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Fans of the Empire podcast from historians William Dalrymple and Anita Anand should find the Empire series as a pretty decent attempt of telling the story of the creation of of the Mughal Empire. Nikkhil Advani's series is based on Alex Rutherford's (Diana and Michael Preston) novel series Empire of the Moghul, hence mixes real history with some fiction.

The broad story, characters, their fates is pretty accurate and Advani does a good job of casting the key characters of the series. Kunal Kapoor is pretty convincing as Babur and is supported very well by Shabana Azmi as his ambitious and ruthless mother. Drashti Dahmi also does a great job as his sister, along with Rahul Dev as his general and Sahher Bambba as his love interest.

The biggest casting surprise is Dino Morea who has truly matured as an actor after a pretty average time in movies over the last 2 decades. His portrayal of the vicious Shaibani Khan is on point. Dino manages to bring out Shaibani's psychotic behaviour along with his hidden human characteristics as the series progresses. Imaad Shah (Naseeruddin Shah's son) is also pretty good. For me Kalliroi Tzaifeta and Toranj Kayvon were odd choices to play Babur's step mom and 2nd wife because of their accents and slightly stiff acting.

The story is good and the overall series is fast and gripping. The VFX and battle scenes is a bit of a hit and miss. Some of the sets, scenes and sequences are pretty good but then there are some that are pretty underwhelming. Which is probably one of the reasons, the series was pretty widely panned on release and didn't get renewed for additional seasons on the stories of subsequent Mughal Emperors. The Empire is not a great series but it is pretty interesting and decently made. Overall a good watch. 7/10.

Just came out from the First show of War 2 in the US and was overall entertained. It is a good action packed movie but does go a bit over the top for me. The highlights of the movie are its very well executed action set pieces with good stunt work and VFX. The story arcs for the characters of Colonel Luthra, Kabir and Vikram are well written. NTR Jr's role has some pretty interesting twists and turns while Kiara not only looks stunning but also packs a real punch. The couple of new characters introduced into the Spy Universe are also pretty Jhakaas and Alpha.

The main attraction of the movie is of course Hrithik. He looks gritty, real (his age) and absolutely fantastic which is probably the reason my wife loved the movie. His high octane entry scene, his thrilling action sequences, his stylish dance moves, his trademark trembling face of anger and his teary eyed monologue are all present in the movie. Hrithik carries the movie but NTR Jr's fans will not be disappointed when he makes his entry, delivers some chill action sequences, shakes a fancy leg, reveals an interesting origin story and has an over the top but cool finale.

The movie is long but is pretty quick moving from one action packed set piece to another. However in order to enjoy the movie, one has to be fine with Kabir's Alpha wolf dominates a real fierce wolf just with his sheer presence and looks, takes on an army of Katana wielding Ninjas, drives a car in the most unexpected places, performs some mind boggling stunts on boats, planes and trains, dodges and even survives some really lethal bullets. The songs are good but not at the same level as the original war. The mid-credit scene introducing the next chapter of the Spy Universe is pretty nice, especially the unexpected cameo. The mention of Pathaan and Tiger is cool but underwhelming because of their complete absence from the movie.

On the YRF Spy Universe scale War 2 lands somewhere between War and Pathaan. It doesn't rise up to the level of Ek Tha Tiger and Tiger Zinda Hai but also doesn't take a dive to the Tiger 3 level. Its a fun entertaining watch for the action sequences, Hrithik and Spy Universe fans but dont expect a lot of heart and goosebumps. 7.5/10.

There has been a steady rise in action military thrillers set in Kashmir in the last few years and at first glance Ground Zero appears to be just another run of the mill entry in the sub-genre. However Ground Zero which is based on the real life operation Ghazi Baba is a pretty gripping thriller closer in style and quality to the real life based political thriller Article 370 than a stylish and over the top big budget action flick like Fighter.

The story is solid, the screenplay is crisp and the acting is pretty good especially Eemran Hashmi who is not a well chiseled indestructible superhero who is dancing and romancing in his free time but a realistic, flawed and hard working BSF commandant focused on hunting down Ghazi Baba, the mastermind of the Indian Parliament Attack. The movie stays focused on the hunt with no distractions....no unnecessary songs and item numbers or side stories or romantic angles etc.

The final sequence has some shades of Zero Dark Thirty which is actually pretty well executed but right at the end, the action goes a bit over the top when Eemran's character finally faces off with Ghazi. Overall it was a pretty good watch and a well deserving tribute to the BSF soldiers who sacrificed themselves for the country. I liked it a lot. 7.5/10.