‘Saare Jahan Se Accha’ (2025) Netflix Series Review - The Secret Life of Spies

Created by Gaurav Shukla, Saare Jahan Se Accha transforms into a sweet, emotional, watchable show whenever it zeroes in on human drama. "Forget the bigger picture, focus on the smaller picture," a character says to Vishnu (Pratik Gandhi), a R&AW officer. This "smaller picture" can be found in the scene where Vishnu meets Mohini (Tillotama Shome) to discuss their marriage. She says she has been rejected 27 times. He says that this time, she can reject him if she wants to take revenge. But Mohini replies by asking whether he is offering her a choice or just sympathy. She likes him anyway and would prefer to be his wife. It's a nice, gentle scene, and it takes you by surprise, mainly because everything before this moment goes by in a blink. In fact, most of the scenes in Saare Jahan Se Accha seem to be in a hurry. Rarely does a shot, a line, or a gesture stay for more than a second on the screen. But when it does, you get the pleasure of witnessing moments like the one where Mohini complains to Vishnu that he has chosen a busy, risky life for himself, but by eliding details regarding his professional life, he didn't give her a choice. Or that scene where a man confesses that he betrayed his country to protect his homosexual son from the judgment of a society that is neither open-minded nor accepting. If Saare Jahan Se Accha is a thriller drama, then the drama portions stop this series from sinking completely. It helps that the show is populated with fine actors who know how to bring out their characters' humanity. Sunny Hinduja and Anup Soni play Pakistani characters (Murtaza and Naushad, respectively) without the typical "Ji Janab" added to every line and the presence of kohl eyes. Saare Jahan Se Accha treats them with dignity by displaying them as humans first and enemies later. We also have Rizwan (Kapil Radha) and Naseem (Diksha Juneja), brothers and sisters who become close to Rafiq (Suhail Nayyar), unaware that he is an Indian spy. There is something to be said here about every human having the same blood in their body and that labels like "Indian," "Pakistani," "Hindu," and "Muslim" are just man-made stupidity, but Saare Jahan Se Accha, alas, skims over such philosophical musings to deal with spy shenanigans that can be sorely uninteresting. 

Early in the series, Vishnu confesses that real spy agents neither work like James Bond nor do they have access to futuristic gadgets. The only gadgets the people in Saare Jahan Se Accha use are some bugs and Morse code machines. The most "futuristic," James Bond-style gadget happens to be a pen-cum-recording device. Shukla, I guess, wants to paint an "accurate picture" of being a secret agent. He wants to tell you that being a spy is not all fun and games; the job brings tremendous psychological pressure, burden, and inconvenience. Vishnu isn't able to reveal his professional truth to Mohini, even though he clearly notices how much pain she is in. When he is assigned the task to recruit Fatima (Kritika Kamra), a journalist, Mohini becomes jealous after perceiving the level of comfort and closeness between her husband and the journalist. Vishnu, however, doesn't back out of the mission. He simply iterates that he's doing his professional duty, and nothing is going on between Fatima and him. Of course, something is definitely going on between Fatima and Vishnu — the atmosphere between them is charged with a trace of sensuality. Saare Jahan Se Accha, though, keeps things professional and under tight control. Like a highly dedicated agent, it sets its sights on the main plot and shows no will to deviate from its objective. That's unfortunate because the series ends up sacrificing a lot of human drama in favor of thriller elements. The sting of betrayal in the Murtaza–Naushad and Rizwan–Rafiq threads, and the ache of incomplete romance between Rafiq and Naseem, all go undeveloped. The drama peeks through a line or two, but its weight is not fully realized. What about Mohini's doubts, jealousy, and protests? They are resolved offscreen as if they don't really matter. The series severely undercuts its emotional impact as it speedily jumps from one event to another. 

The spy stuff is not memorable either. Instead of awing us with nitty-gritty details, Saare Jahan Se Accha treats the highly stressful, highly meticulous job of an agent as child's play. Secret, sensitive meetings are effortlessly set up with voiceovers. Crucial information is gathered without breaking a sweat. Naushad manages to snoop around someone's office without finding himself dancing with danger, and a robbery at a tightly secured bank happens without any experience of risk or fear. All this renders Saare Jahan Se Accha tame, lame, meh. It slips from between your fingers like sand. The six-episode drama thriller eventually looks like a slipshod crash course about a significant historical event (this drama is fictional, though R. N. Kao actually existed). It's also a tribute to all the tireless soldiers who work for the nation, but those hardworking patriots surely deserve a better tribute than this clumsy serial, which says little about the pressures of balancing their personal and professional lives, or the tensions they face during their missions.

Final Score- [4/10]
Reviewed by - Vikas Yadav
Follow @vikasonorous on Twitter
Publisher at Midgard Times