Himmat Singh, being actor Kay Kay Menon, of course. By far the most special part about both parts of Special Ops.
A still from Special OPS 1.5
Special OPS 1.5
On: Disney+Hotstar
Dir: Neeraj Pandey
Cast: Kay Kay Menon, Vinay Pathak
Rating 3/5
Now who uses the word sweet to describe a spy thriller? Naah, I’m just being cheesy, because Special Ops 1.5 is basically a series about desi, middle-aged government servants, getting honey-trapped, one after another.
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The beauty of the show still is that all these men —whether spy, serviceman, or bureaucrat — share a certain air of dignity about them. And for us to care about how none of them really would’ve faltered so badly at the casual invitation of lust. This empathy is sort of essential for the show to simply never slip into B-grade territory as well.
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Not that there is scope for anything B-grade, if you go by the generous budgets of this series that, before all else, is about wanderlust, if you may. So was Special Ops, that this is a prequel of. In fact, given how the camera relentlessly traverses between Russia, Serbia, London, Dhaka, Colombo, Kiev, and the like — you could be forgiven to believe R&AW, India’s external spy agency, is firstly a travel agency!
In any case, all through the show, you wonder whether R&AW is punching above its supposed global weight. As you also felt with Special Ops. But then again, if James Bond from the slightly piddly Britain’s MI6 has the wherewithal to singularly save the human world; hell, why not Himmat Singh from R&AW, no?
Himmat Singh, being actor Kay Kay Menon, of course. By far the most special part about both parts of Special Ops. This isn’t to discount the relatively self-effacing Vinay Pathak, who, as you might know, plays Himmat’s unofficial confidante, from among Delhi’s cops.
I’ll tell you who’s really the ‘find’, by way of addition in the cast here: Aftab Shivdasani. If you’ve followed Shivdasani’s career (tragically, very few have) — right from a golden start as the child star of Mr India (1987) — you might consider him as a really talented actor, squarely done in by a spate of second-rate scripts/films.
He, like everyone else in the equally competent cast, should be happy to belong to the creator plus co-director Neeraj Pandey’s world of sleuths, sex, stylish set-pieces, and some sort of serious-sounding espionage stuff. Pandey — if you’ve seen his films as well (Baby, Special 26, Aiyaary) — comes from a space of love for the spy/cop genre.
So much so that you don’t know if any of this stuff is true, you feel like an accomplished viewer still, learning a thing or two about spy-giri along the way. For instance, that attractive women, fit to be artistes/actors, were trained in special schools from childhood, to be recruited as ‘sparrows’ for honey-traps with KGB back in the day. God knows, if they still are.
Or that in spy-speak, there really are four motives for someone double-crossing, or finding himself in a compromised position, in favour of an enemy state, as it were. That’s MICE, meaning money, ideology, coercion or ego.
But let’s not get too carried away by this education, alright? These are standard tropes for audiences to otherwise suspend disbelief —something that Pandey as writer-director is inherently good at, in the most desi, mainstream way. You’ve seen the original Special Ops, so you know what I mean.
This season, loaded with flashbacks over flashbacks, essentially starts off with Himmat Singh getting into retirement mode. While he’s been a spy gone rogue, for a fair portion of his career, what can’t possibly be ignored is his stunningly daring contribution to India’s security apparatus. He’s saved the country from the brink of disaster over a glorious, albeit unsung, career.
How? Well, that’s what this show is about. In comes, therefore, a much younger Kay Kay Menon. Don’t know if there is a metaphor here somewhere — on screen, despite all the VFX and prosthetics make-up at one’s disposal, the toughest look to pull off, is de-ageing an actor. There was a decent job done on Shah Rukh Khan in the film Fan (2015), for instance. They used an altogether new technology to de-age Al Pacino, Robert De Niro and others in The Irishman (2019).
Was I just imagining it, but you can spot a lot of grains on Menon’s face in the younger portions. That apart, the look-test results are convincing enough. Enough anyway to not distract from the plot.
Which, of course, I’m not gonna detail. Be sure, though, that you’ll spot a loop hole here, a lacuna there, incredulous moments of terrible coincidences elsewhere. What I think you’ll like still is that at no point does the series overstay its welcome. Staying true to a neatly packaged piece of entertainment, cutting to the chase, and uniformly sticking with it until the end.
The end being? For once, the fourth episode, and no further. As against completely rando shows across all OTT platforms, going into their fourth season. That equals a full donation of one’s precious lifetime towards the imagination of a few, seeking attention from bored millions. I’m sorry, but we really could do with more mini-series like these!
VIEW PHOTOS: Newly-wed couple Rajkummar Rao and Patralekhaa arrive in Mumbai
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