THE WEEK THAT WAS

Koi Chand Rakh | ARY, Thursdays 8.00pm

Despite Rabail’s (Ayeza Khan) young cousin Umair’s (Muneeb Butt) sudden return from his hostel and an attempt to set his room on fire because of his obsessive crush on her, Rabail gets married to Zain (Imran Abbas). Emotionally distraught, Umair tries to come to terms with the situation. Meanwhile, heavy innuendo continues between Umair’s sister Nishal (Areeba Habib) and her flirty brother-in-law Zain (Imran Abbas), who only has eyes for her.

When she rants to him about not being happy after his decision to marry Rabail instead of her, Zain’s father (Tanveer Jamal) overhears her and is now clued in to the entire circus of saali-behnoi love-hate shenanigans behind the whole facade of a big fat wedding. Why he chooses to remain mum about it is as perplexing as Zain foolishly marrying Rabail to spite his sister-in-law Nishal and to keep up appearances. The wedding night begins with an annoyed Zain telling off Rabail for the lack of chemistry between them as newlyweds. Predictable turns and unconvincing situations mean only Rahat Fateh Ali’s OST leaves a mark.

Rubaru Ishq Tha | Geo TV, Fridays 8.00pm

Ayaan (Sanam Chaudhry) has always misconstrued Almeer (Danish Taimoor)’s friendly affection as love, which is not the case as he still loves Salwa. For her part, Salwa (Ushna Shah) mopes around as the obedient bahu with a face as though her wisdom tooth is hurting. Who can blame the poor girl for being that way when hubby Wahaaj (Ali Abbas) beats Salwa with a leather belt (the utterly unnecessary violence makes him seem like a sadistic sicko).

Irritated by Almeer’s persistent questions about what her brother Wahaaj does for a living, Ayaan glibly lies that he works in Dubai, hiding the fact that he is a police inspector. During one of Ayaan’s jealous tantrums, Wahaaj intervenes to save doormat Salwa from an enraged sister-in-law’s physical attack, packing off Salwa to her mum’s place to avoid any further confrontations. Wahaaj is shocked when his emotionally blackmailing sister tells him she wants to bring Almeer home to meet the family, since he knows Almeer was once interested in his wife. But he is caught unawares when the special investigator Inspector Jahanzeb (Imran Patel) asks him point-blank why he had drugs put in Almeer’s backpack.

WHAT TO WATCH OUT FOR (OR NOT)

Lamhay | Hum TV, Tuesdays 8.00pm

When Hashir (Shaz Khan) returns home drunk one night and misbehaves with Alina (Zara Noor Abbas), she escapes to Hashir’s mum, the arrogant Bibi Jan (Saba Faisal). Shrewdly enough, Bibi Jan puts two and two together and asks Alina what the inside story is and Alina spills the beans that she is not Hashir’s real wife but just pretending to be one on contract because she needs the money for her ailing neice, while for Hashir it is a way to keep Bibi Jan from forcibly marrying him to his cousin Feroza (Kaif Ghaznavi). Also, it gives him time to sort out telling Bibi Jan his real secret marriage to Rija (Hajra Yamin) in London where he had gone to study but got married and bizarrely returned with an American accent! Bibi Jan finds herself comfortable with Alina’s traditional ways, keeping her fear of Hashir marrying a ‘modern girl’ at bay. Now that she knows half the truth, she wants Alina to keep working on contract but with changed loyalties so that now Bibi Jan calls the shots and Hashir is clueless about Alina teaming up with her. Great cast, but a mind-numbingly boring story.

Published in Dawn, ICON, August 14th, 2018