Ohkay so, it was yet another interesting episode of Khuda Aur Mohabbat & I thoroughly enjoyed watching it. I loved how the focus of this episode was on Hammad & Sarah’s track & their budding friendship. I will however do mention that the editing & also the direction of the second phase of the drama is not as strong as it was in the first phase of the drama but since they are serving a bigger purpose by showing how Hammad is trying to change people’s perspective about himself & his religion, it compensates a great deal for those few mistakes. I think the director at this stage should thank Imran Abbas personally for carrying the drama on his shoulders in such a way that the viewers are hooked to see what Hammad has in store for them & because of that they are being able to ignore the glaring technical mistakes.
So, just because Isaac grew uncomfortable with the idea that Sarah was learning a few things about Islam through Hammad, he decided to get her engaged to Zeeshan thinking it will occupy her & she will stop being friends with Hammad. I don’t know if they are keeping this detail from the viewers purposely because they are waiting for the right time, or they didn’t put much thought into the fact that they should have by now disclosed the details about Isaac’s family, his ethnicity & background because somehow, even though the writing is detailed & we can understand Isaac’s reactions through the situations that he is facing but it is getting harder to understand his perspective, like where he is coming from? Isaac poses to be quite liberal but the way he decided to get Sarah & Zeeshan engaged without Sarah’s consent made him look like a staunch desi father who wouldn’t want his daughter to mingle with a guy of another cast or religion. Please bear in mind that I am not at all generalizing by using the word desi but since Isaac’s family speaks Urdu fluently, I am unable to figure out where do they actually originate from & like it is mentioned time & again that Isaac can’t stand Pakistanis, then I am forced to assume that they might be Indian Christians hence such strong opinion against Pakistani Muslim Hammad? Again I am not generalizing that all Indian Christians detest Pakistani Muslims but I am just trying to solve the puzzle. I really think this is the detail that the director shouldn’t have missed especially at this stage when he was going to elaborate the tension & the rift between Isaac & Hammad, which is taking place because of their different religions & perspectives because it would have helped the viewers a great deal in understanding the root cause of the prejudice that Isaac has against Hammad. Even though by now they have well established the fact that Isaac can’t stand Hammad as he thinks Hammad is a fundamentalist but then again, while watching Isaac & his hatred against Hammad, I feel like I have a blank spot in my mind as I am unable to fill that void about who Isaac actually is, what is ideology is, what his beliefs are & what religion does he belong to? I really wish in the next couple of episodes, they at least give us a conversation between Hammad & Sarah where Sarah gives Hammad an insight into her family background because it will help us a great deal in connecting the dots properly.
Hammad’s friend Behzaad tried to get to know Hammad a little more, like he knows Hammad from the surface but this was for the first time when he tried to dig deep as he knew that the reason behind Hammad getting overwhelmed in the Masjid was something that needed to be addressed. The way Hammad got lost in the thoughts of everything that he faced in Pakistan while offering his prayers was so relate-able, it was like at that moment he was once again reminded of the phase that he lived which taught him so much. Just a few months ago, Hammad was someone who barely knew how to offer prayers & now at this stage in his life, he was fighting to restore people’s faith in Muslims by projecting a good image of what practicing Muslims are like, it just showed the journey that Hammad has covered & how he is preparing himself for all that is yet to come. It was beautiful!
To be honest, seeing Isaac personally checking Hammad’s bag reminded me of a high-schoolers’ life where teachers personally check their bags. I think they have pretty much made it clear that Isaac & Zeeshan are after Hammad, so I think they don’t need to push it so much because all these scenarios not only seem forced but defy the purpose as they turn into comedy scenes because I for once can not imagine a dean of a University in the USA personally checking the bags of Muslim students because he is filled with so much of hatred & is probably quite a bit faarigh. Also, the editing of that scene was just so off because Sarah never left Hammad’s side & the very next moment Hammad told Rebecca that Sarah must’ve taken out those notes from his bag? Anyways, it was too obvious that not much thought was put into that scene & the choppy editing & weak direction of that scene proved it!
Well, the part that I enjoyed the most throughout this episode was seeing Sarah & Hammad becoming good friends, like their friendship started off with a couple of conversations, then they came to such a level where they started helping each other, then they shared a few phone calls & then in the end, Hammad got invited to Sarah’s place. It was probably for the first time when Hammad showed Sarah his emotional side where he taught her a few things about the emotion of love, that was the moment when Sarah realized that Hammad is a completely different person to how she perceived him to be & that is why she grew empathetic & compassionate towards him. I must say that entire conversation, where Hammad explained what love is was beautifully written, even though it was so deep yet it was so simple that even someone like Sarah who didn’t enjoy the subject understood what the emotion & the journey of love is all about. The way Sarah helped Hammad when Zeeshan tried to put him in trouble showed that Sarah has completely changed her mind about Hammad & now she sees him in a very different light & that is only because of Hammad’s attitude & behavior towards her & all those people around him.
Sarah’s invitation to Hammad symbolized that she has started trusting him a lot more & considers him as her friend. To invite Hammad over such a personal family affair like that of her mother’s birthday, without even worrying much about her father’s reaction showed that Sarah believes in taking stand for the right & she believes in forming her own opinions & doesn’t easily get swayed by what she hears from people. Considering how staunch & rigid Isaac is, it would’ve seemed justified if Sarah had shared the same opinions as her father but just because she is observant & mature, she didn’t take much time in judging Hammad’s character differently. The conversation where Isaac once again tried to insult Hammad by labeling him as an extremist was quite off-putting, not because Hammad is a Muslim & to hear such things against Islam repeatedly is burdensome but because we still are unaware of the reason behind Isaac’s hatred.
I don’t know if the drama-makers didn’t want to bring any religion into the spotlight through this drama, that is the reason why they haven’t given out much details about Isaac or his background but I think they should because it is getting hard to relate to Isaac & his perspective. All we know by now is that Sarah’s mother is a Christian, like Hammad mentioned it to Kamran especially that Sarah’s ‘mother’ is a Christian but there was no mention about Isaac so!!!
I loved the scene where Sarah looks over Hammad when he is offering prayer & the way the entire scenario was linked to how Hammad fell for Imaan when he saw her offering prayers too. It is so amazing how they have shown that at this stage, Hammad is standing where Imaan was & Sarah is exactly where Hammad was in the past. Just like Imaan was a step ahead of Hammad & convinced Hammad to come to her level, similarly & unconsciously, Hammad is now a step ahead of Sarah & is now going to convince her to come to his level. The times have changed, the characters have changed but the essence remains the same & that is something absolutely beautiful, like it is a journey that they have shown, which is amazing. :)
I loved this episode because a lot of focus was on Sarah/Hammad, Kubra Khan/Imran Abbas, their chemistry is so amazing like I know a lot of people won’t be happy but I like their chemistry better than Hammad/Imaan’s, hehe I know Imaan is Hammad’s first love but Sarah will be his last, so it is also just as special. Yes, this episode did have some off-putting moments because we had that goon with a ponytail named Zeeshan filling the TV screen with his negativity & toxins. Also, I really expected better acting from Syed Mazhar Ali considering he is such an experienced actor because most of the times his expressions suggest as if he has eaten a pickled cucumber (gherkin) & he is so not happy with the aftertaste. Imran Abbas & Kubra Khan’s amazing & effortless acting is definitely elevating the level of this drama so I am happy. Please share your thoughts about this episode of Khuda Aur Mohabbat.
Keep Supporting,
Cheers,
Zahra Mirza.
