Shekhar Home: Home-ing in on an immortal detective!

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It is a barely disputed fact in English literature that Sherlock Holmes is the greatest fictional detective ever. Personally, I have read his entire canon and even the stories later penned by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s son, Adrian, along with John Dickson Carr. I have also spent a delightful 120 minutes in London’s Sherlock Holmes Museum, examining all the smallest aspects found in the collection of stories and novels, and interacted fruitfully with an actor who posed, behaved and spoke like the equally-immortal Dr. Watson (on alternate days, actors play Watson and Holmes there!).

I have even watched the entire classic series with Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes on TV, as also a few episodes of Sherlock, which placed the detective in 2010s London instead of the late 1800s and early 1900s. In the Indian series, Shekhar Home, co-creator and writer Aniruddha Guha turns the entire saga on its head in a way. How? Well, that is perhaps the finest aspect of this 6-episode banger of a show, which cannot be revealed here as it would be a killer of a spoiler!

As with Sherlock, the plots are completely original, designed in the classic pattern, and to have this certain charm, the stories are set in 1990s in Bengal in the pre-mobile, pre-major technological changes era. The parallels are all amusingly smart and clap-worthy though! Dr. Jayvrat (the Watson here, as played by Ranvir Shorey) asks Shekhar Home (Sherlock, of course, essayed by Kay Kay Menon) about his second name being unknown and the detective rattles off a series of eminent men with ‘Home’ as their surname!

The town in which they are staying is Lonpur (London!), the landlady is Mrs. H, a.k.a. Mrs. Henry (Shernaz Patel), a client who begins to “like” Shekhar is Iraboty (Irene Adler), the dense cop is Laha (Lestrade, essayed by Rudranil Ghosh), Sherlock’s elder brother is Mrinmoy (Mycroft, acted by Kaushik Sen) and the main, and unknown initially, villain is ‘M’ (spoiler terrain again, so watch the show to find out!).

There is an episode titled “Bhaskar Villa” (for Hound of the Baskervilles!) and a very European-sounding name for a restaurant, “Khasha Blanca”! Subtle elements of stories and events and nuances of the original sagas crop in too, like a key element of the famous story, The Red-Headed League, being used in one of the episodes.

Technically, this is an upscale show, but Joel Crasto’s music, though with the period flavor, is rather too heavily retro, which sadly is the norm for some Westernized thrillers nowadays. A Julius Packiam or Sanjoy Chowdhury would have done the music far more cerebrally, for the 1990s was technologically-challenged only vis-à-vis 2024, but this music seems to latch on to the 1950s and 1960s!!

But all said and done, Shekhar Home ‘homes’ into the legendary terrain brilliantly (even vis-à-vis Sherlock) and the greatest winners are the direction (Rohan Bluffmaster! Sippy and Srijit Mukherjee), the writing (Aniruddha with Srijit, Niharika Puri and Vaibhav Vishal). Vaibhav’s dialogues are pithy and what I can call “loaded yet minimalist”.

Kay Kay Menon adds to his roster of magnificent portrayals, and the sheer whimsicality of Himmat Singh (Special Ops) is the only common aspect with Shekhar Home so far as his performance is concerned. I loved his multi-colored uniformed (!) shirts, and come to think of it, I cannot imagine anyone else in the Hindi film industry, past or present, who can get so proximate to the legendary detective. Jeremy Brett (the finest screen ‘Holmes’ to date) had a ringing voice, but Kay Kay scores with his softness.  His mannerisms are superb add-ons and I liked the deerstalker hat and pipe also coming into the final episode.

Ranvir Shorey seems a wrong choice initially, but he comes across as a powerhouse performer as we near the final episode. Shernaz Patel is a darling as Mrs. H, and I loved Rasika Dugal as Iraboty so much that I can well imagine her decked up as the ultra-rich and sophisticated Irene Adler in the original! Kirti Kulhari’s expertise in gray shades is a welcome surprise. Dibyendu Bhattacharya retains his charm even as a murderer (no spoiler, this!).

If you are a Sherlock Holmes buff, then this series is “unmissable”, to coin a term. If you are a thriller addict, do not miss it either, and if you are a sucker for superlative web shows, this one’s for you too. In short, this is a universal must-watch of a show.

Rating: ****

Jio Studios present BBC Studios Productions’ Shekhar Home  Created by: Aniruddha Guha & Srijit Mukherjee  Directed by: Rohan Sippy & Srijit Mukherjee  Written by: Aniruddha Guha, Srijit Mukherjee, Niharika Puri & Vaibhav Vishal  Music: Joel Crasto  Starring: Kay Kay Menon, Ranvir Shorey, Kirti Kulhari, Rasika Dugal, Kaushik Sen, Rudranil Ghosh, Shernaz Patel, Priti Shroff, Salim Siddiqui, Satish Badal, Shruti Das, Usha Uthup & others