'Mrs Serial Killer' Review: Netflix's Indian thriller is a predictable, one-time watch that fails to impress
Spoilers for Netflix's 'Mrs Serial Killer'
In a small, quaint town of the hilly Uttarakhand in India, a serial killer is roaming the streets brazenly, rounding up women who are pregnant out of wedlock and killing them. The killer successfully runs abortion on them, beheads them, and stores the fetuses in glass jars.
But Mr and Mrs Mrityunjoy are far from this. The couple has only just discovered that Sona (Jacqueline Fernandez) is pregnant, but the news could have come at a better time since Joy, as Sona fondly calls him, is away from that. That same night, however, something weird happens.
Inspector Imran (Mohit Raina) storms inside the house and collects evidence against Dr Joy, such as cigarette butts and a hairbrush. Why? Who knows. It is revealed that Sona and Imran used to date once upon a time — they had even gotten married — but that is the end of it.
Soon thereafter, a victim is discovered in the basement of Joy's farmhouse. And then five more bodies are found, leading to Joy's arrest. Indicating that Imran has planned this the entire time, Sona is convinced that he is doing so to avenge their break up.
Desperate to get her innocent husband out of prison, Joy's lawyer tells her that there should be a murder mimicking the serial killer's so as to prove that the real killer is still out there. After some contemplation, Sona gives in and narrows in on a victim — her neighbor Anushka Tiwari (Zayn Marie Khan), who has just found out that she is pregnant. And so begins Sona's quest to mimic the murder and prove her husband is innocent.
Joy gets bail from prison and returns home. But in the dead of the night when Sona cannot find him at home, she goes to the hospital where she had kept Anushka captive. She, predictably, never ended up killing her. And now, it is revealed that Joy indeed has been the serial killer the whole time!
In a climax that was intended to be shocking, it is revealed that the serial killer was born out of wedlock and refers to every unmarried pregnant woman as a "whore" — even his mother. This redundant backstory is so done and dusted that it really is difficult to even feign shock. All you will find yourself saying is, "I knew it!"
Directed by Shirish Kunder, 'Mrs Serial Killer' becomes tiresome after a while. At a runtime of one hour 45 minutes, Shirish Kunder's 'Mrs Serial Killer' is a lengthy watch, which packs extremely low-hanging fruits as its final twists. Simply by virtue of placing Imran in the first few moments collecting that evidence, it was proved that there was something fishy about Joy. But we had to endure a long watch for that.
The only saving grace of the movie is Fernandez and Khan's chase scenes and the little banter between them. There are also some comical moments and dialogues intended to keep the audience going, and perhaps they do work. 'Mrs Serial Killer' is a one-time watch that tries hard but cannot deliver. The very ending is so ridiculously predictable that it fails miserably. Perhaps the fault is in the screenplay. With a few tweaks to the narrative, maybe Kunder wouldn't have let the twist out early on in the movie.
'Mrs Serial Killer' is currently streaming on Netflix.