Fabulous Lives Vs. Bollywood Wives is the kind of show that tests your patience in ways you didn’t know existed. If you have seen the first two seasons, you might be able to handle the insanity that the third one delivers too. However, if you’re someone who would straightaway jump to the third season, then do expect yourself to start questioning your watchlist by the end of the first episode.
The latest season released on October 18 on Netflix is retitled “Fabulous Lives vs. Bollywood Wives.” It brings the twist of a new cast with a touch of two cities pitted against each other- Delhi vs. Bombay, with Fabulous Lives of Delhi women: Riddhima Kapoor Sahni, Shalini Passi, and Kalyani Saha Chawla and the original cast- Bollywood Wives of Bombay-Neelam Kothari, Maheep Kapoor, Bhavna Pandey, and Seema Kiran Sajdeh.
The old cast with their close Bollywood connections has been merged with the new cast who are also from very rich families with influential backgrounds. Riddhima belongs to the Kapoor family (Ranbir Kapoor’s sister), Shalini is an art collector and founder of Mash India (Wife of Sanjay Bassi, Delhi Businessman), and Kalyani, is a fashion entrepreneur who worked for renowned brands (Ex-Wife of Vishal Chawla, whose parents created Ravissant, a luxury brand).
Ostentatious display of wealth and worst traits
A so-called “reality show,” which is scripted. Fabulous Lives Vs. Bollywood Wives Season 3 is nothing but a hollow, and absurd display of Delhi’s rich families and Bollywood’s privilege. The attempt to add new faces may have been intended to give some interesting plotlines to the series with the battle between the two cities. However, this plotline adds nothing new to the random drama that happens throughout. With all filler and no substance the show is exhausting, over-the-top charade of elitism, wealth, and mean-spirited pettiness.
The show begins with the first episode starting with Shalini Passi, the Delhite, an all-rounder newbie’s house who descends from her house’s magnificent staircase in a flowing cream-and-golden Cleopatra incarnating gown. Passi throws a Mash Ball for all the Delhi-Bombay girls and others. The Mash Ball was an event where guests were invited to come dressed as a painting. The next episodes show them having lunch with Karan, celebrating Karwachauth, and taking a trip to Mauritius.
From bitchy and mean arguments over a dress to fake accents and cringeworthy attempts at sounding intellectual, there’s nothing genuine in the show.
By the end of the show, you’ll see them in a bookstore where Saif Ali Khan reads Charles Dickens to them. Karan Johar, who has a long-standing obsession with catfights and female rivalries, doesn’t shy away from pitting these women against each other. From bitchy and mean arguments over a dress to fake accents and cringeworthy attempts at sounding intellectual, there’s nothing genuine in the show.
An unbearable watch with a poorly pitted fight-Delhi vs. Bombay
One of the show’s most jarring elements is how it portrays the so-called aspirational class. While viewers may be curious about the fabulous lives of these Bollywood-connected women, what they get is far from aspirational. Whether it’s Bhavna Pandey’s ‘emotional conversation,’ with Chunky Pandey and her daughter, Ananya Pandey regarding her achieving success, growing big, and gaining independence, by making a big deal out of shifting apartments within the same building or these women throwing lavish and pointless parties or trips, it all feels excessively self-indulgent and alien to the audience.
Each aspect of their life shown in the season reeks of elitism. For instance, in one of the episodes, Neelam dismisses Delhi as “village-like” because of potholes in her way which she by the way travels via her lavish car. Another one of the many instances, where the show reeks of elitism is when Shalini calls herself not being like some “village people” and regards them as a reference to being unaware or uneducated. The show is nothing but a great display of classism, and stereotypical prejudices about lower-income groups and rural India that Bollywood has always managed to display somehow, whether on the big screen or now OTT.
In the second episode, the women dress up for Karwachauth and make fewer mean comments to each other, given the festivities. Particularly, apart from their bitchy, mean, toxic, and teenage-kids-like tantrums, one of the most uncomfortable things to watch is their fake accents. In the latter episodes, apart from almost everything that seems mindless, one of the most insane scenes is where Shalini says how she doesn’t sip from a glass directly, out of fear of eroding her enamel. That is how alien the show and these women seem to the audience.
Everything feels laughably distant from any reality most Indians from both the cities- Delhi and Bombay experience. Not just Delhi, Bombay one would wonder if anyone from any part of the country could ever relate to them. For the Bombay girls, all Bollywood wives, all they have is their delusional little lavish world in Bandra, outside of which anything seems like a ‘village,’ to them.
Shallow women with shallower lives
Whether it’s the bizarre competition between Maheep, Neelam, and Kalyani over who is “best in bed,” while on a trip to Mauritius or their constant body-shaming, their behaviour is just downright toxic. Watching Maheep’s incessant use of cuss words to sound “cool” is anything but empowering. Something that could have given more substance to the otherwise all-filler show would be Seema and Kalyani’s lives as single women who have had divorced. However, instead of giving more depth to that plot it was sidelined and used at times only as a subject of mockery or fun.
Something that could have given more substance to the otherwise all-filler show would be Seema and Kalyani’s lives as single women who have had divorced. However, instead of giving more depth to that plot it was sidelined and used at times only as a subject of mockery or fun.
The plotline of the show forces us to pass off any of these women’s friendships as something deep and meaningful. If anything, the women seem like caricatures, designed to embody the worst stereotypes of high society lifestyle. Whether it’s their obsession with looking good or their inability to engage with the world outside their elite bubble. It is a portrayal that makes one wonder if this is what Mumbai Karan Johar wants the world to see.
Who is watching Fabulous Lives Vs Bollywood Wives?
As the New York Times also suggests, how the entertainment value of watching obliviously wealthy people put themselves on display, transcends nation and cultures, the show is an extended version of Rich Wife, a US-based Reality TV Show crafted for the Indian market. It is only for that kind of audience, that Fabulous Lives Vs. Bollywood Wives Season 3 can qualify as a guilty pleasure entertainment. But most of us would question Karan Johar’s target audience while watching. Like are we supposed to aspire to be like these women, whose lives are filled with inflated egos and a desperate need for attention? Or are we supposed to watch it mindlessly as a bizarre window that unfolds into the absurd lives of Bollywood’s elite?
Whatever the intent, the result is far from fabulous. It’s a show that constantly smashes these women’s privilege in your face. It reminds you how out of touch you are with the lifestyle these women and a class like theirs’ live. Probably, only the aspirational value is what the show creates.
Watching these women quarrel over who has the bigger party or whose vocabulary is better than the other, isn’t entertainment. It is just a sad reflection of Bollywood’s worst traits. If such is the Fabulous Lives Vs. Bollywood Wives, then a regular middle-class audience would any day take their not-so-fabulous life.
