It’s boom time for the web series medium on the digital platform. Every media house, big or small, is giving this narrative format a shot. The three main incentives why creators choose to roll out a web series are:
1. It’s cost-effective. Yay!
2. There is no censorship involved. Woah!
3. You don’t have to worry about distribution or exhibition. Phew!
While we’re being bombarded with a variety of webisodes from each and every corner of the desi digital world, here are some cliches that almost each of them flash at us because there is no Mr Pahlaj Nihalani here playing nanny.
1. Young Confused & Urbane
Every web series has an urbane youngster or group of youngsters fronting it and figuring out their life, work and/or relationships. This is basically a direct, no-holds-barred attempt to rope in the TG or target audience. The assumption being that a large percentage of the online consumer is India’s urban young, so why not go for the jugular?
2. Gaaliyan!
All those swear words that would’ve inevitably been BEEPED out by the CBFC gets an unabashed play out here. When you can say it, you might as well OD on it.
3. Dope-Shope
While on ODing - going by what we’re shown, almost every kid in the neighbourhood is smoking, snorting, whiffing, swallowing some drug or the other. With no threat of censorship or any requirement to have anti-smoking disclaimers, writers and directors are definitely on a high here.
4. Un-sanskaari Is the New Black
It’s always fun and hip to show your middle finger to some Bharatiya sanskar, but too much of the same thing stops making it ‘cool’. Like this young couple saying ‘F U’ at their shaadi ka mandap before their saat pheras.
5. Sex It Up
This is where web creators get to get back at their past lives of being TV directors and producers. Sex was a dirty word on the small screen, but it’s more than welcome on your laptop or handheld device.