Karadayi

I feel compelled to reply to some comments made in this forum. Ezel was my first experience of a Turkish TV series and I adored it. I do not agree that the show was boring, nor complicated. Once you got your head around the plot it was simple enough to work out! As for boring, well the slow motion & emotional scenes are what is best about these shows. I had been watching American shows prior and yes I enjoyed some very much,however by comparison most are filled with explicit sex scenes and overly glamorous film stars. There are exceptions naturally, and I have set aside that aspect in those that I have liked.

Yes there is a glamour to the cast of Ezel and Karaday1 but they come across as super intelligent and real. You can relate to them easily. They come across as deep and meaningful people who have worked hard to achieve such successful shows.

I am mid way through Karaday1, loving every second of it, as mentioned in other reviews, I too cannot wait till the next episode. I too find myself binge watching, till wee hours and not ashamed to admit the odd afternoon session.

Karaday1 did take a little longer for me to get into, but it gets better as it goes along. Long - yes, boring - definitely not, complicated - takes concentration which is a credit to the writers.

The music to Ezel is haunting and will stay with me forever. Thank you Turkish TV

I feel a duty to share my feelings about Karadayı. I watched this series dubbed in Persian split in 350 episodes. I feel a close cultural background with this story especially the timeframe of its events in the 1970s. As a whole, the series look quite different in texture from almost every other series or movie I have ever watched in my life. It is very real. I am not a critique, but I am going to share what I could absorb from Karadayı:

1. I admire the great play by Kenan İmirzalıoğlu, Bergüzar Korel, Çetin Tekindor, Yurdaer Okur, and virtually all the cast. I can't point out any particular actor/actress. They are a team of professionals in one place. Kenan, for instance, can express a broad spectrum of feelings on his face. He can mimic, let's say, 15 shades of happiness, 16 shades of sadness, 17 shades of anger, combinations of them, as well as diverse shades of indifference, astonishing, and virtually any feeling in its right context without any exaggeration. In his extreme anger, Kenan can momentarily get a little bit hopeful and happy; and then resume to his previous level of anger. For example, anytime after getting good news about his father, Nazif, who he holds him in high regards, his face blows into cheers and happiness. I have never been able to feel the life as vivid as Kenan feels it!. He should be a gifted actor whose face muscles are richly innervated. Kenan has been excelling in his roles compared to his plays in the previous series. Same thing with Bergüzar. She can love you now and despise you next minute. She can be so flirting in this scene and so serious in the next scene. They both can cry anytime they want. Other main characters are also great players. I should also congratulate the Persian dubbers. They conveyed passion, love, kindness, anger, and every other feeling through their voices. You could easily tell when the character was determined or hesitant just by listening to their voices. Kenan has enjoyed many dubbers in his other series such as Ezel, but Mr. Nader Keymaram has done an extraordinarily superior dubbing job for Kenan in this series.

2. The directorship is simply GREAT! The way the scenes relate to each other and the story timeline is put together entices you to be impatient to watch the following scene or the next episode. I couldn't sleep enough just to watch it continuously, even 15 episodes in a row sometimes. Although the story could still be trimmed easily, the prolonged story is not a big deal, especially when moral lessons fill in the conversations.

The series depict a story that seems very real. I noticed some less real or less logical parts throughout the story, but they are infrequent and pleasantly forgivable. These less real scenes are just symbolic, used to narrate the message of the story, and don't affect the beauty of the whole thing.

There is a high fidelity in expressing the time of day (using dusk, the moon, and the newspaper boy) and time of year (using people's clothing, green plants, winter trees, snow, and people discussing weather).

3. The camera does a professional job. The camera captures the scenes virtually from any angle regardless the location, either a small room, on the street, on a hill, etc. The camera is just salient in three dimensions. It can move fast focusing in or out, descending or ascending based on the stress level of the scene. It can suddenly start to swirl vertically or horizontally if needed. It showed Mahir once he was sitting on his bed in the jail, leaning to wall behind, drown in his thoughts and banging his head slightly, slowly, and repeatedly to the wall. The camera, showing him from his side 90 degrees turned, as if he is banging is head to the ground, to entrain your empathy with his deep sorrow. The camera does a lot of subtle tricks in every episode. I wish I were a cinema critic to pick all its tricks. But the ones I can notice, help me to feel the fragrance of the scenes better. The light helps the camera to emphasize the feelings of the characters much better.

