Bigg Boss 4 - 1st Week Review

It's been a week now since Salman Khan and Bigg Boss 4 went on air. And, we are having mixed feelings about the show, for sure. First things first, the opening episode was a downer. Though Salman tried to pep up the proceedings with his goofy antics and candid humour, it still left us cold. To make matters worse, the 14 contestants were not who we had expected, certainly not after the kind of names (read Rajesh Khanna, Sangeeta Bijlani, Bhagyashree, Saurav Ganguly etc) that did the media rounds. Daku 'haseena' (well, not quite) Seema Parihar or Bunty 'beep beep' Chor certainly didn't make the cut!
Sigh! But here we are looking at Bigg Boss after week 1.

The Desh Ka Aadesh and Aakhri Salaam episodes were full on fun and masti. As we had expected after the thanda first few episodes, Salman had to pull up his socks, vest, everything to round up the week with a bang. And that he did, whether it was asking cheeky questions to the evictee (Abbas Kazmi) or making him dance with firangi extras or even making the housemates do silly things like running in a circle like a train. All that did make up for the lost zing in the initial episodes.

To have Bejan Daruwala predict the future of the contestants was a good idea though we wish the channel could have saved him for the last couple of weeks.

On the flipside, it's dj vu as contestants seem to follow the template of contestants of those of earlier seasons. So you have Sameer Soni aka Mr Cool and Calm, a la Rahul Roy, Manoj Tiwariwith his pearls of wisdom and endearing smile (as opposed to his boisterous Bhojpuri colleague Ravi Kissen or the short-tempered, wicked Raja Chaudhary), Sara Khan as the damsel in distress (she sure knows to flutter her eyelashes and play the 'babe in the woods'), Seema Parihar sharing her 'jungle' anecdotes laced with a tale or two about her poverty and inability to educate herself, Rahul Bhatt probably still trying to figure out what he's in for (we feel, his dad, Mahesh Bhatt with his bare-all life-stories would have been a better bet), Veena Malik or Rakhi Sawant of Pakistan, has already had a spat with Hrishant Goswami, not to forget her little pow-wow with Shweta Tiwari, Shweta doing her kabhi bechari kabhi chulbuli act (trying hard to be everything she is probably not!), Aanchal Kumar (the striking sweetie with a stunning wardrobe has already shed a few tears over Kazmi's exit, we wonder why), Ashmit Patel (being daddy to little Sara and eyeing Aanchal, all in a day's work), Splitsvila winner, Sakshi Pradhan  (well, whatever) and last but not the least, Begum Nawazish Ali flitting from her yin to her yang avatar…

The contestants are a mixed bunch, alright but none of them seem to be themselves, all are playing 'roles' they are required to play, or attempting to play the way their predecessors did. And that's the reason why you get that 'maine yeh pehle bhi kahin dekha hai' feeling! So we are neither shaken nor stirred when a Veena Malik recounts her story of abuse and insult or when Shweta tells us how she has been working from the age of 12 (baby, some girls start even younger, so spin us another yarn!). Worse, everyone seems to be in a hurry to milk their '15 minutes inside the House' by narrating sad, personal, 'shocking' stories, lest someone else walks away with public sympathy and votes…

Well, we surely hope, they have some other tricks too in their bag they can unleash on the hapless viewers in later weeks. For now, it's Salman and Salman alone who is the big draw ofBigg Boss 4.