‘Khakee: The Bihar Chapter’ Review: India’s New Netflix Series Offer High Action and Drama

India has been on a roll lately when it comes to delivering content to streaming platforms. The stars of the east are now becoming international stars. RRR just became one of the most popular movies all over the world, and producers know they must catch and ride that train to get bigger exposure for their artists, both in front of and behind the camera. Khakee: The Bihar Chapter is the latest Hindi TV series with that mission in mind, and it is now available on Netflix.

Khakee: The Bihar Chapter is directed by Neeraj Pandey, and stars Karan Tacker, Avinash Tiwary, Abhimanyu Singh, Jatin Sarna, Ravi Kishan, Ashutosh Rana, and Nikita Dutta. The series tells the story of Amit Lodha IPS, a newly appointed officer to the remote region of Bihar. The region is infamous for being the one with the highest crime rate and the lowest rate of incarceration in the entirety of India. In this remote region, Amit will face Chandan, a dangerous criminal who believes himself to be untouchable.

Khakee: The Bihar Chapter presents itself as a classic crime history. One policeman against one criminal and that is all it needs to be to become a wonderfully compelling tale of corruption and how some people risk anything for their honor and their land. The core of the experience is the relationship between Amit and Chandan, two characters that couldn’t be more different from each other and that obviously clash the instant they meet. It is good versus evil, and that clear limitation makes the show be simple to watch but always entertaining.

The main actors do a wonderful job of creating their characters. Amit is almost an Indian Captain America. He is a dedicated husband and father, and through his service in the region of Bihar, he has come to love the place and its people. Chandan on the other hand, is a man full of hatred and sadness. His rough upbringing made him a criminal in his eyes, and now everyone needs to suffer for it. Of course, none of the things that Chandan does during the series are justified, but because he believes so, it is what makes him a wonderful villain.

The supporting cast is equally good. There are many characters, so the series has a hard time developing all of them outside the main characters. Sometimes they just appear for a couple of scenes, and sometimes they always appear in the background, but they gain very little attention as the series is often just centered around the two main characters. It would have been nice to meet all these characters in a better way, but they do their job by pushing the plot forward and putting all the pieces in place so the confrontations between Amit and Chandan can happen.

The story is divided into seven episodes of around an hour each, so the commitment is smaller than with other series that are currently being released not only on Netflix but also on other streaming services. The pacing is quite nice, and while towards the middle the show might feel like it is running in circles, that sensation passes pretty fast. Soon enough, we will be right in front of the climax we always wanted to see happening. The ending is also quite satisfying. It is not a typical ending, but it feels right with the characters and what the story was building up at that moment.

Visually, we are in front of a very clean and efficient shoot. The action scenes are handled very well, and they are often fast and violent. You won’t be seeing action sequences that last for many minutes unless they are chase sequences. The shooting and the fighting are contained, and that makes them feel a lot more intense than they would be otherwise. Pandey has proven time and time again that he can construct very nice action sequences. They might not be the best in the Hindi industry, but they are way above the average of what we are used to seeing in this part of the world.

It is also very nice that the story doesn’t only become a chase between cops and thieves, but also injects a lot of social commentary into every situation. As the story begins, you can see why Bihar is the way it is, not just because the people who live there don’t have the resources to clean up the area for themselves. But also because the authorities have completely abandoned these communities to their luck. It is hard to watch, but you might end up relating yourself to many of the situations as they happen all around the world in the same way.

In the end, Khakee: The Bihar Chapter is a very good crime drama that becomes quite entertaining thanks to the relationship between the main characters, and offers some depth thanks to some injections of social commentary. Pandey proves that he is an excellent director, and is capable of handling action and drama with equal ability. Give it a watch, this is just one example of what Hindi entertainment has in store for anyone who is interested.

SCORE: 8/10