Saat Phere, Saloni Ka Safar - Good start, but ..

Why is that I get disappointed in serials so early. When the ads for Saat Phere, Saloni Ka Safar started coming on Zee, they seemed somewhat different from all the saas-bahu serials, maybe as a breath of fresh air. The concept of a women struggling because of her skin colour is something that is very intrinsic to Indian culture, one that we do not recognize as racism. I had some hope that this would be a more realistic story.
So, when the serial started in the third quarter of 2005, initially things were good. This had a good girl (Saloni played by Rajshree Thakur) playing the role of a dedicated daughter fighting against colour based discrimination. The initial portrayal was realistic, with family not sure about her future, and she hoping for the best. Her younger sister was also fairly realistic, having been pampered due to her good looks, and feeling the pride in it.
Then Saloni is preferred by the family of Nahar, a very eligible bachelor from a rich family. Feeling for Saloni's character, you could understand that she had been chosen because of her good values. So far so good. But things start to unravel after that. You would think that a serial should terminate after that, so that it leaves when a good feeling is still there. But no, the pressure of money will prevent soaps from ever ending.
So you have endless twists where the realism goes away, with pure evil characters such as Saloni's bhabhi (Kaveri) and then Devika / Chandni (Kirti Gaikwad). This character has an interesting story. She is married to Saloni's husband in real life; so after they terminated her character Chandi earlier, it seems that they brought her character back in the form of Devika so that the husband-wife team can continue acting together.
Some of the twists are: Earlier marriage of Nahar (Saloni's husband), Change in nature of Tara, Dispossesion of property of entire family, Samar's blindness, Neel turning evil, and so on. The other major problem that I see is that they show some characters as black or white: Saloni, Kaveri, Neena Gupta, all these are characters without any shade of grey. Either very good or very bad, and that is certainly not realistic.

I Dream Of Jeanie - an English language classic of its time!!!

"I Dream of Jeannie" was a comedy starring Barbara Eden, Larry Hagman, Bill Daily and Hayden Rorke. The show was about the adventures of an astronaut who inadvertently became the master of a genie he discovered in a bottle during one of his missions.

I still remember it used to come in the morning ( around 10-11 slot) and in the evening (5:30-6:30 slot). One of them was a repeat telecast. I used to watch the evening show as it used to be my school time in the morning.

I Dream of Jeannie was a cute television show about Anthony Nelson, his friend Roger, his Dr. Bellows... and his Jeannie, Jeannie. A very cute show even though some episodes tended to go off track (like the one where Jeannie was watching a performance by a famous singer, I forget which one, and a lot of the episode was wasted on this guy's video clip, yes- there actually was a video clip in the episode that had nothing to do with it).

But still, most episodes stay on track. I especially love when Jeannie's sister pops up, always trying to capture Major Nelson and make him her own master. Cute and witty, there's a reason why Major Nelson dreams of Jeannie.

Barbara Eden was entertaining to watch and it was just not her looks either. If the show was on now in these times, it would be based on her trying to keep her master out of her bottle. I would still love to see if it starts again.

JASSI JAISI KOI NAHI... a good start, but faded out

This show started out really GREAT!! Very different and a real self esteem booster for millions of those beautiful Indian girls who are put down--cuz they dont fit the bill. Looks aren't everything and that's exactly what this serial showed.

Basically the serial Jassi Jaisi Koi Nahin was written around a plot of a ugly girl who later changed her outlook with makeup and the serial depicted what sort of changes she felt around her after her new look. Upto that point the serial was good. But the masala things that were put to carry on the serial in order to make it run and make money should be avoided. They kill user interest in a serial, and make people forget how good the serial was.

Jasmeet Walia’s daily struggle to keep Gulmohur fashion house afloat, romantic moments with her boss Armaan Suri; Chashmish Chuhiya’s confrontations with Armaan’s fiancee Mallika Seth were far more entertaining than the other saas-bahu serials.

Jassi’s attachment to bebe (her grandmom), her relationship with Nandu, the next-door neighbour and best friend, and Jassi getting bullied by Pari in office were a laugh riot besides adding the human touch to her character.

Jassi aka Mona Singh impressed all in her spectacles, she seemed pretty too in her new look, but slowly the whole story became very unrealistic. As per my point of view its wasting time seeing the serial further after Jassi changed her look. Sometimes I feel how would it had been for Mona Singh to dress up like Jassi for two years, that would have been made her very dheela (sloppy). After the new look, she had to watch her body language and be more careful about the image she depicted.

Astitva...ek prem kahani

It's off air now. It was one of my faviorte serials. When it started, I missed some earlier episodes but I soon got a hold of it. The serial has given Niki Aneja's (was initially known as Madhuri Dixit look-a-like) career a new lease of life. She acted in few films but it was ignored. I never thought highly of her but after fitting so well in the character of Dr. Simran Mathur, she has changed my opinion of her. Abhimanyu (Varun Badola) is okay, i really liked him as Neeraj in Koshish but he
was as per the role.

The story revolves around Dr Simran who is a well established doctor but unmarried and daughter of an IAS officer (played by Alok Nath) if i am not wrong. She meets Abhimanyu, a photographer by profession and who is 10 years younger to her in her hospital where he had come to admit his sister Ananthi who is pregnant. He gets infatuated with her beauty and simplicity and tries to impress her. Both side parents are against their marriage but they somehow manage to get married against their parents' will with the help of Dr. Manas (Harsh Chaya). Then comes how the relation develops, the age gap between them, Simran is ready of child, Abhi is not and due to his immaturity he is attracted to a model of her age group Kiran. Then comes twist and turns, divorce, remarriage and all those things that make serial masala type. It got pretty long, took a 20 year leap, now story revolved around their daughters.

Lots of replacements for eg: Kiran, Rashmi (simran's sister) and bumping of those characters which were not needed took place in this serial (Ananthi, Simran's Mom, Rashmi's husband). But let me tell you this, the only reason why I watched this serial is bcoz of Niki Aneja.

It was a very realistic serial with no over acting, custome or dialogues, got a very good start, kept going fine but excess of everything is bad, it got bored in middle and then it was extending.