‘Four More Shots Please’ Season 1 And 2: Recap And Ending: What To Expect From Season 3?

Four independent women are living in the city of dreams, Mumbai. “Four More Shots Please” is how they navigate their life. Directed by Anu Menon, Nupur Asthana, and written by Devika Bhagat, Ishita Moitra, Rangita Pritish Nandy, and Ishita Pritish Nandy, the show deals with the daily routines of these women, their careers, personal relationships, and travels. The writers and the directors go all the way to talking about the kinds of questions women face after a certain age. Starting with marriage, kids, jobs, settling down and facing all kinds of questions that men never face.

Damini Roy, Anjana Menon, Umang Singh, and Sidhi Patel are from different walks of life and met each other at Truck Bar, their regular hang-out place. They go from acquaintances to best friends who would go miles to take care of one another. Damini Roy is an investigative journalist; Anjana Menon is a lawyer; Umang Singh is a trainer at a gym, and Sidhi Patel is rich and unemployed in the first season but becomes a stand-up comedian by the second season. Season 1 begins with Anjana Menon defending Damini in a defamation case against her and her website. Damini and Anjana are trying hard to win the case, but things go south pretty quickly. Damini is a single woman, and Anjana is a divorced mother of a daughter navigating between handling a job and taking care of her kid. Throughout two seasons, the show accurately throws light on how single mothers have to face the burden of taking care of their children, but the father just has to show up and do nothing. Most of the time, it is the mother who is the bad cop because she has to deal with the good and the bad, while the father just has to be there for a few days and deal with the good side of parenting. Anjana’s ex-husband, Varun, goes from an irresponsible father/spouse to a man now divorced from Anjana and engaged to Kavya Arora. To Anjana’s dismay, Varun appears to be more considerate with his new fiance than he was with her.

Umang Singh, a gym trainer, starts training Samara Kapoor, a Bollywood actress. Umang is bisexual and does not have a good relationship with her folks back in her hometown. She doesn’t keep in touch with them for that reason and learns to live on her own. As she starts training Samara Kapoor, they both start to get attracted to each other. Samara is surprised to see her being attracted to women but is conscious because she has an image to keep up with in the media. For obvious reasons, in the beginning, Umang and Samara keep the relationship hidden. Umang is also kind of surprised to know that a well-known Bollywood actress is attracted to her and is in a relationship with her. Umang soon finds it difficult to keep her relationship under wraps and feels Samara is purposely keeping her away from her crew as well.

Umang and Samara’s relationship goes through its own set of ups and downs. Even though the wedding preparations are underway, Umang starts getting fidgety and anxious over the number of social media glares their wedding is receiving while Samara dismisses her concerns. By the end of the second season, they come to the point of getting married, but Umang realizes that no matter the love they share and the conflicts they are ready to face together, Umang cannot commit to someone who puts her second on her list of priorities. Umang walks off from her wedding in front of the whole crowd. The story of Umang and Samara comes across as a tale of the fear a bisexual person goes through, fearing the backlash they will receive from the public and family for their sexuality. Their fears and apprehensions are as real as it gets. Families and the public, in general, don’t respond well to anyone coming out. Umang and Samara are examples of individuals who seem to be leading perfect lives, but from within, they are struggling to keep themselves together as they can’t be themselves, not just in front of the public but their family as well.

On the other hand, Damini becomes the talk of the town through her investigative story on online trolls. She gains good traction and receives awards. She also learns that the entertainment wing of her media house will be doing a sting expose on Samara Kapoor. Damini’s hunch is right about Samara Kapoor’s sexuality being made public by an entertainment website; it will possibly damage Umang as well. Damini, in the second season, learns to beat procrastination and starts working on her book. After months of research, when she approaches publishers, she gets shrugged off by them, only to feel dejected. Her book gets published eventually, but she wasn’t ready to face the backlash it received at the launch and the literary book festival. Subsequently, her book gets banned, and she receives an offer to move to Singapore. Damini, on a personal front, loses Jeh due to her infidelity with Dr. Warsi. Jeh, a bartender at the truck bar she frequents, falls for Damini after his previous girlfriend cheats on him. Jeh is devastated to learn of Damini’s infidelity. Dr. Warsi is attracted to Damini, but she is confused if Dr. Warsi’s affections are real. Soon though, Damini learns of her pregnancy and is sure it is Dr. Warsi’s kid. Unfortunately, Damini loses her child to a miscarriage, putting her in a bad state of mind. Damini is seeking a partner that won’t be threatened by her profession, which sadly is the state of independent women in India. She finds an understanding partner in both Jeh and Dr. Warsi. She is perpetually confused about whom to have her future with, as she likes both.

Sidhi, on the other hand, decides to take things into her own hands and pursues a lot of activities after the major incident in her life. In the first season, she got on an adult website and posted a sensuous video of herself to gain some validation for her body type. It turns out she was being harassed by none other than her fiancé’s father. Her fiancé broke up with her, and her father was ashamed of what she had done, but her mother, who was constantly bickering about her body size, came to her support. Sidhi is trying her level best to do something good for herself and gain the confidence of her father. She ventures into stand-up comedy along with Amit, who helps her from scratch with how to write material for the stage. Sidhi finds solace in Amit while getting better at writing scripts for her stand-up comedy. Sidhi soon realizes she needs to get away from her privileged life in Mumbai and her parents. She applies for a comedy course in New York in an attempt to be independent. Sidhi comes from a background where she doesn’t have to work to achieve anything. She was initially okay with a life like that, and the rest of the gang accepted her for who she was. She soon realizes that to gain control of her life, she cannot give the leash to some guy she is dating or stay with her parents forever. Sidhi takes it upon herself to change her life.

Each episode of “Four More Shots Please” dives deep into the friendships these women share and with people outside of the four of them. The struggles of a single mother, shuffling between work, being a parent, shuffling between work, parenting, and dating, become exhausting, which is portrayed quite well in the show. Damini, Umang, and Sidhi find a way to be themselves in a crowd of so many talented people and still stand out. They also stand up for themselves without being dependent on anyone. They face the consequences of their actions and are proud to have moved on to things they like. The writers of “Four More Shots Please” may have exaggerated a lot of scenarios, but they do not shy away from calling a spade a spade. Female writers telling stories of women is the highlight of “Four More Shots Please.”


What To Expect From ‘Four More Shots Please,’ Season 3?

Season 3 of “Four More Shots Please” releases on October 21st, 2022, on Amazon and will take the stories of Damini, Umang, Anjana, and Sidhi forward. We will see what they are up to and know that they have made some major changes in their lives. The women face the usual backlash from the menfolk for living a life on their own. Umang will try to figure out her life without Samara. Damini, by now, will have chosen her life trajectory. Sidhi will have to deal with life going forward without her father’s presence and support, and Anjana will have to find ways to be a working mother, juggling all the tasks she is expected to do. These topics and many more will be a part of the narrative in season 3 of “Four More Shots Please.”


“Four More Shots Please.” Seasons 1 and 2 are streaming on Amazon Prime Video with subtitles.

Smriti Kannan
Smriti Kannan
Smriti Kannan is a cinema enthusiast, and a part time film blogger. An ex public relations executive, films has been a major part of her life since the day she watched The Godfather – Part 1. If you ask her, cinema is reality. Cinema is an escape route. Cinema is time traveling. Cinema is entertainment. Smriti enjoys reading about cinema, she loves to know about cinema and finding out trivia of films and television shows, and from time to time indulges in fan theories.


 

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