Not sure if it's fair to review given that I didn't even make it past 10 episodes...but I will review it anyway to say this has such a great premise, why isn't there a better show or movie about this historical figure?
I will explain why I couldn't get through this show. First of all, let there be no pretenses: this is a melodramatic soap. Normally, I don't like those, but sometimes, the historical context can make up for the melodrama. For example, I was able to go through several seasons of Downton Abbey before it got too much (although Downton Abbey really did try to hide its soapy melodrama for a long time and then just couldn't anymore). There is also the Turkish soap The Magnificent Century about a ruler of the Ottoman Empire, which is a closer example to this particular show. I couldn't finish The Magnificent Century because somehow the whole show was not on Netflix, but if it becomes available, I would definitely complete it.
The difference between The Magnificent Century and Razia Sultan is this - in the Magnificent Century the intrigue was was far more interesting and there was more going on. Razia Sultan, kind of like a typical South Asian soap drags out its plotlines to no end and spends so much time on reaction shots of people's faces that I just couldn't muster enough patience to watch. Razia Sultan is also less interested in presenting complex characters. The characters in The Magnificent Century, despite their melodrama, were complicated characters, ones designed to be loved and hated at the same time. But in Razia Sultan the show goes to extreme lengths to idealize the good characters way too much and villainize the bad characters to comical extents.
The other reason why this show was a disappointment was because despite everything, the first 1-2 episodes were actually rather good because of the subject matter. It directly dealt with the issue of the way in which women were not viewed as equal to men and despite the melodrama, I was very open to watching that content, to the point that I was thinking "I would love for this to air back home so my womenfolk can watch this kind of trash unlike the other kind of trash they watch". And then the story got so wrapped up in the plot of the sultan's conniving mistress that nothing of the subject mater that I liked remained. I'm sure it would have come back eventually, but who knows for how long and with how much emphasis. And so I just abandoned the show.
But I hope they make another show or a movie about Razia Sultan in which they feel more comfortable leaning closer to historical accuracy.
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