A (Dis)Honorable 2026 for Bollywood So Far? | Assi | Main Vaapas Aaunga | O'Romeo, Tu Yaa Main, Ikkis & many more! #190

Hello Hello Hello,It's that time of the year when QID does its mid-yearly Bollywood round-up (aka the time when Dhruv and Cris are at their bitchiest). Rather than following our regular format, we've split our episode into 2 parts: the first one, featuring first-time guest & regular writer for The Indian Express, Anas Arif, is (hopefully) the civil one. We discuss two of the more prominent titles of this year—Anubhav Sinha's controversial Assi and Imtiaz Ali's much-revered Main Vaapas Aaunga—extensively to try and understand their appeal (or lack thereof) for a broader audience.The second part of the episode, featuring only Cris and Dhruv, is chaos as usual because we revert to our format of picking notable honorable (or in this case, mostly dishonorable) mentions of the year (so far). We go through these categories by category - discussing performances, direction, writing, music & editing that missed (or, in the rare case, hit) the mark.MAJOR SPOILERS FOR ASSI & MAIN VAAPAS AAUNGAMINOR SPOILERS FOR COCKTAIL 2 & O'ROMEOTIMECODESPART 1 (w/ ANAS) - [00:00 - 01:39:01]Introduction - [00:00 - 03:42]Assi - [03:42 - 51:19]Main Vaapas Aaunga - [51:19 - 01:39:01]PART 2 (w/o ANAS) - [01:39:01 - 02:37:13]Introduction - [01:39:01 - 01:41:26]Honorable/Dishonorable MentionsPerformance - [01:41:26 - 01:47:46]Direction - [01:47:46 - 01:54:28]Writing - [01:54:28 - 02:00:51]Scene - [02:00:51 - 02:07:13]Cinematography - [02:07:13 - 02:14:52]Editing - [02:14:52 - 02:22:16]Music - [02:22:16 - 02:28:39]Film - [02:28:39 - 02:37:13]OUTRO - [02:37:13 - 02:39:07]Do hit 'Follow' on Spotify if you haven't already to help the podcast reach more people!YOU CAN (AND SHOULD!) FOLLOW ANAS ON HIS SOCIALS.TWITTERINSTAGRAMANAS' CRITICAL PIECE ON ASSI & MAIN VAAPAS AAUNGA1. "MVA chronicles a country in danger of forgetting itself."2. "The devastatingly affective tragedy of MVA's climax."3. "Assi vs. Mardaani 3: The grammar of rage in the era of hypermasculine cinema.Follow us on Instagram at:Dhruv: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/terminalcinema/⁠Cris: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/prdscris/⁠Follow us on Letterboxd at:Dhruv - ⁠https://letterboxd.com/aterminalcinema/⁠Cris: ⁠https://letterboxd.com/crislim/⁠