4. The music is from a great Turkish composer, Toygar Işıklı. I didn't know him before, but I am addicted to some soundtracks such as Ateşe Yürümek, Ölüme Gülümse (İdam Sehpası), Elimi Tut, and Benden Kaçış Yok (Turgut). I should appreciate his choices of the old songs including but not limited to Sensiz Saadet Neymiş (by Yaşar Güvenir), Kıskanıyorum (by İnci Çayırlı), Unutama Beni (by Esmeray), Geri Dönülmez Bir Yoldayım (by Neşe Karaböcek), Sensiz Kaldığım Geceler (by Şecaattin Tanyerli)

In summary, Karadayı is the best series I've ever watched. I laughed and cried with the characters. I was just stuck to the chair, hungry to watch next episodes. I wish it never ended. I will watch it again next summer.

My husband and I binge watch this 1st series of Karadayi and enjoyed every episode and not wanting them to finish. We feel anxious now about when we might see the 2nd and 3rd series on Netflix in Australia??

This series is up there with Magnificent Century, 1001 Nights, Gran Hotel and we have had many late nights trying to fit in as many episodes as we could. Just lovedit!!

The music, scenery and the acting are amazing all the actors had a depth that draw you in to their colourful worlds. We find that there is no going back to TV in general for us which has no content to speak of.

The Turkish sure know how to put together a great series that keep you wanting to go back each night to catchup on their stories.

Without good acting though the storyline would not be realised as it is in these series, wonderful actors who portray their characters so well.

It's a 20 out of 10 for us!!

Sue and Dan Australia

Suffering through this series.

Love love everything about this drama but at season 2, I'm starting to really suffer through the plot.

I love the addition of a new character but it's not enough to push the narrative forward.

I'm left with the feeling that the story is going nowhere and the constant repeating of plots (back and forth of the main couple, in and out of jail, etc) is exhausting.

Reluctantly taking a break.

Reluctantly because it's still an amazing cast and script but right now I can't deal with the repetition. At this point, I don't know what they could have done differently to push the story forward.

The first time I started Karadayi was three years ago, I watch two episodes on YouTube and stopped because I thought it was too slow... then three years later, it showed up on my Netflix recommendations. I was at a different place in my life and I started watching it again.. and lo and behold, I couldn't stop! I binge watched the 93 episodes that were on Netflix in two months (because I work for a living).. and I was left wanting more! I needed to see how it ended. So I looked and looked till I was able to find Seasons 2 and 3 on another source. I loved how the series took time to develop the characters, and how those characters changed throughout the series. Some even transformed from annoying to stellar. What I realized is that by the end of the series, I knew each and every character so well that I could anticipate their next move. And I knew the streets of Mahir's neighborhood.. where the bakery was, where the Kara shoe shop was, where the indoor bazaar was and most of all, I looked forward to Mahir and Feride's rendezvouz in the beautiful and quaint Cay Bahcese. I also loved how characters weren't just good or evil.. they were given context.. you knew why each character was the way they were. And when one of them overcame a difficult life choice, or came to a realization, you cheered. The story starts as a murder.. Mahir Kara's father, a shoemaker in Istanbul, is framed for a murder and Mahir goes undercover as a law clerk on his father's case to prove his father innocent. While undercover he falls in love with the Judge in charge of his father's case. But as the series progresses, you see that its more than just a murder.. that the frameup is a result of corruption in the system.. and that is just the tip of the iceberg. Along the way, over the course of the 3 plus years that is the timeframe of the series, you meet the Kara family. You go through their trials and tribulations as they struggle to prove their father's innocence and you witness a love story unlike any you have ever seen. Every woman should be loved the way Mahir loves Feride, and every man should be loved the way Feride loves Mahir. Their love is mature, self sacrificing and has withstood the test of time and tragedy. Only the first season of the series focuses on the murder trial, but the other two seasons bear out the fruits of the investigation that Mahir along Feride have conducted along the way. Quotes like "As long as the sun comes up, and we open our eyes, we hold on to hope." may seem cliche, but you will remember their true meaning as you watch the tribulations of the Kara family.. And new quotes like "If I don't burn myself, if you don't burn yourself, if we don't burn ourselves, how can there be light in the darkness?" will forever be ingrained in your memory as you face the notion of righteousness vs power in your every day life. I can honestly say that Karadayi gave me a whole new perspective on life, family and justice. I highly recommend it.