'Kaattaan' Trailer: Will The Real Vijay Sethupathi Please Stand Up

In the latest trailer of Kaattaan, we get a bigger clue of how the series is going to pan out. If in the teaser, we were shown a severed head of Vijay Sethupathi and of the confusion its appearance creates in a small town, in the trailer, we understand that we will listen to several different characters “piecing together” his character’s past as we wonder how his head ended up there. In the trailer, we see Muthu or Kaattaan in different timelines working in different occupations.

In one, he is introduced as a watch mechanic, then we see him work as a mahout, then he joins a gangster from Mumbai (played by Milind Soman), until we’re told that at one point in time, his only job was to spend an unlimited amount of money. A family angle for him is also teased, and so is an action avatar ("only Kaattaan can kill Kaattaan," we're told). The series drops on Jio Hotstar on March 27. 

It is created and co-directed by M Manikandan, who had last made the much-loved Kadaisi Vivasayi, also starring Vijay Sethupathi. With Ajith Kumar sharing directing duties, Kaattaan is a gritty, layered character saga told through the eyes of people around the protagonist — revealing different versions, different truths, and different scars. A man becomes a myth, a monster, or a miracle… depending on who tells the story.

In a recent conversation with The Hollywood Reporter India, Vijay Sethupathi spoke about the importance of getting to know a director before filming. Comparing the dynamic to a friendship, he said, “If you know somebody for a month, you know you have a subconscious understanding of what that person likes and how he thinks, you know that it will happen automatically.” 

His approach to the characters he plays and their stories is deliberately open. Understanding the director’s vision, he reiterated, is always the main focus. Everything else, the choices, instincts, improvised moments, orbits around it or is a result of it. He is, however, careful to distinguish the trust he puts in his directors from blind faith. “It is not blind because I know them. I know their capabilities, their sincerity, their responsibility.”