Half CA Review: Amazon miniTV’s latest Hindi teen drama is an original TVF creation starring Ahsaas Channa, Gyanendra Tripathi, Anmol Kajani, Rohit Tiwari, Manu Bisht, Prit Kamani, Rohan Joshi and others. Directed by Pratish Mehta, the series has been developed by Arunabh Kumar and Harish Peddinti, and written by Harish Peddinti, CA Khushbu Baid, and Tatsat Pandey. Produced by Arunabh Kumar, the series’s executive producers are Vijay Koshy, Palash Vaswani and Anandeshwar Dwivedi.
Now available to watch for free, the series has 5 episodes that primarily introduce us to two CA aspirants from different age brackets and sides of life as they embark on a strenuous journey to crack one of the toughest courses in the country, while their attempts shape their lives in the process.
-No Spoilers-
Half CA Review: Discussion
Keeping the entire journey of 5 episodes well balanced out with an evenly paced narrative, the series keeps its feet on the ground. The teen drama never tries too hard to please its viewers, rather keeps its storytelling authentic and valid, which ultimately does the winning on its own. With several pre-existing college-driven storylines out there in the public eye, especially the obvious counterpart – Kota Factory – in sight, one would question the need to pen down another one to the lot. However, that’s a question that would possibly only arise in your mind before watching the new title.
As soon as you let yourself immerse in what the characters and the story itself have to say, you will only nod along to the magic created on your screen, which is nothing short of an all too familiar visualisation of reality itself for many. A lot of shows and mainstream movies have already unravelled what it’s like to be a “Science student” in school, and along with it, the same real talks and tripartite bifurcations between the three streams available to students in schools have pushed the counterparts leading these respective journeys further apart.
The pains of a science student have long been humanised, but the other two sides of the triangle have never been accorded the same identity and agency. The ongoing discussions of how Commerce and Humanities/Arts only exist as the “lesser” analogue have long been a hard subject to break free from, because regardless of what the individual likes or not, society’s perception always finds a peeping hole to seep into the discussion and take over one’s self-esteem. Loosely touching upon the issue at hand, Half CA assumes its well-deserved space to first impart the Commerce students with an identity of their own and not as someone existing a step beneath Science students.
Steering clear of all kinds of vast stereotypes and archetypes, The Viral Fever creation lets its characters breathe and tell their side of the story without derailing or disparaging anyone else’s anguish. It allows them to voice out their day-to-day cycles without giving them a glorious title either, rather letting them be humane and grounded accounts that have barely reached the public’s ear or eye before this in this manner.
With each episode, the show gracefully probes into their lives without shooing away the interest of the viewer. Normalising moving ahead at one’s own pace opens the door to an out-of-the-box sense of clarity related to competitive exams and their varying natures. If the lows bring you emotionally closer to the characters who put up a mirror to some of your truths as well, then the highs are equally traversed to grant you a simple kind of beautiful view.
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The director’s camera and vision in Half CA create enough claustrophobia when needed to accentuate the stress generated by exams and the nervous energy fuelling the examinee’s competitive spirit. Simultaneously, it also keeps nudging us as a reminder that the ones taking these exams are not fact-spewing robots, but actual people who’ve invested their time, sweat and tears into the hard work that doesn’t always yield favourable outcomes for them.
Reigniting the strength held within hope, the director neither intends to romanticise the portrayal of these arduous realities nor vilify either of those wanting to move away from the ascribed path ahead of them. Moreover, it reinstates our trust and belief in the beauty of good teachers who don’t just bring out the world of textbooks, but also genuinely care for their students.
With two predominant lives running parallel to each other, one who’s already running the race (Tripathi), another who’s getting ready to step on the START line, Ahsaas Channa and Gyanendra Tripathi take the lead in Half CA. Ahsaas proves again why she’s become a constant casting choice for such grounded TV series. On the flip side, Tripathi’s essay on his character touches hearts with the genuine vulnerability he wears on his sleeve throughout the course of the season.
You can’t help but root for their characters. Rohan Joshi, who appears as a rather solemn presence in the beginning, presents an explosively moving glimpse in the last episode, further allowing the show to break away from pre-established cliches and stereotypes of certain character sketches.
Final Thoughts
You know you’re watching a TVF original series when you’re left with a lingering sweet feeling in your heart. The same goes for Half CA, too. Lately, I’ve been wondering if the industry is lacking in ideas to conjure up a feel-good Hindi title, or if something else is going on down there. While that’s a discussion for another day, what this latest Amazon miniTV series has reminded us is that it’s not that the Hindi cinematic industry itself is fractured; it’s just that we’ve forgotten the charm of original storylines that are relevant in and sourced from the Indian context.
Creators seem too busy putting on copies of whatever seems to be doing well on the other side of the entertainment spectrum, but this is where the TVF magic kicks in and wakes you up from that viewing slump and rings the alarm by informing you that the goodness of genuine visual media expression is still alive and well.
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