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Written by Yogeshwar Karera and directed by Ali Junejo, Bargad is an unsettling look at family, faith and the things we choose...

From Iran to India: Five AI Film Stories Shaping Cinema Across Asia

Asian screens have adapted fast to AI-driven entertainment, from China’s billion-dollar short-drama machine to India’s corporate...

Kuch Ankahi - minority representation ARY Kashf Foundation

Decoding Primetime Hegemony: Who Is the Default Pakistani?

If you turn on your television in 2026, you will be confronted by a remarkably smooth world. There is no grit. There is no...

kubra khan sari shuja asad censor mehreen jabbar

Accept the Slap but Censor the Hug: This is TV Outrage

In the world of social psychology, there is a concept known as the “threshold of tolerance.” It’s the invisible line that...

Saba Faisal and What We Choose to Shame

Progress is hardly ever linear. Any time we make a meaningful change, there will be backlash and pushback. There will be people like Saba Faisal who try to drag us back a hundred years. On a viral television appearance, Faisal lamented the lack of shame heaped on a divorced woman

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Men Age Into Legends. Women Age Into Punchlines

Ageism and misogyny do not announce themselves as villains. They arrive smiling, joking, framed as banter. This week, we saw two such incidents, one in a victorious Olympic locker room and the other on a television set in Pakistan. Both revealed the same ingrained reflex – to trivialize and denigrate...

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The Mother: A devastating family drama about being unseen

There are no villains in Usama Khan’s “The Mother”, only a slow suffocating absence. Absence of attention, of purpose, of being seen. An ordinary seeming day in an ordinary family reveals the cracks beneath the surface. A woman waits, a husband comes, a son does not call, a daughter is ignored. In these...

Opinions Streaming Platforms

Beyond the Call: How to Kill Your Dreams

Beyond the Call is an anti-motivational tale about choosing a steady pay-check over passion. Teeli’s four-part corporate coming of age story reminds you that middle-class Pakistanis can’t afford dreams. In the first episode, Raeed (Hunaen Shahid) breaks the fourth wall to explain he’s joining...

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Kuttay (Rated 18+): Theatre That Bites Back

I thought of walking out of Kuttay: The Ones Who Don’t Bite at several points, a few people actually did. Not because the play was bad, but because it was so uncomfortable to watch. For those who stayed, it was worth it. Good art needs to shake us a little. Director Muhammad Ali uses absurdism and chaos...

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Who gets to be a Pakistani drama critic?

“Culture Critic” has always felt like a misnomer to me. The word suggests someone hovering at the edges, judging from a distance, poking holes in another’s work. In Pakistan, Kya Drama Hai, Instagram reviewers, and serious critics now coexist uneasily. Entertainment and critique collide and overlap –...

Opinions Streaming Platforms

Is Pakistan Ready to Cut the Cable Cord?

The way Pakistanis watch content is changing fast. With smartphones in nearly every hand and affordable internet bundles from telecoms, digital platforms are beginning to replace traditional cable in some urban homes. Viewers no longer wait for prime-time slots; instead they stream sports matches live,...

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The Performative Male Meets Lahori Machismo

The “Performative Male Contest” began as satire on American campuses, mocking men who deploy feminist aesthetics to appeal to progressive women. Viral clips from New York, Chicago, and Ivy League universities showed contestants showing off Clairo vinyls, wired earbuds, thrifted button-ups, long jorts,...

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Pakistan's AI Reporters Aren't What Journalism Needs

The launch of Pakistan Today English News, billed as the world’s first fully AI-powered English-language channel, has ignited debate in Pakistan’s already embattled media industry. Is this a bold step toward efficiency and global reach or a shortcut that sidelines human journalists in favour of avatars...

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Blender: The Smartest Show on TV?

Is this the smartest show on TV? Blender. Hosted by Fahad Bombaywala, Executive Director at 365 and alum of M&C Saatchi and Ogilvy, Blender looks nothing like mainstream Pakistani TV. It sounds smart, feels sharp and refuses to play dumb. It treats the audience as if they’re already insiders. At...

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Confessions of a Chronically Online Pakistani Woman

I live on the internet. Not just on it, but in it, like a fish in plastic-choked water, inhaling memes instead of air. I remember when it wasn’t this bleak. The internet once felt like a refuge, a parallel world that softened the suffocation of the offline one. Sharing silly memes was a small act of...

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