Four inseparable schoolboys, some cops scurrying for clues in a robbery and assault case and a gang of vicious criminals whose depredations vitiate a fictional hill town populate Snakes & Ladders, a moderately engaging Tamil web series created by Kamala Alchemis and Dhivakar Kamal.
The low-intensity and uneven show, which has Karthik Subbaraj as creative producer, employs the tropes of a cops-and-thieves thriller to examine the power of family and friendship to serve as bulwarks in the face of grave and unanticipated danger.
The meandering flow of the Amazon Prime Video series is broken occasionally by a flurry of action and befuddling comings and goings both in the town and in the gang's hideout. The life that it springs to is not steady enough to make the repercussions of the crime and the police investigation consistently absorbing.
That is not to say that Snakes & Ladders is not watchable. Especially noteworthy are the sub-plots that centre primarily on the boys' relationship with their parents, especially with their fathers, and with each other. These throw up a few of the show's more diverting tracks.
But it is the cops and the crooks and the boys (and a girl who they all bond with) who are caught in the melee that Snakes & Ladders is primarily about. It is here that the show needed a more generous injection of excitement, energy and intrigue.
The show's gentle canter never gives way to a full-fledged sprint. At times, the languor appears to be in sync with the leisurely pace of life in picturesque Rettamugadu (Kodaikanal stands in for the town). At others, it appears overly ponderous, even perhaps a touch indulgent.
Gilbert (M.S. Samrith), Iraiyan (Surya Ragaveshwar), Sandy (Surya Kumar) and Bala (Tarun Yuvraaj), like other boys of their age, are lured by misadventures. In the bargain, they land in trouble with the school headmaster, their guardians and the larger and more dangerous world of adults outside their immediate environs.
The problems of the teenagers - they ride around town on their bicycles looking for the little joys that seem to elude them at home - are severely aggravated by the ill-advised choices that they make either in haste or under duress.
Their impulsive actions inadvertently pit them against a bunch of goons who have their eyes on a precious artefact in an indigenous art museum. Two burglars working at the behest of a crime syndicate make their way into town and steal the priceless object.
One of them, a borderline psychopath named Blade, then decides on the spur of the moment to invade and rob two bungalows on his way out. That move backfires. Both end up separately in places they would not have bargained for.
Snakes & Ladders, written by Alchemis and directed by him (two episodes), Bharath Murlidharan (four episodes) and Ashok Veerappan (three episodes), is set in the mid-noughties in a fictional town where the police have not had much to do in years.
The chain of events triggered by the two robbers, and many other devious individuals in their wake, most notably the exceedingly hot-headed Richard "Rico" (Muthukumar), sends the cops on a manhunt that assumes the unpredictable nature of a game of snakes and ladders. They take far fewer steps forward than backward.
Leonard (Naveen Chandra), a man with a slew of secrets that hold the key to many a crucial revelation, does not help matters. He slips into town and rents a dwelling owned by a policeman who also happens to be the father of the nerdy class topper Irai.
The nine-episode series opens with an invasion of the home of a schoolteacher (Srinda). The robbers, before they decamp with their loot, attack the lady, leaving her in a coma, and her haemophilic young daughter, Raagitha (Sasha Bharen), in a state of shock.
The violent robbery is followed by another similar attempt that culminates in a kitchen closet and sucks Gilbert and his unsuspecting pals into the bewildering aftermath.
One of the burglars breaks into the bungalow where Gilbert lives with his grandfather, an ex-military man, and his wife. An unintended act committed in self-defence spells big trouble for the boy. He enlists the support of his friends to deal with the fallout and find a way out of the tangle.
The more the boys try to deflect the cops and the criminals from their secret, the worse things become for the quartet trapped in a quagmire. Irai's father, Chezhian (Nandha), is a police sub-inspector. But the man in uniform has no inkling what his son and his friends are up to. Nor is he aware of what Leo's bag of tricks contains.
Gilbert, Gilly to his friends, rues not having seen his parents in person for more than five years. The reason for their absence is never revealed - all that the audience learns is that the separation is about the end.
Sandy, a rebellious lad, has an uneasy relationship with his father Mahalingam (Manoj Bharathiraja), a factory worker who tends to overdo the disciplining act.
The plot has another father, Inspector Rajendran (Sreejith Ravi), who struggles to rein in his son, Vinay, even as he leads the investigation into the robberies. The boy is a high school bully hoist with his own petard when one of the four junior boys socks him in the face, leaving him seething with anger and a sense of dented pride.
A box with a locket pendant with a painting enclosed in it is what the goons - there is an array of them - are after. The stolen article has gone missing along with the man who is supposed to be in possession of it. Add to that the jewellery burgled from the schoolteacher's home and the hunt for the booty - and the attempts to conceal it - become all the more desperate and complex.
This isn't the end of the story and the Rettamugadu boys aren't out of the woods. Another season is in the works. The biggest snake of them all makes an appearance - we do not see his face but know who he might be - in the final shot of Snakes & Ladders.
This one's a middling affair. The follow-up would need to pack a bigger punch.
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Naveen Chandra, Srinda, Vettai Muthukumar