Rangmunch New Article- Is IPKKND really dipping??

Please raise your hands if you are unhappy with the current track in IPKKND? What started off as a story between a suave businessman and a goofy damsel is now still stuck in a limbo with meaningless comedy and badly directed scenes and episodes.

The Heer-Ranjha track that just went by had immense potential to bring out the inner turmoil between the characters but it failed to evoke the feelings that it was actually capable of. If Arnav is angry with Khushi why doesnt he tell her? How will that change anything for him? What holds him back? What stops Khushi from letting her family know that she is being tormented by a man who has held her captive?

Arnav is sexy, Khushi is beautiful. They seem to share an unexplained bond. What happens to the story after that? All of a sudden, the dark, hateful man turns all cheesy just like our regular TV leads. Even the actress, though charming and likable is now all mushy and irritating out of turn. The serious love story has turned into a comedy! 

This brings me to question a lot about the consistency in these serials. Are drastic changes to a script a good option, or is it what the viewer's really looking for? Lets take a look at the trends.

If one were to take a note of the TRP figures, Iss Pyar Ko Kya Naam Doon made an entry into the Top Ten List of shows in the Month of October with a TRP of 3.48 in the No. 8 slot when the Arnav had slowly begun to exhibit emotions towards Khushi. During this month the ratings ranged between 3.24 and 3.5. The show remained in the in the bottom five of the Top 10 Shows List. It crossed the 4.0 mark for the very first time when the Jadu Hai Nasha hai Promo aired in early November. Expectations were running high and the audience badly wanted to see Arnav and Khushi together. With a galloping 4.18 TRP the show made tremendous progress over night. However when the story switched back to the hatred track one could see an instant drop in numbers to as low as 3.24 in the very next week.

The comedy track was pulled in during the month of December with the introduction of new characters such as Nanda Kishore while Arnav's girl friend Lavanya made an exit. The ratings during the month seemed to have settled between the range of 3.7-3.9 which seemed a safe zone. 

However when the show started to dip in its rankings despite having a steady TRP the airing of the Teri meriPromo and the subsequent song sequence once more worked in its favour. 

Audience clearly wanted the intense love track back and embraced the same with open arms as the TRP's once more touched 4.12 during the airing of the sequence. 

The show had made it to the Top 5 by this time. Between January 21st and February 14th the TRPs each week ranged between 4.12 and 4.59, the latter being the highest ever since the inception of the show.The moment Arnav and Khushi's got married and the reason for the marriage turned out to be hate the numbers plunged downwards once more.

Through March the show managed to maintained an average TRP of 3.6 which was a constant figure since November even during the tracks that had received a lot of criticism among the show discussing Online audience. In the week that concluded the latest TRP was 3.50 which was a steady fall over the weeks from 3.9 to 3.7 to finally 3.5.

Observations: People prefer watching the love track between the leads more than the turmoil. Whenever the leads are at logger heads, there has been a steady fall in the numbers. Though the average number of people who watch the show remains stable on an average, perhaps weaving a slightly more sensitive story around the leads may work more for the show. The online audience in case of this show have shown strong sense of like and dislike. Irrespective of whether they like something or not, at least a 3.5 range audience always watches the show.

The Online Audience: The show enjoys a vast Online Fanbase with various Fan Groups and Fan Pages adding numbers by the day. This audience enjoys discussing and debating over the tracks in the show and often readily offer suggestions and feedback. This is perhaps one of those very few shows where the TRP's and the Online Fan Base peacefully co-exist in harmony with one another.

Suggestions: A little more attention can be paid to the story and the direction which seems to appear disoriented off late needs to be immediately looked into. While the character graphs would remain the same, a little progression in terms of their daily developments and incidents could add more variety to the current plot. The emotions at times fall flat taking away the beauty of what could otherwise be sensitively conveyed. Other characters can be more effectively inter-woven into the main love story. For example there is no interaction between Payal and Shyam, though the former is fully aware of the man's past with her sister. She is so stuck up with pleasing her mother-in-law that she hasn't bothered to probe further into why her sister got married to Arnav all of a sudden. Even if Khushi had fallen in love with Arnav without Payals knowledge she has every right to ask questions being her sister. Khushi can discuss her problems with her own family.

If she chooses not to in order to save her sister, there has to be a way in which what Arnav did should start to back fire. After all, he got married to Khushi under misconception. He does nothing to change his brother-in-laws ways other than making eyes, gritting his teeth and asserting Khushi is now his wife. The forced rabba veymoments too can be replaced by sequences where Arnav and Khushi start to understand each other as fellow humans and stop running after the unexplained divine connection they share. A little more attention to direction while Arnav emotes can work wonders for the show especially since most of the population watching the show is female and they are young too. We have his break down sequences for precedence. No one likes the villain, but people are always willing to watch a man who is ready to change for the woman he loves. A subtle emphasis on it with a variety infused in day to day sequences can do the trick for the show.

We will be back next week with another show and their trends.