Class

'Class' is an adaptation of the popular Spanish series' 'Elite,' which was created by Carlos Montero and Dario Madrona. The creators (Ashim Ahluwalia, Kashyap Kapoor and Raghav Kakkar) have based the Indian show in Delhi, with the same story that centres around three teenagers-studious Muslim girl Saba Manzoor (Madhyama Segal), sensible and level-headed Dheeraj Kumar Valmiki (Piyush Khati) and cool dude Balli Sehrawat (Cwaayal Singh)-who are from slums but join an elite high school through a scholarship program, which ignites the class war between the rich and the poor kids.

Similar to its original show, this eight-part series with nearly hourly episodes serves intrigue early on. The narrative starts at the conclusion of our story when a murder has been committed, and the police question these teenagers who could have been potential suspects. 'Class' doesn't have a central protagonist, but most of the drama and mystery revolves around the death of one particular character, whose identity is revealed at the end of the first episode. The narrative shifts between the present and the past to answer the show's most pressing question: who is the killer ?

As the story progresses, the focus shifts to the school's popular students-a free-spirited Suhani Ahuja (Anjali Sivaraman), who is constantly high, her older brother and a spoilt brat with a kind heart, Veer Ahuja (Zeyn Shaw), a social influencer and Veer's girlfriend, Yashika Mehta (Ayesha Kanga), experimental couple Sharam Gujral (Moses Koul) and Koel Kalra (Naina Bhan) and principal's son, Dhruv Sanghvi (Chayan Chopra), who is still in the closet-who receive equal screen time and character arcs.

Everyone performs well, but they don't do enough to stand out. Suhani's troubled past is recounted hurriedly and fails to elicit sympathy. Her relationship with Dheeraj's brother Neeraj (Gurfateh Pirzada) is also underwhelming. Another subplot involves two closeted teenagers, Dhruv and Saba's drug peddler brother Faruq (Chintan Rachchh), but sadly, they get less screen time. Despite this, the show keeps you invested in its characters and their personal lives.

There is plenty of sex, nudity and drama here. And, while it is certainly bold for an Indian series, the show lacks originality in presenting the flow of the events. Except for a few tweaks in the story, the makers have not meddled with the original show in order to create a different version. Adding a few more twists and turns to the story that wasn't in the original show, on the other hand, would have made it less predictable and more intriguing.

Inspired by the Spanish version, the series producer (Bodhitree Multimedia) and director Ashim Ahluwalia, incorporates a posh school into the picture, where most of the scenes were shot. The production values are high and clearly on par with the Spanish school to depict the lifestyle of these hi-fi students. Some sections show glimpses of Delhi's alleyways, from Gaffar Market to Chandni Chowk and historical sites like Agrasen Ki Baoli.

In a nutshell, those who have seen 'Elite' will find nothing new in the story besides the different locations and cast. For others, it's a binge-worthy murder mystery that will keep you hooked until the end.

Let's get straight to point. There are many things shown in this series that just can't be digested by average Indian audience. The makers have simply stuck to the original "Elite" without much changes to its controversial parts. However, overall, the series is pretty interesting and technically superior.

So for those who haven't seen Elite like me, the story is a whodunit thriller where we explore the past of a bunch of school teenagers and what ultimately leads to the murder of Suhani Ahuja . The past explores a lot of things in the relationships between the students.

First, let's talk about the whodunit part. It was damn surprisingly good. For those who haven't seen Elite, they won't be able to guess for a second also who is the killer considering all the students in picture have a grey shade to their characters and all are under suspicion. When the killer is revealed, it is a shocker because just before the moment Suhani gets killed, you feel there are others as well willing to kill Suhani.

Second, let's get to the past , the bulk of the story. So this part is a bit of "Student of the Year" and "Parasite" mix. I would say this Netflix school is the daddy of KJo school. From school kids consuming alcohol, drugs to getting involved in unbelievably weird fetishes to constant shaming to students kissing their elder teachers , when you just witness those scenes, many of them will make your skin crawl with disgust. There's absolutely no study in this school. Time to time you have to slap your face hard to remind yourself that these are being done by school kids, not college students. I don't know man i maybe too poor to understand what these rich people do or what awkward fetishes they possess but ya ..thi s series shows all that and you have a hard time believing all this . Makers should realise in which country they are remaking such series whether it suits their taste or not.

