Do You Wanna Partner review: Tamannaah Bhatia, Diana Penty show is plain terrible

Let me count the pain points. In and of itself, to have two gal pals working flat-out to get out of holes that they are good at digging themselves into, is a neat hook: women who work for a living, and want to excel at what they do, is a theme that never gets old.

So Shakes aka Shikha Roy Chowdhury (Tamannaah Bhatia) and Mak aka Anahita Makujina (Diana Penty) who have long shared each other’s ‘sukh-dukh’ find themselves ganging up against sexist louts who refuse to either back them with the required lolly, or support them in other ways — raw material, brewery space etc — and, gasp, actual gangsters. If it is NCR, how can a chiffon-clad, foul-mouthed loanshark called Laila (Shweta Tiwari) who has a thing for snapping fingers off for those who don’t repay her in time, or a bulked-up Tokas, the danger man behind the danger woman, be far behind? Roll eye time, natch.

There’s also a single-dad-cum-genius-brewmaster (Nakuul Mehta) who looks pained right through. Don’t blame him: how would you react if the so-called biz whizzes who come looking for your skills keep going through excel sheets after excel sheets of sad figures without a single idea other than bringing to life a dream of an impractical beer-loving dad (Indraneil Sengupta)? At one point, I could swear I saw the distinctive Raw Mango entrance on Lodi Road, standing in for the girls’ office, which is meant to be somewhere in Gurgaon: is that laziness or ignorance?

Do You Wanna Partner trailer:

There’s Neeraj Kabi hamming it up as the undisputed liquor baron of NCR who starts getting jittery with these two new entrants in the market. Ayesha Raza, as Shikha’s sensible, supportive mom, keeps telling anyone who cares to listen that all of it is a bad idea, but of course, no one does. As Anahita’s brother, Sufi Motiwala’s Mumbai-coded character has been written by people who’ve never lived in NCR, nor have those in the show’s costume department; Rannvijay as Shikha’s chef boy-friend is reduced to perfecting his ‘kosha-mangsho’. And finally, there’s the always-splendid Jaaved Jafferi saddled with an arc which stretches all credulity, in a wig that doesn’t bother hiding that it is one.

It takes all the way up to the sixth episode — yes, I counted — to come upon a few moments shared by the two leads asking us that we believe that they are best friends — which feel relatable. Do you wanna last till then?

Do You Wanna Partner cast: Tamannaah Bhatia, Diana Penty, Jaaved Jafferi, Neeraj Kabi, Nakuul Mehta, Shweta Tiwari, Indraneil Sengupta, Ayesha Raza, Rannvijay, Sufi Motiwala
Do You Wanna Partner directors: Archit Kumar, Collin D’Cunha
Do You Wanna Partner rating: 0.5 stars