Bollywood finally meets its match — in Aryan Khan. With The Ba*ds of Bollywood, he doesn’t just peel back the glittery curtain; he yanks it off and sets it ablaze. And there we have a chaotic, clever, and brutally funny look at the industry’s underbelly, delivered with a wink and a whip-smart pen.
From the first frame, you know you’re in for a ride that’s as much roast as it is homage. The show opens on a film set, mid-action scene, where CGI explosions and slo-mo stunts are stacked like overused plot twists in a ’90s potboiler. It’s loud, glossy, and gloriously ridiculous — on purpose. Aryan’s not mocking Bollywood’s excesses from the outside; he’s doing it from the director’s chair with the confidence of someone who’s seen it all from the inside out.
Lakshya plays the action hero with jawline and gym-body intensity, delivering punches and one-liners in equal measure. Raghav, his sidekick, channels a Gully Boy-meets-Karan Arjun vibe, street-smart and loyal to a fault. We see a bromantic cliché there and that’s the point.
But the real meat of the episode lies in the meta. Aryan’s script throws industry titans into wildly exaggerated versions of themselves. Karan Johar and Ranveer Singh face off in a verbal duel that crackles with camp and barely disguised truth. It’s juicy, theatrical, and laced with insider jabs that land hard — and hilariously.
Enter Bobby. His screen presence is old-school masala — think silk shirts, slow-motion struts, and a smirk that says, “I’ve seen worse scripts.” He’s a scene-stealer, and Aryan knows it. The camera lingers, the music swells, and just like that, Bobby walks off with the episode’s most memorable moment.
There’s satire, yes — but it’s not mindless mimicry. Aryan’s got a sharp eye for the industry’s hypocrisies: the egos, the fragile alliances, the “let’s-do-lunch” diplomacy. Manish Chaudhary as the megalomaniac producer is pitch-perfect — all bark, bluster, and Bollywood baggage. You can almost hear the off-screen whispers of “this is based on so-and-so, right?”
What keeps the episode from tipping into parody is Aryan’s control. The tone is snappy but never sloppy. Jokes don’t overstay their welcome. Even the caricatures are drawn with just enough restraint to sting without spiralling.
In just under an hour, The Ba**ds of Bollywood sets the tone for what could be a genre-defining series — sharp, stylish, and refreshingly self-aware. Aryan Khan doesn’t just direct; he dissects. And he does it with flair.
The industry may pretend to laugh along. But deep down, it knows, this one, cuts close to the bone.
IWMBuzz rates it 4/5 stars.
