Nakaab review: Makes a mockery of Sushant Singh Rajput's death

The tragic death by suicide of actor Sushant Singh Rajput last year and its crazy consequences, including the media trial against some Hindi film personalities, has a lot of scope to be adapted into a film or a web-series. This is what director Soumik Sen attempts in Nakaab.

The show starts off when popular television actress Vibha (Ankita Chakraborty) falls to her death from the fifth floor of a studio where she is shooting for her successful television show. The death sends shockwaves through the country as Vibha was a popular actress with plenty of fans. Questions are raised whether this was a suicide, accident or murder?

Inspector Pawan (Gautam Rode) arrives at the spot with forensic expert sub-inspector Aditi Amre (Esha Gupta). The deputy commissioner of police does not let them finish their investigation and asks them to leave the spot soon. But Aditi secretly gets hold of Vibha’s phone. She also comes face-to-face with mysterious television producer Zohra Mehra (Mallika Sherawat), who was also close to Vibha.

Anyone who has followed the media and social media circus since last year after Rajput's death would know that his fans style themselves ‘SSR Warriors’ and ‘SSRians’ and regularly make the hashtag ‘JusticeForSSR’ trend on social media. So, in the show, Vibha’s fans are shown trending ‘#JusticeForVibha’ and proclaiming themselves ‘Vibha Victorians’ or ‘Vibharians’.

That’s not all. The show has a loud-mothed television anchor who makes atrocious claims on his channel and a YouTuber calling the big names of Hindi cinema a ‘mafia’. Just like Rajput, Vibha was an ‘outsider’ in the industry. Plus, there is a drug angle.

The problem with Nakaab is that it’s so obsessed with taking advantage of the tragedy that it gives the cold shoulder to the content and all major creative departments. In fact, this MX Player show is an eight-episode tutorial on how not to make a crime series.

For a good portion of the series, the narrative does not have much of a story. The whole show is filled with philosophical monologues on ‘zindagi’ (life) that become boring from the first episode itself. And while this plays in the background, we are shown unending slow-motion visuals of Aditi working on her laptop.

The plot leaves several questions unanswered, the biggest being why Aditi secretly took Vibha’s mobile phone even before the DCP had asked them to abandon the investigation. This is just one of many questions.

Vibha's phone has videos in which she has recorded her life story and included some scandalous visuals, but we are never told the reason for this. Funnily, the intimate videos recorded with a secret camera show visuals from different angles. The makers have made silly use of Vibha’s confession videos by playing them continuously. So we constantly see Vibha speaking to us and it becomes pointless after a while. Yet, Ankita Chakraborty, who plays Vibha, is the only artiste who shows some conviction in her act.

Esha Gupta has always been an actress of limited ability and she merely confirms it here. She is unable to display the dedication and excitement of a junior police officer eager to get to the bottom of things. Hence, it is not possible to take her seriously.

Mallika Sherawat overdoes her 'attitude' to the point where it becomes irritating. Gautam Rode fares better than the two actresses despite his below-par performance. Same is the case with the actor who plays the negative character Vardhe.

Nakaab has a scene in which Aditi, gun in hand, tells someone, “I know how she died,” and quickly follows it up with, “Please tell me how she died!” This scene summarizes the confusing show.

Nakaab is now available on MX Player.

Correction: An earlier version of the review wrongly mentioned the lead actress as Esha Deol. It's Esha Gupta.