos!), she made a beeline for the good ol’ London. According to the news bugs, she is there to get her five-year-old daughter into school. But, when is she coming back? Well, they say she is going to stay long. It seems this time she went tou aisee went, ke went hee went! Arre bhui, Noor, please come back, because actress Shabnam is arriving soon to play your mom in the TV serial, Mohni Mansion kee Cindrellaein. Hope that would, at least be a Sundar Laila.

Ad-vice – What’s The Message?

Ad-ding it or subtracting it should matter, or else the message isn’t forthcoming! If the publicity falls face down, then the whole thing is that ke bhaiyya sab se bara rupaiyya! Remember the ad, when a seemingly handsome young man steps down from his car, as the traffic is bumper-to-bumper, and brings out a cutting machine (it was lying in his car trunk?), and cuts it down to size, thereby making his way through the traffic? You can call it a cutting-edge technology. How weird can you get? Firstly, by the time this nerd is through the chop and change, it should be the next day, and the traffic would still be piling on the roads. Secondly, has he cut it down to the size of a motorcycle that he could pass through the tracks? It’s absurd, and such ads are too many to name; that ad where a monster is lapping up a certain beverage. Instead, he must be chomping the glass bottles, as can be seen in the ad. Similarly, the razor commercial, where a fellow in the fast lane is shaving inside a rickshaw… that’s ridiculous! Another counter-productive ad shows a girl continuously denying that a certain hair tonic can change her hair for the better. Can you elaborate what’s the message?