The new Netflix series Saare Jahan Se Accha begins with Pratik Gandhi’s character being posted to the R&AW’s Islamabad station, and it ends with him foiling a major nuclear operation and blowing things up real good. All of this happens in six episodes of roughly 45 minutes each. In these six episodes, we are introduced to several characters — field agents, a journalist, the chief of the ISI; even Indira Gandhi drops by. Most of these characters, including the protagonist’s wife, is introduced with enough fanfare to suggest that they are going to be important to the plot. Some of them are, most aren’t. But you can never shake the feeling that Saare Jahan Se Accha was stripped to the bone after somebody interfered with either the scripts or the first assembly. Nearly everybody in the cast suffers, not to mention the show itself. But nobody is done quite so dirty as Tillotama Shome.There is no way in hell that she signed up for this, especially after having done The Night Manager for Hotstar. As Mohini, the wife of Gandhi’s all-too-vanilla spymaster Vishnu Shankar, Shome is essentially reduced to wallpaper. The only time she opens her mouth is to complain about her circumstances to her absent husband. He practically admits that he married her mainly as a cover before they departed for Islamabad. After settling in — we don’t see any of this, by the way — he becomes consumed by his work, which, admittedly, is very important. But both the show and Vishnu display a casually sexist attitude towards Mohini. Just because she is allowed to protest doesn’t mean that she has a voice.Also read – Sarzameen: Ibrahim Ali Khan’s terrible film accidentally gets you to root for a terrorist to kill a soldier, and you can’t even deny it Suhail Nayyar in a still from Saare Jahan Se Accha.It is a terrible abuse of Shome’s considerable talents, and all that one can hope is that she got compensated handsomely for this humiliation. Ditto for Suhail Nayyar, who is outstanding as the field agent Sukhbir. Enlisted by Vishnu after landing up in jail back home, Sukhbir is essentially blackmailed into going deep undercover in Pakistan as a merchant named Rafiq. It is implied that the character went through a major transformation over the years, going from a disgruntled government employee to a genuine hero. But we see none of it. In fact, the show uses Sukhbir as a convenient plot device. It’s deeply dehumanising.There was a fabulous Rolling Stone article last year, titled, “The CIA Sent Him Deep Undercover to Spy on Islamic Radicals. It Cost Him Everything.” The article told the story of a “deep-cover CIA officer” who spent years trying to infiltrate the Al Qaeda. He succeeded. But his mission took a damaging toll on his life. He lived with one eye over his shoulder, hiding from his own countrymen lest he be found out. On his visits to America, which were becoming more and more infrequent as the years went by, he was transported amid heavy paranoia. He switched vehicles multiple times; the route he took was designed to throw any potential pursuers off the scent; he was snuck into the basement and not allowed to mingle with other employees. He would be debriefed by the Director of the CIA himself, and was even offered a meeting with then-president George W Bush himself.This deep-cover agent sounds a lot like the character played by Leonardo DiCaprio in the underrated Ridley Scott movie Body of Lies. Even by Hollywood standards, there was a gritty authenticity to the character that felt wholly unfamiliar in a landscape dominated by Jason Bourne and James Bond. Sukhbir is a lot like that character. He seems to have built a full life for himself in Pakistan. He has a thriving business, good friends, deep connections inside the government, and even a love interest. All of this would’ve been so engrossing had the show not omitted what seems like entire chapters of Sukhbir’s life. In one scene, he declares that he doesn’t work for any country. “People like me, we work for agencies,” he says. Guess what happens in the very next episode.You’d buy it, but Saare Jahan Se Accha isn’t interested in giving Sukhbir, or any other character for that matter, a proper arc. Nayyar is so good that he could’ve given Ranveer Singh a run for his money ahead of Dhurandar. But he’s made collateral damage in Netflix’s assault on this show’s narrative. Come to think of it, of course they didn’t hire an actor to play Mrs Gandhi just for one scene. There was probably an entire subplot involving her, as well. But we don’t see any of it. Perhaps they’d written some actual Pakistani counterparts for Sukhbir, too. But, bafflingly, the ISI chief does all the dirty work personally.Story continues below this adRead more – Black Doves review: Classy and kinetic, Keira Knightley’s Netflix spy series is an unmissable romp Sunny Hinduja in a still from Saare Jahan Se Accha.Played by a very impressive Sunny Hinduja — both he and Nayyar are doing great accent work here — the ISI chief in Saare Jahan Se Accha behaves like a low-level operative. It’s like watching Don Corleone himself do the kind of work that even Clemenza would’ve delegated to Paulie in The Godfather. This man, Ali Murtaza Malik, is at the forefront of every scene involving the ISI. He’s conducting investigations on the ground, shaking down suspects, and giving chase to people like he’s some kind of Terminator. Meanwhile, his Indian counterpart never leaves the four walls of his cushy office. Perhaps there was more to Malik’s relationship with Anup Soni’s character, a Pakistani army officer named Naushad Ahmed. Revealed to be a double agent, Naushad’s betrayal hits Murtaza hard.But we don’t feel the blow, because Saare Jahan Se Accha doesn’t establish their bond with nearly enough patience. There is no point to making shows like this; they have no identity of their own. It’s as if they haven’t been touched by a single human hand. Saare Jahan Se Accha is algorithmic to a fault; it isn’t so much a television show as it is a series of Reels, stitched together with a vague sense of forward momentum. It isn’t designed to be savoured, it’s made to be chugged. And, like most things that are chugged, Saare Jahan Se Accha will have you running for the toilet. That’s where it belongs.Post Credits Scene is a column in which we dissect new releases every week, with particular focus on context, craft, and characters. Because there’s always something to fixate about once the dust has settled.Rohan Naahar is an assistant editor at Indian Express online. He covers pop-culture across formats and mediums. He is a 'Rotten Tomatoes-approved' critic and a member of the Film Critics Guild of India. He previously worked with the Hindustan Times, where he wrote hundreds of film and television reviews, produced videos, and interviewed the biggest names in Indian and international cinema. At the Express, he writes a column titled Post Credits Scene, and has hosted a podcast called Movie Police. You can find him on X at @RohanNaahar, and write to him at rohan.naahar@indianexpress.com. He is also on LinkedIn and Instagram. ... Read MoreClick here to follow Screen Digital on YouTube and stay updated with the latest from the world of cinema.© IE Online Media Services Pvt Ltd