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Cubicles 2 Review: This Corporate Sector Flick Will Give You The Right Doses Of Nostalgia
As Nidhi Bisht's Megha rightfully says in Season 1 of Cubicles, 'Each of these cubicles looks identical but have a different story.' This can be rightly said about this TVF's office drama too. Cubicles Season 2 makes one experience a plethora of emotions that will be extremely relatable and overwhelming for anyone who has or is experiencing a cut-throat and routinized corporate work culture. TVF has yet again managed to tug at the heartstrings of its target audience with this one.
What's Yay: Performances, direction, writing and the relatability quotient, music
What's Nay: Some subplots could've been more nuanced
Story
The second season of Cubicles continues Piyush (Abhishek Chauhan)'s tryst with the corporate rat race in his organisation Finotech. He grapples with all the nitty-gritty of the corporate humdrum like craving for a designation and remuneration upliftment, performance anxiety and the dilemma of shifting to a meatier opportunity.
His solaces are his close friends Shetty (Niketan Sharma) and Gautam (Badri Chavan). This season sees another ambitious entrance to their team in the form of new joinee Sunaina (Ayushi Gupta). Meanwhile, Megha (Nidhi Bisht) continues to be the perfect mentor and confidante to Piyush whenever the need arises.
Direction
Creator Amit Golani had tapped into the subtle nostalgic and relatable quotients of every corporate worker's life with Cubicles. The second season follows suit and does justice to the same. Director Chaitanya Kumbhakonum has brought out the vivid dilemma, bitter-sweet experiences and the feel-good aspects of the corporate work culture intricately.
The happiness experienced by the employees on getting a new role based in Goa or the protagonist weighing the pros and cons of leaving or not leaving his current organization, these moments have been experienced or are still being experienced with millions of corporate employees in the country. The subtle hint of patriarchy wherein Megha instead of her husband has to bring and supervise her 7-year-old son also brings in the notion that it's still the woman who's expected to bring in the work-parenting balance in a marriage.
A senior employee who has been ridiculed in the workplace for a long time delivers a hard-hitting speech on his last day which will tug at your heartstrings. The writing by Avinash Singh, Vijay Verma and Siddhartha Tiwari bring out these moments beautifully. However, it would've been more impactful if the protagonist's equation with his current organization would've been more nuanced. There should have been more backing into the reason why the protagonist has a deep soft corner for Finotech despite its many cons and thus takes an important decision in the end. The series should have tried to delve deeper into the same.
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Performances
Abhishek Chauhan once again does complete justice to his titular role. The actor is immensely organic in his performance and will make his character extremely relatable and empathetic to the viewers. Badri Chavan especially with his character's tryst with the dating app 'Tumble' is hilarious to witness while Niketan Sharma's Shetty on a quest to embrace fatherhood is endearing to witness. Ayushi Gupta is a good addition to the stellar star cast and will make the viewers cheer 'CMC' for her character (Watch the show to learn about this one.)
Khushbu Baid and Shivankit Singh Parihar deliver an impeccable act in their no-nonsense characters as Supriya and Angad respectively. However, for me, the star of the series is undoubtedly Nidhi Bisht. Her character Megha's stern yet subtle mentoring and guidance will remind one of Jitendra Kumar's act as Jitu Bhaiya in Kota Factory. It's never a dull moment with her on the screen.
Technical Aspects
The music by Karthik Rao including the background score and the title track pumps up the essence of the events taking place in the series. The cinematography by Ashwin Kadamboor is detailed. The office space scenes are realistically captured in this one.
Verdict
Watch Cubicles Season 2 to experience a sense of realism and relatability especially when it comes to the corporate workspace. This TVF series will inevitably make you 9 to 5 grinders super nostalgic. We give Cubicles Season 2, 3.5 out of 5 stars.
