Kankhajura, a crime thriller web series directed by Chandan Arora is set for streaming on Sony Liv on 30 May 2025. The 8 episode web series stars Roshan Mathew, Mohit Raina, Trinetra Haldar Gummaraju and Sarah Jane Dias in key roles and the teaser and trailer got good response. Let us see whether Kankhajura thrilled viewers or not.
Kankhajura story revolves around the founder of a top real estate company bringing to his home a person whom he considers as his brother after he gets released from jail where this leads to form the twists and turns.
Max (Mohit Raina) who owns a real estate developer company MAX Developers in Goa brings Ashu (Roshan Mathew) home after he gets out of jail. However his decision brings sensational changes in his personal and professional life. How Ashu is connected to it and what role Max's wife Nisha (Sarah Jane Dias), Pedru (Ninad Kamat), Shardul (Mahesh Krishna Shetty), DGP Leena Rai (Heeba Shah), MLA Santosh (Anant Jog), Deshmukh Bai (Usha Nadakarni),Cathy (Kasturi Bannerjee), Janardan (Pratap Madhavrao Phad),Surya (Sachin Ashok Shinde), Babya (Sarur Gaikwad) form rest of the developments.
Mohit Raina looked uber cool in the role of the owner of the real estate company. He looked stylish and handsome and also his screen presence made an impact. His smile is infectious and addictive and he delivered dialogues with ease with his expressive eyes. He emoted well and also expressed himself in a fluent manner.
Roshan Mathew stole the show with his stunning performance. He showed variations in his role quite effectively. He looked like a silent killer sporting innocent looks. The way he acted delivering dialogues with stammer speaks volumes of his talent. His body language is good as it shows how deceptive he can be. His expressions and emotions elevated the scenes to the next level.
Sarah Jane Dias played the role of the supportive wife quite well. She is good as an innocent girl who is taken for a ride. She made her presence felt at the same time showing her individuality and she surprises all during the climax.
Heeba Shah is impactful as the police officer and Anant Jog made his presence as the MLA. Usha Nadkarni is good in the role of the powerful and influential person. Ninad Kamat, Mahesh Shetty, Pratap Madhavrao Phad played key roles in taking the story forward.
Kankhajura story is penned by Chandan Arora. The webseries comprises of 8 episodes and each episode is of around 35-40, minute’s duration. This is an Indian adaptation of Israeli series Magpie. Chandan Arora's story showcased the intricate details of redemption, family relations, friends, betrayal and political dealings, murky happenings and dark happenings and secrets. He paced the narration in a slow and steady manner and highlighted the relationships between various persons and characters in a clear and precise way.
He tried to narrate the happenings in an interesting and exciting manner and dialogues are impactful to an extent. However, the slow pace of the narration impacted the final outcome. The screenplay is unidimensional and the happenings are predictable after a point of time. But what makes the series watchable is the performances of Mohit Raina and Roshan Mathew. Chandan Arora should have added few more twists and turns and also few unpredictable elements to increase the curiosity levels. Direction of Chandan Arora is ok.
Rajeev Ravi and Viond Illampally's cinematography is good. He turned the scenes aesthetically beautiful. He showed the exotic locations of Goa in a natural and appealing way. The music and BGM is good and maintained the intensity levels.
Vaisak Ravi's editing is smooth and followed the same pattern throughout all the episodes except for few drags here and there. The final episode dragged a bit as it could be understood as the director took his time to bring the story to a logical conclusion with a subtle lead to the second season.
Altogether, Kankhajura turns out to be an interesting, but routine thriller. Mohit Raina and Roshan Mathew came up with spirited performances, elevating the scenes to the core and director Chandan Arora is ok with his direction. If Chandan Arora Had fine tuned the story and script and turned the screenplay racy including interesting twists and turns, things would have been different. Considering all these elements, Cinejosh goes with a 2.25 rating for Kankhajura.