4 Reasons Why Season 2 Of Masaba Masaba Is A Fail!

Anyone who knows about Neena Gupta’s backstory would say that she is a boss lady, a badass woman, and the very definition of a feminist. I would agree with them all.

However, after all these decades of her working in the Indian film industry, is her boldness and bravery the only things worth appreciating?

The second season of Masaba Masaba (2020-2022) made me feel as if both Neena Gupta and her daughter Masaba have gotten typecast when it comes to the roles they play on screen. What’s more is that the directors who cast them have stopped putting in any effort to challenge the actors, or to make them deliver their dialogues differently.

I don’t know about others, but I am genuinely bored of Neena Gupta playing the role of a victimised old woman who has to battle both ageism and gender equality (how many times?) in Bollywood because she neither receives roles nor respect.

Based on my understanding of and frustration with the second season of Masaba Masaba, here are my (very personal) thoughts about how and why the season fails miserably:

Extremely annoying female characters who genuinely got on my nerves

The two characters don’t seem to have evolved or grown since the first season in any way. If anything, they are more annoying, interfering, and unbearable. While Neena has absolutely no respect for Masaba’s life choices and Masaba, in turn, has no respect for anyone whatsoever.

I am glad that Masaba, in the series, decided to discontinue her business venture, House of Shaadi because the only thing that seemed to come out of the same in the plot was her being able to check out the groom’s shirtless body and return his flirting. I would, in every way, consider Masaba’s character to be unprofessional.

Neena, on the other hand, continues to be someone who has been sidelined all her life and is not satisfied with anything on this planet. She expects everyone to respect her, but can not herself respect her own daughter’s personal boundaries.

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Common misconceptions that Indians have about feminism and feminist identities

Feminism is not all about getting physically intimate with a married or engaged man or developing feelings for someone outside of your own marriage. Feminism is not even about belittling other women and being labelled as a ‘bitch’ for being blunt and sassy.

I feel the need to mention all of this because the makers of Masaba Masaba feel as if a woman can get away with horrible behaviour and immoral actions in the name of female liberation.

Neena and Masaba are shown to be two women who have absolutely no idea about what they are saying or doing in the series, but everything they do is still justified because they are independent working women. Masaba flirts with and kisses the man whose wedding outfits she is getting paid to design. She also ridicules multiple young female fashion designers by labelling them as ‘instagram designers’ or referring to their design as ‘linking road aesthetic’.

I am sorry, but none of that is women empowerment. It is because of such ridiculous depictions of Indian feminism that we have so many anti-feminists in our country.

Pedestalization of absolutely mediocre creative works just because the creators are women

While I was in awe of Masaba Gupta’s designs in the first season, I have to say that in the second season they were quite average and I wouldn’t ever pay a lakh and a half to wear any of them. In the climax scene, she designs outfits for a bunch of teenage girls to make them feel more confident. But, are those outfits good and worth wearing? If someone had handed them to me when I was a teenager with body image issues, I would’ve genuinely had a nervous breakdown.

Neena’s acting skills also come across as pretty mediocre in this. There are scenes in which she is shown to shoot for a daily soap, but doesn’t look her part at all. In fact she doesn’t even try to change her facial expressions or work on her diction.

Did the creators of Masaba Masaba just wake up one morning, go to the sets and decide to create something absolutely random without putting any thought into it?

Below average comebacks and punchlines

The poorly written dialogues of Masaba Masaba are far from motivating. In fact, from the very first dialogue exchange between the mother-daughter duo, it becomes clear that they are simply talking in a regular manner instead of acting convincingly or delivering solid comebacks.

I could feel myself losing focus every time there was a long dialogue or monologue being delivered by Neena or Masaba. In a scene where Masaba talks to her friend about entering her 30s, I felt so bored that I had to fast forward to a point where she wasn’t talking anymore.

In conclusion, if the aim of the makers was to motivate young women through this series, then they failed miserably. Additionally, if the aim was to show how Neena and Masaba Gupta live their lives, then the second season of this series is as unnecessary as Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives (2020). 

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