Forget the politics, the stars, the songs, all the rest of it. You may want to skip this movie just because I found myself checking the time every 15 minutes. That’s baaaaaaaaaaaad! Especially since I kept going “It’s only been 15 minutes??? That felt like an hour!”
First, politics wise, this film goes pretty hardcore on border issues. That is unpleasant. But I will say it also did the 1970s “Good Muslim” trope. Complete with a full on Muslim hero funeral at one point. And the violence stayed strictly within combatants, soldiers and “terrorists” only, no innocent bystanders. That makes it a lot easier for me personally to stomach.
On the other and, the gender stuff was very blah blah. Not so bad as to be infuriating, but definitely not great (the usual, “let’s understand and sympathize and gently guide the Patriarchy instead of just BLOWING THEM THE HECK UP”). And Dips’ character was disappointingly bland, feels like they never quite figured out who she was supposed to be.
Yeah, that’s what it was, blah blah. Nothing was so bad as to be infuriating, but nor was it good enough to be entertaining. Decent songs, decent action, it’s just everything else that was dull. Characters didn’t gel, stars didn’t get to stretch their star power, dialogue was bland, even costumes were just okay. Boring.
I was just talking about it with a friend and I think it might be a symptom of Sidharth Anand fatigue? YRF/Sid JUST made Pathaan and went right into this movie. And everything is just kind of good enough to get by. Sidharth Anand is not going to be making some deep psychological drama or anything, I don’t want that from him. But I do expect lots of quotable one liners, non-stop action, crazy twists, over the top visuals (costumes, sets, the works). And this just wasn’t that. I can’t think of a single punchy line of dialogue, or a costume that sticks in mind, and the fight scenes were dull dull dull. Pathaan had helicopters and busses and crazy things! This movie has punching in fire?
So I’m not gonna say “don’t watch it”, if you want to see a movie in theaters, and you can stomach jingoism, do it. But I’m also not going to say “not to be missed!” It’s just boring.
dontcallitbollywood 
I’ll wait for it to stream.
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Yeah, and don’t feel bad if you turn it off after 10 minutes. It doesn’t really get better.
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I felt bad for wasting my $13 and 3 hours.
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I am so glad I waited to see it with a friend! Would have been a waste of time and money, but instead the two of us giggled and made fun of it through out. I was still bored enough to keep checking the time, but I wasn’t THAT bored.
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I kept waiting for it to get better… Otherwise I would’ve walked out. It never did.
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Same! I had a lot of hope when he was assigned to the Hyderabad school, I thought the film was going to switch gears to a whole new setting. And that was over in like 10 minutes and we were back to boring.
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Lol, I also got excited when he was moving to Hyderabad because he was becoming a teacher in a new city but it’s just more of the same.
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I thought at least that would give us a chance for a good fight scene. He could get drunk and get in a bar fight or SOMETHING.
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Lol, I wasn’t even aiming that high. I was just wanting to see someone speaking in Telugu and we didn’t even get that😂
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I’m not happy that a movie turned up to be bad / flop but maybe they will think twice now before making another spy/war/ universe movie. There were so many in the last few years. I’m tired.
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I think the filmmakers are tired too. Let them try something new, do a different thing, the movies will be better for it.
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Definitely. How many versions of the same story one can make/watch? This is one of the aspects I hate the most in Bollywood – when a movie is successful, they do it to death, till we all are sick with the genre.
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If it is a spy universe, why can’t the spy characters be the same in the different movies? Tiger & Pathaan are the same. It sounds like Dips was something totally new, not her Pathaan character, and it sounds like Hrithik wasn’t his War character. Those characters were fleshed out, though Dips could use even more fleshing. Of course I didn’t read the spoiler review, and I haven’t seen the movie. So all I’m going off of our your words from this one review.
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Good question! I think probably because they planned this movie before they decided on doing the whole Spy Universe thing. And it was too complicated to rewrite and create a backstory that would make Dips’ character and Hrithik’s character meet and end up as pilots.
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Since this is Sid Anand’s own production house, I assumed he wanted to do something “new” and totally standalone that’s seperate from the YRF spy movies.
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