Written by: Muna Moini
Posted on: May 20, 2019 | 
| 中文
Raising sons who treat women right is a huge responsibility. When men aren't taught the concepts of consent, respect and equality between sexes since birth, they remain unable to understand them later on in life. This only makes us wonder; when will our society, including mothers and other female members of the family, stop treating the male child like an entitled god?
Written by Sarwat Nazeer and directed by Danish Nawaz, HUM TV’s latest play “Khaas,” is yet another story of a self-obsessed man named Ammar, played by Ali Rehman Khan. Suffering from narcissism, he believes he's perfect and bound to get whatever he sets his mind to - be it objects or women. While the drama has nothing new to offer, every episode so far shows the viewers how to identify the qualities of a narcissist, and how damaging this trait can be for a person, as well as the distress it can cause to everyone around him.
Set in present day, the first episode introduces us to the three main characters; Saba (Sanam Baloch), Ammar (Ali Rehman) and Faakhir (Haroon Shahid).
Coming from a family where daughters are raised as no lesser than boys, Saba is a university student who lives with her younger sister, mother and father (Behroze Sabzwari). As always, Sanam Baloch plays the character of Saba well, taking ownership of her role and doing it justice. However, we’ve previously seen her in similar roles. Behroze Sabzwari as the father, sets up a perfect example of what the man of the house should be like, acting as a loving husband and father.
On the other hand, we have Ammar, who happens to be the pampered son of his family. Though he has a younger sister, Nida played by Anam Gohar, everyone has always treated him like he's special, and therefore he's grown up believing that he actually is superior. Ali Rehman plays this very negative character convincingly, which is fairly new territory for him.
His best friend, Faakhir, is the exact opposite as a person. Despite playing a lonely, ‘sick of this world’ character, Faakhir happens to be a fairly decent human being. While Haroon Shahid is playing the role of a nice guy yet again, but he doesn’t seem fully invested in the role, and looks slightly bored most of the time.
The drama has a good original soundtrack, sung by Natasha Baig, who narrates how Saba’s world completely changes when fate brings the three characters together. While Faakhir is introduced to her through a car accident, Ammar stalks his way into her life, and both men fall for her. Ammar finds out details about her through his cousin, who happens to be a lecturer at Saba’s university. Coincidentally, she’s the same girl his mother wanted as a match for Ammar.
While the families instantly connect with each other, Saba is uncertain about Ammar, which leads to a delay in her response. Furious that he might get rejected, Ammar tries his best to woo her and upon convincing her, decides to teach her a lesson by rejecting her. Once his ego is fed, he finally agrees to marry her, but this is just the beginning.
Five episodes in, we see that Ammar needs constant praise and admiration, and emotionally abuses his new wife, both in public and private. He frequently demeans, intimidates, bullies, and belittles her, to a point where she starts losing her self-confidence. Case in point; on their wedding night, he tells her that she has manly hands, and upon seeing her natural curls in the morning, he says that he finds them hideous. These scenes are even more impactful due to their contrast with the touching words exchanged between Saba and her father before her mayun, who displays his affection for her.
Long story short, Ammar is manipulative and cannot deal with the fact that Saba is an individual with a mind of her own, while Saba is clearly unhappy. Will this lead to Faakhir's entry as the knight in shining armour? Saba seems to be standing up for herself in private arguments with Ammar, but perhaps she needs the confidence of another loved one to expose him publicly or leave him. So far, it’s been a pretty predictable storyline, but we'll have to watch the upcoming episodes to see how the story unfolds.
Khaas airs every Wednesday at 8 pm on HUM TV.
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