Applause Entertainment’s Criminal Justice season 4: No better legal drama anywhere

Applause Entertainment and Sameer Nair have done it again.  Season 4 of Criminal Justice, now streaming on Jio Hotstar, is designed as the visual version of a page-turner. The sleep-steep storytelling is simply irresistible.

There are hot springs of ingenuity strewn across the eight episodes, so that we never know when and where the investigation will end. And honestly, do we want this to end?

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And even if, let’s just say for the sake of saying, the plot was not throbbing with as much scripting vibrancy as it does, there is the delightfully credible Pankaj Tripathi as our resident lawyer, Madhav Mishra.

His instinctive understanding of the compulsions behind the given crime is so grave and gamely, it feels like a panic picnic. Fun while it blasts, so to speak Pankaj’s Mishra once again holds the show together. He gets terrific support from not only from his immediate co-stars—Khushboo Atre is in splendid form as Madhav’s seemingly scatterbrained but substantially savvy spouse—but also the distant dramatic personae, the murder accused Raj Nagpal, played by the actor par excellence Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub who doesn’t have to do anything except look like someone who could be guilty in ways that we can’t imagine.

But it is Surveen Chawla’s Anju Nagpal, a poised wife with a turbulent family life, who brings a simmering tension, in and outside the courtroom. Ms Chawla is the backbone of this season. And she delivers.

The taut plot about the wife, husband and his murdered mistress is so adroitly assembled (by Harman Wadala, Sandeep Jain and Sameer Mishra) it feels like the perfect jigsaw puzzle with all the pieces fitting in…well, if not perfectly then certainly as perfectly as possible, given the hot bloodied marital mess and the crime of passion that rips across the picture-perfect frames.

Oh yes, this is as apt a place as any to say that season 4 of Criminal Justice is one of the most good-looking series we’ve seen lately. The exterior is lit up with well-groomed characters. Which is why the blood-soaked body in the living room is such a dead giveaway.

Such a heinous crime in a world where money can buy practically everything (including guilt and the freedom from punishment) seems an anomaly. Director Rohan Sippy dives into the contradictions and spotlights the sorrowful spite behind the sparkle.

There are the pretenders and posturers: Madhav Mishra can see right through them. It takes some time.  But it is time well spent. This new season of Criminal Justice is just about the best courtroom/crime drama you will see this year. Go for it. And don’t even think of skipping episodes. As they used to say in the trailers of yesteryear’s blockbusters, if you blink, you miss a link.

Rating: ****

Views expressed are personal