Get over the typical saas-bahu chikchik, thanks to the The Viral Fever (TVF) who are bringing out their creative web series. First, Permanent Roommates and now the mind-boggling, inspiring and truly amazing web series, TVF Pitchers, is like a sea breeze in the desert of saas-bahu fiction.
‘Pitchers’ is a short five-episode series by TVF. It revolves around engineer Naveen Bansal and his three friends who give up their high-paying comfortable jobs to pursue the dream of having their own start-up.
Apart from Naveen as the CEO (played by Naveen Kasturia), his team of entrepreneurs has two of his engineer friends, Jeetu (Jeetendra Kumar) and Yogi (Arunabh Kumar, founder of TVF). If Jeetu is the technical brain in the start-up with his talent for coding, Yogi is the brawn who can bully his way into getting things done. The fourth member of the core team is the goofy Mandal (Abhay Mahajan) who is an IIM marketing graduate, always trying extra-hard to fit in with the rest.
The first episode starts with Naveen being told, “Tu beer hai”, by one of his very successful entrepreneur friends. After this, Naveen is inspired to quit his ‘safe’ job where he did not get any satisfaction from his work. Determined to pursue his start-up idea, he gets Yogi and Jeetu on board, although Jeetu does face a dilemma as he is a married man with a wife to support.
By the second episode, even Mandal comes on board. Hell bent on joining this venture, he offers to pay Jeetu’s salary till the company gets funding. The geeky Mandal who annoys the hell out of everyone because of his naivety and quirks, uses his marketing skills to sell himself.
Once the groundwork is laid, the real struggle starts – the struggle of living in a metropolis like Mumbai without a job, with just your dreams to support you. Naveen and his team have a hard time getting an investor for their start-up as he is not ready to compromise on their hard work in any way. This leads to some tensions and altercations amongst the four as well as some ups and downs in their personal relationships. The problems of leaving your job and taking a risk surface most effectively in the third episode.
The fourth episode is sort of a make-or-break situation for the four friends, with their funding seeming further and further away and Jeetu being forced to deal with his scary and unsupportive dad back home.
It takes the four friends quite a lot of patience, struggle and time to finally reach ‘where magic happens’. Dealing with all kinds of potential investors, some smart, some scary, some ridiculous, some geniuses, Naveen and his team finally catch a break and manage to get funding in the season finale of the series.
What is worth noting in Pitchers is that it serves the viewers an entire package, a great package. The casting by Nidhi Bisht for the lead as well as supporting characters seems perfect to suit the script written by Biswapati Sircar. The dialogues and situations remain with the viewers as they are extremely relatable.
Nothing is overdone. The humour and drama is intellectual and refreshing, especially after watching what other TV shows have to offer. The attraction lies in little intricate details, the credit for which should go to the director, Amit Golani.
We highly recommend giving the saas-bahu serials a break and to stop looking towards the West for decent TV. Pitchers is the first Indian show to have made it to the IMDb list of top 250 shows with a great ranking of 38 currently.
You can watch the episodes on their website, TVF Play, or on their YouTube channel, The Viral Fever.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bwu1x8hfEIo
