After more than 4 long years, Made in Heaven S2 release is finally around the corner. Naturally, I realised I had forgotten most of the first season when they announced the new dates. And given the show was so phenomenal, my more-than-excited self went back to re-watch the series only to return with an epiphany – the mirror Kabir Basrai held for every marriage was the highlight of the show.
Set in the deceptively picturesque world of affluent South Delhi, two wedding planners must face the reality of Indian marriages while putting on an extravagant facade manufactured more for the world than for themselves. Each episode centers a new couple and exposes the world’s hypocrisies, convenient morality, inherent biases, and the place society has ‘gifted’ to women.
By the end of every marriage scene, a perspective is seamlessly woven through the poetic commentary of Kabir Basrai, the photographer who silently observes the binaries of the world, the superficial pretence and the fragility underneath. His commentary is also perhaps the only harbourer of sense in the madness of the Made In Heaven world and the battle every character fights.
Here are 8 times when Basrai spoke in the first season and we were all moved:
1. Marriages are not made in heaven but made by society
That time he explained how marriage, for the majority, is not a sacred union of two souls but a tie-up within a social class. And if one were to trespass that boundary and marry someone outside their social class, it’d be called a ‘marriage for money.’
2. But there ARE moments of magic in the madness we inhabit
3. The centuries of patriarchy is a deeply rooted establishment built on hollow grounds
And when Priyanka walked off that alter that asked for ‘payment’ in return for marriage, she dismantled the institution with one tiny moment of courage.
4. That patriarchy is also internal and it’s more common than what you may think
The ticket price for Sukhmani to escape her small town was a life in New Jersey with an impotent man who’d resent her for it.
5. That education cannot cure the deeply ingrained superstitions
Gitanjali was ‘mangalik.’ So, she had to marry a tree before her actual marriage, which Nikhil, her groom-to-be, vehemently disapproved of. So she went ahead and married the tree in private without his knowledge.
6. That royalty will reign, even in the 21st century
7. And the fact that a woman’s value will still be derived from her marital status
8. And the ‘hope for something better’ will keep driving people every day, every night
Here’s hoping Zoya Akhtar and Reema Kagti retain Kabir’s WORD moments in the new season.
To refresh your memory about what happened in the previous season, you can look at this Quick Recap Of How Things Ended In Made In Heaven Season 1.
All the screenshots have been taken from Made in Heaven S1 on Amazon Prime India. You can stream it here.
