Think of a shot where a swash-buckling cop kicks a villain and the villain shoots up in outer space. Well, this is not a scene of a feature film. It could be a Hollywood movie or an interesting avatar of a dearly loved cop of a Bollywood film.
ChulBul Pandey, the famous cop played by Salman Khan in the Dabangg franchise, is getting an animated makeover. An Indian equivalent for Hollywood superheroes like Hulk, Spiderman and Superman.
Arbaaz Khan Productions has teamed up with animation studio Cosmos-Maya to bring the Dabangg universe for kids.
In addition to Chulbul, who was last seen dusting up goons in 2019’s Dabangg 3, the characters Rajjo, Makkhi, Chhedi Singh, Prajapati Pandey and others will be featured in the series.
According to reports, the multi part adaptation is in the early stages of development. The first two planned seasons will have 52-episodes slated for April 2021 release.
Talking about the reason for the animated adaptation of the movie, Arbazz said that the wide popularity of Dabangg led them to crave more stories on these characters. He also said that the quicker production time of animation would fill in the gaps between feature films, which is slowly getting back in action amid coronavirus pandemic.
The makers believe that the genre offers unparalleled creative freedom with storytelling and we can focus on shorter standalone stories of favourite characters instead of longer,straight narratives.
However the original characters won’t be voicing for their animated avatars.
Cosmos-Maya Studios, founded by Ketan Mehta and Deepa Sahi, has created popular shows like ‘Motu Patlu’, ‘Vir: The Robot Boy’ and ‘Selfie with Bajrangi’. In 2018 they created two seasons of the Motu-Patlu spin-off Inspector Chingum on Amazon Prime, based on Rajnikanth.
Anish and team have opted for 2D animation for the series.The format is characterised by low angles and strong, dramatic poses. The Dabangg series is their first adaptation of a major Bollywood franchise.
