BOTTOM LINE
Nothing Good, Only Old and Outdated
PLATFORM
YouTube, Telugu web series
RUNTIME
2 hours 40 minutes (approx), 5 episodes
What is the Telugu show Good Old Days about?
Parvathi, an art enthusiast, has a troubled equation with her recently widowed father and finds solace in her friendship with a childhood buddy Vamsi, a visually impaired man. Over the years, she has relationships with multiple men – a much older and married artiste Pradeep and Vamsi’s stepbrother Santosh. Meanwhile, she’s on the hunt for an artiste Ganga, who drew a portrait of her late grandpa.
Performances
Tejasri Reddy and Aay, Maruthi Nagar Subrahmanyam fame Ankith Koyya are the only actors in the lineup who make a minimal effort to salvage the show. Pradeep Rudra is a capable performer but gets to add little value to the proceedings. Bhargav Kommera’s portrayal of a blind man lacks any impact and his exaggerated mannerisms make matters worse.
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Analysis
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Good Old Days is like a bunch of vaguely interesting chapters of a novel that struggle to come together seamlessly. The show, presented by popular filmmaker Harish Shankar and helmed by Ala fame Sarat Palanki, wants to convey something profound, and doesn’t want to judge its characters for their choices but the writing and the execution make us exactly feel the opposite.
The characters and the plot of the show are a culmination of random ideas. The director just doesn’t know what to do with them, deals in broad strokes and employs age-old cliches to resolve his conflicts. The tale unfolds over a flashback where Parvathi is an accomplished artist who has settled down in Paris and reminisces some of the most eventful chapters in her life.
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Across the five episodes, you witness various episodes in Parvathi’s life – from the trauma of growing up in a dysfunctional family to her early years as a college student to her ‘friendship’ with Vamsi, relationships with Pradeep and Santosh. Meanwhile, it also focuses on the conflict between two step-brothers – Vamsi and Santosh – who fight for their father’s wealth and end up falling for the same girl.
For a show that primarily deals with romance and one messy relationship after the other, Good Old Days is very sketchy in portraying the equation among its key characters – Parvathi, Vamsi, Santosh. For the umpteenth time, a filmmaker wants to portray a liberated urban woman as one who smokes joints, indulges in an extramarital affair and one who doesn’t know the value of ‘true’ love.
It’s equally tiring to see the stereotypical portrayal of specially abled characters as beings craving sympathy. Vamsi comes across as a terribly melodramatic youngster who’s only filled with generosity and is ever ready for a sacrifice. Santosh is also a character you struggle to relate with and his ever-changing equations with Vamsi and Parvathi complicate the mess further.
Throughout the show, it is very evident that it’s not serious about exploring the artistic side of Parvathi. While the emotional link to her profession – relating to her grandfather’s portrait – is impressive, everything about her career feels superficial and insincere.
Good Old Days loses the plot in the penultimate and the final episodes, where Vamsi takes drastic decisions that alter the course of Parvathi and Santosh’s lives – which don’t create any emotional impact whatsoever. The characters keep sobbing like there’s no tomorrow, but there’s nothing to feel for, in a show that is content with being shallow and does not even try to make any sense.
There are way too many voiceovers in the flashback indulging in a dialogue fest, trying hard to suggest what’s so obvious in the first place. The same song – Ila Ila – is repetitively used in all the episodes, drowning the impact of the sequences. In spite of its problems, the show is visually pleasing for its cinematography, even in a limited set of locations.
Good Old Days doesn’t even come close in being a feel-‘good’ romance. The characters and the situations feel like remnants from age-old films which don’t make any sense today.
Music and Other Departments?
Popular playback singer Sruthi Ranjani (who recently sang Dhop) disappoints as a composer and the music does little to contribute to the show’s impact. Sarat Palanki, the cinematographer fares better than the director in him. The five-episode show has many loose ends, disconnected threads and there’s no momentum to the storytelling at all. The lesser said about the dialogues, the better.
Highlights?
Impressive cinematography
Reasonable performances of Tejasri Reddy, Ankith Koyya
Drawbacks?
Pretty much everything
Vague plot, poor characters
Amateurish execution
Did I Enjoy It?
No
Will You Recommend It?
Not at all
Good Old Days Telugu Web Series Review by M9
