Envoy score: 3/5
The Viral Fever, which is known for its contemporary subjects, has come out with yet another web series ‘Hostel Daze’, targeting the younger generation. It is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Story
As the title suggests, this story is about lives in a hostel which converge on many moments and feelings spread around the scare of ragging, joy of knowing or learning new things, excitement of exploring the unexplored, sadness of losing, fear of failing, gladness of friendship, power to handle pressure and much more.
The story revolves around three youngsters; Ankit Pandey (Adarsh Gourav), Chirag Bansal (Luv) and Jaat (Shubham Gaur), who get admitted into the hostel after joining an engineering course.
Hostel Daze is altogether a different kind of world with people like Jhantoo (Nikhil Vijay) making hostel as their permanent ‘adda’ to carry out their escapades unabashedly. While Chirag is a shy and innocent guy who cannot even utter a cuss word, Ankit is quite bold.
These three different people share a room befriend Jhantoo who gels with these three to generate some funny as well as embarrassing moments.
Performances
Amazing performances by all artistes is definitely a plus for this series. Harsha Chemudu, as Ravi Teja, who already made a mark in short films and feature films in Telugu where he is popularly known as ‘Viva’ Harsha has performed well to prove his talent again.
Luv looks well-suited in the innocent and shy looking role of Chirag. Adarsh Gaurav also carries his character with two variations (before makeover and after), perfectly. Another performance worth mentioning comes from Nikhil Vijay. His gestures and the way he portrays the unsophisticated Jhantoo is simply fabulous.
Positives
The story is simple and narrated in a ‘no words minced’ manner, making it a thoroughly entertaining series. The feel of a real hostel atmosphere and conditions which prevail inside a hostel are very well captured.
Though the comedy or dialogues sound a little crass at times, it can be glossed over keeping the present trend in mind. Director Raghav Subbu needs to be appreciated for his straightforward effort along with his writers Saurabh Khanna and Abhishek Yadav for their sincere approach.
Negatives
The scenes of Kavitha Aunty (Paromita Dey) seem somewhat farfetched. They could have been chopped off fully or at least edited to some extent. It seems that the hangover of Kota Factory still persists as some portions in Hostel Daze look similar to scenes in Kota Factory.
Worth it?
Definitely yes, If you like student comedy infused with innocuous crudeness. Those who are right now living in similar hostels can definitely identify themselves with the characters in Hostel Daze.