The biggest, funniest and most entertaining show -Zor ka Jhatka screamed a hoarding .Hmm,
I thought, the timings( 9pm) clashed with our family favourite show Jhalak Dikh la jaa, but lets give it a try, said the SRK fan in me .from the commercials I knew It was some kind of sports based reality show like Khatron ke Khiladi(minus the dangers of course). The show is a licensed version of Wipeout, the Endemol show that originated in the United States in 2008( Reference:Wikipedia)
==What is the show all about == Contestants need to clear the obstacles, jump from one big elastic balls to another, avoding punching fists etc and make it to the end in the least time .These challenges are based in large pools of water, there are have four rounds in which the slowest ones gets eliminated in each round and the fourth round leaves 3 contestant to fight it for the winner.The winner gets Rs10 Lac and to participate in the finals.
The first eposide had contestants like Manoj kumar( the boxer not the actor), vindoo dara singh, Claudia Ciesla, Bhaktiyaar Irani(big Boss 3) Debina Bannerjee( Sita) to name a few.
Shahrukh gives live commentary of the contestants actions tries to induce humour, while another anchor Saumya Tandon does the field job.To his credit SRK does manage to carry it out for the some time( depending upon your endurance level) but after some time you wish he would stop.
10 minutes into watching the show I started catching my head .Shahrukh is at his hamming best making fun at the cost of the participants names, failed attempts, repeated double meaning jokes on big balls, using haryvani accent and trying all tricks in his reportoire to make it sound funny( script writers please give him some new ideas). Finally I was tempted to shout -Awaaz neeche( inspired by the film Action replay which has the Zor ka Jhatka song).
Also shahrukh commentates from the studio’s in India while the action takes place in Argentina which I feel does not match at all.On the positive side the contestants do give their 100% into their tasks.
If you have watched Takeshi’s Castle( in some Kid channel) hosted by Javed Jaffry years back you would feel that he was far more better in terms of anchoring and presentation.Kids might like the show but for a me I don’t see any fun in laughing at people falling down or getting punched.FYI some of the participants have faced injuries on this show . SRK’s stint at KBC and Are you smarter than a fifth grader seems like Oscar winner’s in comparison to ZKJ.
Manoj kumar was the winner for first episode, I think every episode will have a winner till we have the final 12 or 14 finalist.This might be the biggest show( Shahrukh is getting Rs 2.5 crore per eposide) but certainly not the funniest or entertaining show.
Do watch this show once to get a feel of the stupidty.May be the show will improve after getting feedbacks from the audience or that I might get used to the show but we will have to wait for another day. My first impression about zor ka Jhatka was not at all Zordar.
Regards,
Rajiv