Akshay Kumar has tried all genres in 2022, but nothing has worked. Can Ram Setu turn the tide?

The image makeover

Over the years, Akshay found a way to leave behind the over-the-top and flamboyant 90’s and cater to the country’s changing sentiments. He knew that he couldn’t quite pull off a Tu Cheez Badi Hai Mast Mast or Zeher Hai Ki Pyaar Tera Chumma on a new decade and a fast changing audience. With much trial and error, he moved with the new times, proved his comedy timing with both the Hera Pheris, Bhool Bhulaiyaa, Namaste London and Garam Masala, and managed a cult following with the thriller Ajnabee. From 2014, he slowly began to move towards a nationalistic image with films such as Airlift and Rustom. The film was a dreary drag about the Nanavati case that had plagued the judicial system in the 1950s. Akshay rewrote history and emerged as a stoic hero who was just trying to protect his wife’s honour. He won the National Award for this performance, amid much protest. After this, Akshay leaned fully into this new image and became a hero of social messaging of sorts. Toilet Ek Prem Katha and Pad Man followed.

He sermonized on the lack of proper toilets in the first, and in the second, he played the role of Arunachalam Muruganantham, a man who generated awareness about the traditional unhygienic practices in India. He doggedly kept up his patriotic onslaught, with Gold, Kesari and Mission Mangal. All if them worked. Akshay had the Midas touch and much was written about how he had raced ahead of the Khans, each of whom were struggling at the box office in dofferent degrees. Yet, Akshay didn’t want to completely leave the side of him that fans were familiar with—and so we were subjected to Housefull 4, an agonizing comedy that had every possible problematic trope in cinema. That worked too. There was the comedy Good Newwz in the mix too, which was Akshay’s valiant proof that he wasn’t just into nationalistic films.

Pre-Covid Akshay could still get away with a lot, even when the scripts failed to make sense at points. He could bank on that glowing heroism and messiah image—the one who could save the country, be it in science, sports, or even war. Akshay could singlehandedly pull the country out of devastation in his films. He was merging seamlessly with his film roles, in terms of box office successes—-there was really nothing that wouldn’t work. He seemed to have found the secret key to success, and other filmmakers were hastily following suit—-whatever mints the money at the box office. Chest-thumping jingoism became Bollywood’s cash cow.

Post-Covid Akshay

But has the tide turned? Post Covid, as Bollywood can miserably testify, people needed a lot more than hefty budget star-driven films with mostly unappealing trailers to bring people to the theatres. He had better luck in 2021, as BellBottom saw people returning to cinemas and Sooryavanshi did good business at the box office, primarily because it was part of Rohit Shetty’s cop universe.

To be honest, none of Akshay Kumar’s slew of films in 2022 had something remotely interesting about them. There was hardly a buzz about Bachchan Pandey, touted to be an action-comedy, starring Kriti Sanon and Jacqueline Fernandez. Akshay played a menacing one-eyed gangster, killing people with much relish. But what’s there to kill when the storyline is already dead? The film had none of the madness of the original film Jigarthanda, and just progressively made less sense as it continued. Made on a budget of Rs 180 crore, the film earned only around Rs 73 crore.

Following this, Akshay released the historical drama Samrat Prithviraj, another desperate re-writing of history, to the extent that even the crucial facts were changed. History, nationalism—this was his zone, wasn’t it? Just three years ago, he had starred in Kesari, a retelling of the battle of Saragrahi. He dies heroically on the battlefield. But Samrat Prithviraj didn’t even let him die gracefully, no; he had to be the hero, an ingratiatingly incorrect presentation of history.

Once again, the trailer left no impact, the film, even less. Samrat Prithviraj even starred Manushi Chillar, but even that was not enough to rouse the audience from the Bollywood fatigue that had set in. The film left the box office with a mere whimper, rather than the glorious roar that Akshay had expected. Historical dramas had failed Akshay too, which is ironic, because the audience devours them as Ponniyin Selvan showed. But Samrat Prithviraj had none of the tautness of PS-1, or the even the thrills, glitz and panache of SS Rajamouli’s RRR. It barely even had history.

But Akshay wasn’t done. He still had the melodramatic family drama Raksha Bandhan left in his arsenal. This could work perhaps? Action-comedy, and historical drama had betrayed him. But he was let down here, and all the debates surrounding the imminent clash with Aamir Khan’s Laal Singh Chaddha fell silent, because neither films performed. Nobody was keen on a Forrest Gump remake, and nobody wanted to watch Akshay running pillar-to-post and playing savior to his sisters this time, in an effort to get them married before he does.

Slammed by critics heavily, the film crashed and burned at the box office. Following this, a determined Akshay released a murder thriller as well, Cuttputtli on OTT, which received the same negative reviews that had been plaguing Akshay throughout 2022. The film was dreary and lacked any sort of riveting interest that one could expect from a thriller.

Now we have Ram Setu, where Akshay will go on a King Solomon’s Mines-like mission to unearth the story about the Ram Setu bridge, and seems to have found a astronaut-like spacesuit to do that in. But, will this work?

Akshay Kumar tried everything in 2022, really, a desperate effort to prove that he in fact, can do anything and reignite that old belief. Yet, that faith has temporarily weakened—it remains to be seen what Akshay will do next. Will he once again become the savior of the Bollywood box office?