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Cast: Keerthy Suresh, Radhika Apte, Tanvi Azmi, Monika Panwar, and others
Creator: Dharmaraj Shetty
Director: Dharmaraj Shetty
Streaming On: Netflix
Language: Hindi
Runtime: 5 episodes of 45 minutes each
“Gharano ke teen niyam hain – 1. Ye gharana apni auraton ki nasal se jaana chahiye, 2. Shaadi ki pratha ko koi maanyata nahi di jaayegi, 3. Gharano ka bantwara karna nishiddh hai!” Sounds like a brutally strict patriarch? Brutal – Yes. Strict – Yes. Patriarch – No! So, when Akka, produced by Yash Raj Films, started its 5-episode series on this note, I was pretty excited! I was even excited looking at the cast of the film – Keerthy Suresh, Radhika Apte, Monika Panwar, Tanvi Azmi, all stalwarts in their craft. So, when all of these women decide to come together in an action drama ruled by women, who would not be excited, right?
On paper, it looks like a goldmine of an idea. A world exactly upside down to Mirzapur, to be honest! A dynasty of gangster women, ruling an area/village/territory for ages. Such a solid hook – matriarchal gang – follows a legacy – swears by loyalty – hit by betrayal – rage to revenge. The idea of women owning a genre that men have monopolized for decades is so tempting.
Akka Review: What’s It About:
Akka revolves around Bhavani (Keerthy Suresh) and Rudra (Radhika Apte), two formidable women whose clashing ambitions and beliefs fuel a rivalry. The story unfolds in Pernuru, a fictional kingdom ruled by women, in a period crime saga from Yash Raj Films. It’s set in the 1980s, in a world of crime, power, and female rule in South India.
The series sets up a premise where female characters wield complete dominance. However, instead of channeling this female-led crime dynamic into a gripping psychological or political thriller, Akka devolves into an endless bloodbath where hundreds of women hack, slash, and eliminate each other across grueling episodes. I am serious: this gang of women arrives on screen only to belittle men, kill them, and then die themselves before we learn their names, so when everyone is redundant, nothing actually matters.
Akka Review: What Works:
Dharmaraj Shetty clearly has a vision that is magnificent and an idea that is brilliant! I mean, Uno Reverse on patriarchy! Even the production deserves credit for building a fictional land and bringing the feel of the 80s. Mumbai looks Bombay, and the villages look like a tribal town! Art and aesthetics are clearly the show’s strongest asset. The action choreography is energetic, but the amount of it is a turn-off!
Akka Review: Star Performance:
Keerthy Suresh makes a sincere attempt to play a matriarch shouldering the weight of a legacy. She has the screen presence. But she crumbles when Bhavani needs to take matters into her hands. I mean, letting everyone around you die is such a meh thing to watch in a gangster drama! At least the revenge should have been a banger! But the writing offers her little beyond glares and grim declarations. She deserved a character, but wasn’t given one! At times, she resembled Deepika Padukone’s Leela from Ram-Leela, and that is a glaring mistake her character could have avoided!
Radhika Apte is a woman who is ever incapable of being dull, and she’s the one who keeps scenes alive even when the material doesn’t. Yet it’s painful to watch an actor of her caliber reduced to a cycle of rage and revenge. Her talent screams for nuance, and the script hands her a sexualized weapon instead.
Tanvi Azmi is a class act, as always. Even in limited, stylized moments, she brings authority, and she makes you wish the series had been built around her rather than all the chaos. Just like Shabana Azmi led Dabba Cartel! Mahesh Manjrekar, Anshuman Pushkar and Monica Panwar do what’s asked, but the ensemble is largely lost in the crowd. With this many women on screen, very few get a moment to stand out, including the lead actors!
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Akka Review: What Doesn’t Work:
The writing of Akka is its core problem. It ignorantly believes that grand is good! Well, it is, only if there is a point to it! There are hundreds of women, and almost all of them seem to exist for one purpose: to be killed, or to kill. Characters arrive and are butchered before we know who they are, why they are behaving so, what did men do to them to become such staunch men-ignorers. But we get to know nothing! Just like men abuse women for no reason, these women are abusing men for no reason, as per this show!
The rivalry between Bhavani and Rudra should have been the spine. It’s reduced to a series of confrontations that escalate in how many bullets one can take or shoot. There is no emotional stake involved here! Despite the fact that they belong to the same clan, the root of their rivalry is also related to the clan!
Throughout the show, we’re told these women are dangerous, but we’re shown it only through blood. There’s no cunningness, no decision-making skills, no chases, no moment where you lean forward thinking, What will she do next? Great gangster sagas run on strategy and betrayal. Here, it’s mostly blood – so much so that I was nauseated at a point, watching Radhika Apte take a blood shower! I mean seriously?
The pacing is another casualty. The series is stretched, with repeated bouts of confrontation, violence, and aftermath. By the midpoint, it has exhausted you. You do not even know why it is 5 episodes, when this literally could be a very crisp 1- 1.5-hour OTT film!
Akka Review: Last Words:
Violence clearly overwhelms the vision of Akka as a premise. The frames make you feel nauseated, choked, and unappreciative. It is rather out of irritation! camera is daring you to look away. There’s a difference between depicting violence and making some feel disgusted about it! This one falls in the latter category! A tighter edit and a firmer hand on the writing could have saved this beautiful yet ambitious story!
Akka had everything going for it: a bold idea, a fantastic cast, and the might of YRF. What it delivers is a long, loud, bloody slog that left me nauseous and choked, and not in the way the makers intended. Keerthy Suresh and Radhika Apte are too good for this, and the audience deserved a smarter series about women in power rather than one where they simply slaughter each other.
A women-run gangland is a great hook. The series just doesn’t know what to do with it. It could have been a sharp study of power, but it turns into a relentless slaughterhouse. Watch it only if you have a high tolerance for gore. Everyone else can safely skip it.
2 stars!
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