Freedom At Midnight Season 2 Review | Suchin Mehrotra | THR India

Suchin Mehrotra reviews Freedom At Midnight Season 2, the concluding chapter of the Nikkhil Advani-directed series based on Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins's book of the same name. Streaming on SonyLIV, this seven-episode season follows the weeks and months leading up to India's independence, the horrors of Partition, and the challenging period that followed. Suchin finds the second season far stronger and more affecting than its admirable yet emotionally distant predecessor, tackling explosive events from the largest mass migration in human history to the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.

Suchin highlights the conviction and sophistication in the storytelling, praising the writing team of Abhinandan Gupta, Gundeep Kaur, Adwitiya Kareng Das, Divy Nidhi Sharma, Revanta Sarabhai, and Ethan Taylor, along with DOP Malay Prakash's painstaking frames and Ashutosh Pathak's sensitive score. The performances shine, particularly Rajendra Chawla as a scene-stealing Sardar Patel, Luke McGibney as a surprisingly dimensional Lord Mountbatten, and powerful cameos from Abhishek Banerjee and Anurag Thakur. While Sidhant Gupta's Nehru hits hardest in vulnerable moments and Arif Zakaria's Jinnah risks feeling like a villain, editor Shweta Venkat ensures episodes feel alive through striking montages marrying real-life footage with fiction. Suchin concludes that if this show indicates the calibre of storytelling ahead, there may still be hope for the year.