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Chiraiya Web Series Review | Suchin Mehrotra | THR India

Suchin Mehrotra reviews Chiraiya for The Hollywood Reporter India, a six-episode JioHotstar series from writer-showrunner Divy Nidhi Sharma and director Shashant Shah. Suchin finds the opening episode bursting with promise — its synthetic, overly processed feel-good family imagery seems poised to subvert itself and reveal something darker. He draws a comparison to the American show Kevin Can Go Fuck Himself for its dual-toned approach, but notes that Chiraiya never delivers on that ambition. Instead, Suchin feels it settles into a preachy, PSA-style narrative that spoonfeeds its messaging on consent and marital rape rather than weaving it organically through storytelling — something Divy's earlier co-writing credit on Laapataa Ladies managed far more effectively.Suchin highlights the series' structural issues, particularly the decision to centre Divya Dutta's Kamlesh as protagonist, which inadvertently reduces Prasanna Bisht's Pooja — the actual victim — to a plot device. He does single out Siddharth Shaw's performance as Arun, calling the character the most fleshed-out in the series — not a calculating villain but an entitled man-child whose warped understanding of love makes him all the more haunting. Suchin also flags his discomfort with the male creative team behind a female empowerment narrative, and notes the lack of a substantive plot across six episodes. His verdict: Chiraiya is a well-intentioned but heavy-handed social drama that struggles to convert its rallying cry into genuinely engaging storytelling.