Most of the Indian ghost stories are famous for song and dance routines, and clichéd jump scares. In fact, some are so formulaic that they seem comic. But Sujoy Ghosh’s Typewriter is unlike anything we have seen before. Set in Bardez, Goa, the series has an idyllic yet urbane feel. The five-episode season is a testament to Ghosh’s mastery over the thriller genre with tight and pacy storytelling. There are dead bodies, there are killings, there’s a storybook and an old typewriter clicking away fear into locals.
The series not just highlights how both good and evil can reside in one person but it also shows how good and evil can fragment one whole human being into parts. In an Enid Blyton-esque format, (or some might think the show similar to Stranger Things), three school kids and their beloved dog set out to unravel the mystery of a haunted bungalow, a doppelgänger and the rickety old Remington device. As members of a self-formed ghost club, the kids dream of nabbing a spirit for real.
The tools Ghosh has used in the series are conventional yet sufficiently creepy. But the characters and tropes are mostly Bengali. In fact, if the series was set in a rural town in Bengal such as Chandernagore or Murshidabad, the creepiness would have been further elevated. Character names such as Satyajit and Amit Roy further establish this fact.
In the setting up of the ghostliness, the audience is not privy to a lot of information which makes the stabs of fear delectable. We must admit that while watching the show through the night we did get scared and missed a few heartbeats in several scenes.
But soon explanations piled on the motive of revenge are unveiled. Mythology gets mixed with mumbo-jumbo on a blood-moon night in a rather stretched-out finale making the build-up seem messy. The subplots seem meaningless unless there is a possibility of the second season that could explain the left-out details.
What cannot be denied is that Ghosh has a way with creating characters that make his stories edgy. Add to this mix the stellar cast of Jisshu Sengupta and Palomi Ghosh, and the story seems flawless. A special mention must be given to the kids and the ghost-buster dog in the series. In a series, which is meant for adults, it is a bunch of 10-year-old kids superbly headline the show.
| Typewriter Writer and Director: Sujoy Ghosh Cast: Palomi Ghosh, Purab Kohli, Jisshu Sengupta, Sameer Kochchar, Kanwaljit Singh Release date: July 19 Platform: Netflix |