In the first episode of the show, Gayatri Rajvansh (played by Mini Mathur) tells her daughter, Bae (played by Ananya Panday), that she must aspire to become a Birkin in a world of fakes, i.e., irreplaceable and not original. Similarly, in a world where everyone in pop culture is exploring the ideas around ‘Eat the Rich’ and White Lotus on HBO is being raved about for its depiction of the filthy rich and the complicated whirpool that their lives are, be a Dharmatic Entertainment production busy indulging the concepts of privilege and entitlement rather than admonishing them. The only human expression that encapsulates the spirit of Ananya Panday’s Call Me Bae (2024), directed by Colin D’Cunha, would be an ‘eye roll.’
In the story, Bae – a South Delhi girl – born with a golden spoon in her mouth, grows up to be a spoilt socialite. She is here to slay and ‘eat, love and pray’ until three years into her marriage, she is caught cheating on her husband with her gym trainer. Aggy, aka Agyasta Chowdhary (played by Vihaan Samat), is scandalized (not heartbroken, mind you), and the only course of action that he and Bae’s family think fit is to throw Bae out of the house overnight; her friends also remove her from social media groups as a sign of termination of their relationship with her.
Aggy and Samar (played by Shiv Masand) cannot bear to see Bae suffer, so they propose to help her with a house, a car, a servant and a fat bank account balance; all she has to do in return is to lie low till the controversy blows over. Bae, however, rejects the offer and impulsively moves to Mumbai – the city of dreams.
One would expect this to be the beginning of Bae’s struggles and her coming-of-age in a city that refuses to soften its blows, maybe a new-age, girlhood-coded Wake Up Sid. But Bae is luckier than most. A drunken rant makes her go viral on the internet, lands her a paid (!) internship, admiration from multiple boys, a flatmate, and an exclusive story to follow up with.
Even if we willingly suspend our disbelief, the problems in Bae’s life are not glaring enough for you to buy her story. She experiences privilege flashbacks, reminisces about shoplifting as a cry for help and uses a lot of puns in her speech, but ‘owl’ (read: all) is certainly not well about this hashtag-behen-coded TV show; all, except Ananya Panday’s pitch-perfect wardrobe and the number of luxury brands that are casually littered around. If anything, it is EXHAUSTING.
Ananya Panday is fabulous; she is so believable as Bae that it almost feels like she is in her own skin for this role. She is selectively intelligent, refuses to pronounce the word ‘poor’ as if it was a cardinal sin, sheds tears over the loss of her pet handbags and focuses only on good looks while walking into a corporate workspace in a way only Poo from K3G can.
Her artifice is covered up by the genuine emotions she is brimming with on the screen. However, all the female characters around her are sanitized stereotypes of the Instagram-loving, pinteresty, early-20s girlies. If this wasn’t enough, Vir Das, as Satyajit Sen, a TRP-hungry controversy mogul and misogynistic man, steps in as the perfect ‘bad cop’ at whose expense Bae is then fashioned as very demure, very mindful. Bae is a good person, but with the kind of bling she is enraptured in, it becomes difficult for the light to shine through and for the world to recognize her true potential.
After the first 3-4 episodes, once the exposition round is done with, Call Me Bae (2024) starts to stuffer. Ishita Moitra, Sania Motlekar and Rohit Nair’s writing feels like drinking soda on an empty stomach – all froth and little to fill you up with. The constant reminders about social media usage, the jargon around not judging a social media user, and a focus on driving home the difference between social media uploads and our real lives are heavy-duty themes the show is not quite equipped to handle.
However, it’s self-awareness deserves some praise! There is a wedding sequence that almost replicates and parodies Siddarth Malhotra and Kiara Advani’s real-life wedding video, something I personally found very violating, but the depiction of it in an unserious way possibly helps most viewers take the spirit of th show in their stride as they cozy up to the show’s universe.
I recommend you binge-watch Call Me Bae (2024) with your girlfriends this weekend as you wind down after a work week. However, take it with a pinch of salt and hold your tongue if you think the show is blowing a few things out of proportion. Caricatures have their own space in the world of popular culture. It is silly but fun, and at least it is not another boilerplate crime thriller struggling to find a welcoming audience in the OTT space.
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