Kafeel hits all the right, fast paced notes we were hoping for in the first two episodes of the new drama starring Emad Irfani and Sanam Saeed.
Kafeel means ‘responsible’ and from the get-go, we’re hooked. Zeba (Sanam Saeed) is the studious, happy college going girl from a wholesome family, loving parents, a brother, a younger sister and it’s clear the family is living life just the way they want.
But kya karein is maashre ka? Zeba is taken in by her friend who comes to take her final exams, hitched in a minute and back from her honeymoon, incredibly happy because her husband is good-looking and loaded. And all the young college girls can’t get enough. Asking for a prince, you know that Zeba is going to do something stupid for love, which is what young, college girls do end up doing.
It’s also a credit to the writer that the story is set in the past – a time with no cell phones, landlines with extensions, when hand-written notes are the only way to get attention.
Riding on the high of finding her love, Zeba goes to a party, meets a guy she likes, who writes his number for her on a handkerchief and millennials are like…we know how this goes. Zeba is starstruck, especially because the guy can sing, and she overhears the guy is friends with her friend’s prince-like husband (meaning he isn’t poor), and she’s all for it.
Her father isn’t. When Zeba’s mother gets a rishta for her (of course, a guy with the same name as the person Zeba meets at the party), her mother is set on the shaadi. Her father isn’t. The happy go-lucky, sincerely sweet father, wants his oldest daughter to study and do her masters before he marries her off.
The handkerchief is the killer, the big stab wound. Zeba’s mother finds it, and that’s that. Zeba has to marry because as her mother puts it, when girls start holding love letters in their hands and sleeping, it’s time to get that young blood married off. And unfortunately her father agrees. So does Zeba because she thinks she’s marrying the guy with the same name at that party. But she isn’t. She marries the wrong guy because she believes in destiny – and her parents do no double checks.
The drama is going to be a suspense-filled, dramatic showdown between Jami (Emad Irfani) and Zeba because whatever she seems to be right now, it doesn’t seem like Zeba won’t hold her own.
It also highlights one of the most major problems we face around the world – money. If the guy is loaded to the hilt, the girl is being showered with jewels and clothes and cash, our society believes to marry her off- the guy has money, marry her off, his sister and parents are nice, marry her off, she’ll have a fleet of staff, bags and shoes.
And we tend to ignore any warning signs – background checks, what does he do, is he nice? Money has and always will be the overshadow of love – and if love and money come together, like they did for the dreamy-eyed Zeba, it’s happily ever after. But that doesn’t always happen.
What will happen and what is exciting is that the pace the drama has already set, it doesn’t seem like it’s going to keep us waiting for long. The teaser for the next episode and episode 2 show Emad Irfani in real swag. The guy is owning Jami and we are so here for it. The hair, the look, the absolute contempt – Irfani will be the perfect villain. Watch out Pakistani drama scene – Kafeel is about to take over.
