Episode 11 and 12 of Kafeel take a turn that’s confusing and to be honest, boring. We leave Zeba (Sanam Saeed) behind as a wife, about to have a child, and resigned to her life with her good-for-nothing husband Jami (Emmad Irfani). Years later, she's living in a small flat with four kids, one boy and three girls all of whom are in their late teens, her father has passed and her husband is still the good-for-nothing trash she had married. 

Her brother is doing well in life as are her former neighbours whose daughter is in love with her son.  For two episodes, we are introduced to her life, in which she is constantly working, or asking for money, to make ends meet. And in the end, her mother says to her that she is always the bearer of bad news and she blames her mother again for the marriage that she was put in (and that she could’ve gotten out of).

We also see a secondary timeline of her neighbour who is marrying about his means, and also see her son behave with ‘ghairat’ when he doesn’t accept presents taht are above his lifestyle. 

And for some reason, unknown to us, we are also told that her daughter must tell her to wear her dupatta when going out. It was a super cringe, highly unnecessary moment and yes, it must happen in real life, but really, did it need to happen here?

The storyline seems to be going in the direction taht when you make a bad decision and live with it, you also put others at risk - a frustrated son who can’t stand up for himself and wants to, daughters that see their mother struggling and don’t respect their father and how things never change. It is a powerful message but the delivery in these two episodes is week - almost comical that the writer and the director have tried to include an element of fun - when it isnt fun at all. 

If the drama continues in this trend, it might be one that has to be watched on fast-forward if at all because just like Zeba chose this life, we can also choose not to watch it. The hotch potch episodes, the second storyline, the forced messaging is not doing it any favours and we hope that future episodes snap out of it and give us the nuanced and emotional episides they had before.