Criminal Justice Season 4: A marvelously acted and intriguingly emotional knock out

Criminal Justice Season 4: A marvelously acted and intriguingly emotional knock out

‘Criminal Justice: A Family Matter’ - your favorite Madhav Mishra (Pankaj Tripathi) is back and he scores a boundary (four solid performances in a row) as he navigates a complex case, director Rohan Sippy completes his hattrick of three well-made seasons back-to-back but the player of this match is someone else.

‘Criminal Justice: A Family Matter’ synopsis

‘Criminal Justice season 4’ aka ‘Criminal Justice: A Family Matter’ follows Madhav Mishra (Pankaj Tripathi) as he navigates one of his most complex cases yet — a well-known surgeon Raj Nagpal (Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub) gets arrested for murdering his lover Roshni Saluja (Asha Negi).

Anju Nagpal (Surveen Chawla) wife of Dr Raj Nagpal hires Madhav Mishra as the defense lawyer. As the case progresses and hidden truths unravel, Madhav Mishra this time faces stiff competition from two sharp and determined lawyers – his ex-colleagues Mandira Mathur (Mita Vashisht) and Public Prosecutor Lekha Agastya (Shweta Basu Prasad).

Criminal Justice: A Family Matter review

‘Criminal Justice: A Family Matter’ the fourth season of Disney + Hotstar’s super-duper hit series ‘Criminal Justice’ this time goes full circle with elements of love, loss, betrayal, desire, sacrifice, redemption, need, greed, lust, parenthood and more.

Creators Harman Wadala, Rahul Ved Prakash, Varsha Ramachandran, Riya Poojary along with the writers Harman Wadala, Sandeep Jain, Sameer Mishra and the director Rohan Sippy in ‘Criminal Justice Season 4’ set the drama in an affluent family of Nagpal’s and present us a conflict about changing human natures in different times which makes it highly engrossing. Following it familiar route seen in previous seasons we see characters apart from the lead like Khushboo Atre as Ratna Mishra, Madhav's wife, Mita Vashisht as Mandira Mathur, Shweta Basu Prasad as Lekha Agastya, Barkha Singh as Roshini Mathur, Kalyanee Mulay as Sub-Inspector Gauri Karmarkar, Pankaj Saraswat as DCP Raghu Salian, Rajesh Khera as Solkar, Lekha's senior, Ajeet Singh Palawat as Sr. Inspector Harsh Pradhan, Raaj Gopal Iyer as Constable Namdeo Jadhav and Aatm Prakash Mishra as Madhav’s brother – in – law ( Sallesahab), all reprising their respective roles.

Khushi Bharadwaj as Ira – the daughter of Dr Nagpal and Anju Nagpal is the new addition and she holds the key. Ira is suffering from asperges (a type of autism spectrum disorder) and ‘Criminal Justice Season 4’ begins from Ira’s birthday celebration where we see a ‘separated’ couple – the Nagpals standing together for their daughter.

Dr. Nagpal is in love with Ira’s caretaker Roshni and its open and Anju has no problems with his husband having an affair with her daughters care taker and the ‘Nagpal’s are ‘separated’ not divorced. This setting may feel somewhat ‘odd’ in the beginning but director Rohan Sippy and writers Harman Wadala, Sandeep Jain, Sameer Mishra ensure that the eight episodes series in spite of this odd setting make it engaging and emotionally charged to the hilt.

‘Criminal Justice: A Family Matter’ tries to give something to all its prime and important characters and succeeds well and it does comes out with an unexpected surprise that lifts the series which at times falls prey to mediocrity and restores to gallery playing tactics.

As the previous seasons, the courtroom scenes are its USP anyhow the jija saala and beauty parlour jokes/humour is now getting repetitive.

Overall, ‘Criminal Justice: A Family Matter’ manages to make the audience involved as it reaches it peaks of thrills, breaking points and emotions.

Performance

Pankaj Tripathi as Advocate Madhav Mishra does it again, a winner all the way, the actor give his unique mannerisms to his ‘aam’ vakil/advocate persona which blends so well and delivers a delightfully unforgettable performance.

Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub as Dr. Raj Nagpal gets a character with different shades and the actor does it with finesse, his dilemma, his guilt, anger everything comes subtly to the core.

Surveen Chawla as Raj's wife is extraordinary, as the series progresses, we see her transformation and the actress as an unfortunate wife and caring mother delivers a performance that will be hard to forget.

Asha Negi as Roshni Saluja is fabulous, displaying the vulnerability of her character laced with desire, guilt, jealousy and anger, the actress does a splendid job.

Khushboo Atre as Ratna Mishra, Madhav's wife is pleasant as usual and as her moments.

Mita Vashisht as Mandira Mathur is competent and does well.

Shweta Basu Prasad as Lekha Agastya again delivers a fabulous performance.

Ira as the teenager suffering from asperges is fantastic

Barkha Singh as Roshini Mathur mages to make her impression.

Kalyanee Mulay as Sub-Inspector Gauri Karmarkar is in her element and does very well.

Pankaj Saraswat as DCP Raghu Salian is fine.

Rajesh Khera as Solkar, Lekha's senior has very little to do but he is fine in whatever screen space he gets.

Ajeet Singh Palawat as Sr. Inspector Harsh Pradhan is very good.

Raaj Gopal Iyer as Constable Namdeo Jadhav hardly gets any scope but he is okay in whatever screen space he gets.

Aatm Prakash Mishra as the brother-in-law of Madhav Mishra is very natural and does a fine job.