The problem with plays that have a very long storyline is that they start to contradict themselves in the middle, storylines go wayward, characters lose their appeal and everything becomes a little confusing. The same is happening here now. What could have been a pretty straightforward tale of a single mother raising her daughters in a gender biased society has taken many dimensions now, some quite far from the original idea. While its good to see a little unpredictability and suspense, what is happening here is twisting the story away from its original theme which was quite beautiful on its own.
The funniest part of the episodes was Anum’s behaviour. If she was cordial and nice to Fehmida, I think that would have been quite reasonable and enough. But to go all out of the way to stand up for the rights of a woman whose husband you married willingly and lovingly has befuddled me. Why would she change Fehmida’s outlook and personality so Jawad can appreciate her? If she wanted Jawad to stick with his first wife, she could easily have listened to her mom and refused Jawad, but she was obsessed and madly in love with him at that time. A few hours into the marriage, she has shifted her obsession and and love onto Fehmida, even to the extent of refusing to go to the movies or shopping or dinner with him unless his first wife accompanies them. While its very unrealistic and odd, but I could not control my laughter at Jawad’s plight. If every second wife starts acting like Anum, very soon married men would think one hundred times before proposing to a pretty colleague, by cribbing about their first wives.
Regarding Anila, she was always this selfish, but her disappearance served Sadiq well too. There was a lot of suffering on the men’s side in this episode. Sajid Hassan was again phenomenal in this episode. Despite knowing that he has brought on his own fate, it was hard not to sympathise with his portrayal of a broken man, who while having two wives, four biological children and two step children has essentially no one who cares about him at all. Anila had once snatched material things from Naheed, paying no heed to morals and that is what she did again. For financial gain, it was very easy for her to decide to leave her aged husband and ailing child.
Sadiq also got to know about the cake Amber kept on sending him. While it was a totally pointless gesture,done purely out of vengeance, it was still sad to see that how bad parenting and wrong priorities of father had played havoc with a little girl’s senses and attitudes. Amber finally confessed to Naheed all that she had in mind and all that she had achieved by marrying Ahsan, which ofcourse was overheard by Ahsan as the door was very conveniently left open. He was naturally heartbroken and oblivious to the last part of conversation where Amber expressed her guilt at doing all this. This episode only showed his anger and avoidance of Amber, so maybe next time we will get to know better how he is going to handle this ultimate betrayal by a wife he had so loved and trusted.
Iqra’s story is still stagnant but it is good that she is working and carrying on with with her life, though Naheed has started looking for a suitable husband for her. When Naheed told Fareeha and Shehzad that she has no intention of hiding Iqra’s previous marriage and subsequent divorce from any prospective suitors, Fareeha went totally against it and prompted her to lie. I am sure if Naheed had shown her intention to be otherwise, Fareeha would be the first one to announce of that unfortunate incident of Iqra’s life. She is such a vile woman.
Sajid Hassan, Saboor Ali, Saima Noor and the boy playing Ahsan were all fabulous today. They nailed their characters, even thugh the story is losing common sense a little bit. One thing is for certain though, that neither Anum nor Amber learnt Naheed’s endearing habit of minding her own business. They are both extremely nosy and have no sense of personal or private boundaries whatsoever. They plunge head on to take control of situations and manipulate them according to how they deem right, which is so different from the quiet dignity with which Naheed carried herself all her life..maybe nature does overcome nurture in a lot of instances.
Stay tuned to see how the drama wraps up..