The clash of rich and poor is explored in Indian cinema a million times and this kind of presentation might not impress many . You have the rich always calling the poor "waiter" "beggars" and all sorts of filty stuff like c'mon , it's 2023 and i really don't think we still live in this era where kids from well educated families would even do so.

However, i really liked a lot of things . The relationships between the students is explored pretty well in this series . I like the relationship explored between Suhani and Dheeraj, Faruq and Dhruv and to some extent, Saba and Veer. Despite being a gay relation, i felt Faruq and Dhruv had the most beautiful relationship between them and it stood out amongst all . The remaining relationships like Koel's weird fetishy Balli and Sharan, and Balli - Sharan' s gay relationship, and Veer - (Tara sutaria clone) relationship were either cringy or too disgusting to accept. The fact that again, these are being shown to be done by school teenagers makes me somewhat feel really disgusted. In India, such filthy stuff doesn't happen in schools like boys randomly roaming around naked, or some girl putting their panties in boys lockers , man all these stuff happen in America, not india.

The technical details of this film is just outstanding. The raw and rustic lanes of old Delhi are shown so well. The raw background sounds are incorporated so well, from a peacock sound / sweet music sound at a rich persons house to the sound of people coughing loudly and incessantly and water dripping noise at the Poor's house . The lighting is terrific. The screenplay is fast and interesting. Bgm is also well used.

One thing to note is this series doesn't try to show the rich enjoying and the poor struggling. It shows how both classes have equal problems in their lives .

Performance wise, Suhani, Saba, Dhruv, Dheeraj, Neeraj, Faruq were the best for me. Rest were too cringy or overacting shops. Overall, i think this series might not find widespread acceptance in india . However, if the fetish part is ignored, then it's a pretty riveting and dark presentation of class division in society with an interesting Whodunit angle to it. It was definitely a surprise watch for me.

SHORT REVIEW- Watch the original Spanish series 'ELITE' instead of this show.

This webseries could have been a saviour for Netflix India.

After all, the makers had not much to do, because incase you don't know, this is not an original series, rather an adaptation of the Spanish series 'Elite'

But they have failed. It is nowhere near the parent series. The direction lacks passion and the show appears to be trying too hard to create some buzz.

Apart form the show being underwhelming for most of the time, the makers have failed badly to give justice to the theme of the show. Instead of sticking to the core theme ie. 'class divide', the show makes a very desperate attempt to turn it into a typical 'Upper Caste Vs Lower Caste' battle.

The Upper Caste in this show is represented by people who hate the poor, mock 'HIJAB' and trust h0rny spiritual leaders, alongwith other innumerous flaws.

The creators knew that the show is mostly gonna be watched by the youth and thus, used this opportunity to add political junk to our brains.

In a world where we should be healing our distances, 'CLASS' tries to create a divide amongst the viewers, using its outdated political narratives.

As good as never would I ever or Blood and water but those are more Americanized if I dare say. Was this the greatest? No, but it was decently entertaining for the evening. Now I hope not only foreign shows come up as new releases( because it's all that has been coming up lately tho I've been into period pieces Jeez! 300 characters left! Not great but decent high school murder/ drama mystery. 200! Jeez. Not bad, not bad, not bad. Come on!!!!!!! Kept me entertained for the evening! OMG! 100. This is ridiculous! Decent watch for the evening! I'm not going to write reviews if this 600 character thing remains a thing!

First off it's better than elite it has less sex scenes and it's overall i good show I hope Netflix doesn't cancel the show after one season I hope it gets loads more so we can see different characters .

The show overall is very good 10/10 I know it's not in Spanish but the Spanish version is good but has way to many sex scenes in , I mean I don't mind that but too much gets a bit boring .

This show surprised me in many ways the trailer looked very good 8 episodes is not that much so I hope they continue the show to see the characters and overall so we can see more elite content Spanish or not.