OTT Review: Jallikattu – Telugu dubbed series on Aha

Tamil star director Vetrimaaran recently produced a series named Pettaikaali. He is also the showrunner for this show, which is based on the traditional bull-chasing sport Jallikattu. The Telugu dubbed version titled Jallikattu is now streaming on Aha Telugu, and let’s see how it is.

 

Story:

Set in Mullaiyoor of Tamilnadu, the story begins with a fight between zamindars of that area and agricultural laborers. The laborers request the landlords to give a portion of the land to them, but the landlords deny their request. This leads to a massive clash between the laborers and landlords. Hence the laborers decide not to catch the bulls of the upper caste in Jallikattu sport. Years later, a man named Paandi (Kalaiarasan) participates in the Jallikattu event and tames Zamindar Selva Sekharan’s (Velaramamurthy) bull. This again leads to a feud between the upper caste and lower caste people. What happened next? This forms the crux of the story.

 

Plus Points:

The makers took a lot of effort to showcase the traditional sport of Tamilnadu, i.e., Jallikattu, in a captivating manner. It isn’t easy to make a series involving a sport like Jallikattu, and it is important that all the actors, irrespective of their screen time, must undergo a humongous amount of training. The actors’ endeavors can be seen clearly, and they deserve applause.

The detailing part of the sport has been done nicely, and all the scenes that are related to Jallikattu will leave the audience awestruck. The camera work while depicting the sport is awesome. The starting episodes raise curiosity, and the story is nicely set.

Every actor gave their best in their respective roles. Antony, Kishore, and Sheela are more impactful, and one would connect well with these characters. Also, the caste discrimination and scenes related to this are nicely shown. The comedy track that comes in the fifth episode is a huge relief in this seriously driven series.

 

Minus Points:

Using Jallikattu, the makers tried to knit different elements around it. While a few elements are nicely presented, a few aren’t. Some subplots aren’t etched well, and hence the impact gets heavily diluted. These various aspects and tiny subplots seem good in parts, but they aren’t connected properly.

The series moves at a very slow pace for the most part of the time. Some episodes are very boring, and the narration is also flat. Whenever the sport element is brought in, the series becomes interesting, but right after that, some underwhelming scenes come into the picture.

As the story moves forward, the show turns highly predictable. The ending episode is very rushed, and it is more cinematic too. The series could have been even better if it was wrapped up in 6-7 episodes.

 

Technical Aspects:

The camerawork by R. Velraj is top-notch as he showcased the sport in various dimensions giving goosebumps. The sound design by Prathap is nice, and Santosh Narayanan’s background score is too good. The production values are fair. However, the editing team should have cut short the series. The Telugu dubbing is first-rate.

Coming to director La. Rajkumar, he has done an okay job with the series. He also is the writer, and his idea to connect different elements like greed for power, love, and revenge to Jallikattu sport is good. But he only succeeded partly in his attempt. The main problem lies with the slow pacing, which at times causes boredom too. Also, the narration doesn’t hold together the multiple subplots properly.

 

Verdict:

On the whole, the Jallikattu series focuses on various facets like love, revenge, and hunger for power. The makers tried to bind these elements with Jallikattu sport. While a few episodes are watchable, a few are boring. The sluggish narration works against the show big time. If you love watching rural dramas, Jallikattu ends up being just an okay watch this weekend.

123telugu.com Rating: 2.5/5

Reviewed by 123telugu Team