Imagine what would happen if each one of us turn into a demon. The world will no longer be a place of life, but death. Asur, a web series by Gaurav Shukla and Oni Sen, very creatively and intelligently portrays such type of scenario through a seamless blend of crime, forensic science, mythology, psychology, and new-age technology.

From the thought-provoking storyline to the suspense and mysteries that each episode holds, Asur never lets your heartbeat go slower.

The series revolves around Nikhil Nair (Barun Sobti), a forensic expert, and Dhananjay Rajpoot (Arshad Warsi), a CBI officer and Nikhil’s mentor, who reunite at the CBI office to solve the mystery of a series of brutal murders. During investigations, they found that the killer has mythological links as well as deep knowledge of modern-day science and technology.

The series has two seasons. Season 1 deals with the series of murders and the suspense of the anonymous killer and his motive. Parallely, it unfolds the past events of an old case of a child Shubh Joshi (Vishesh Bansal) whose father had a mysterious death.
Season 2 unfolds the mystery of the motive behind the series of murders and also reveals the mastermind behind brutal events.

One of the most promising features of Asur is its intelligent and layered writing. Each event is found to be effortlessly and intelligently linked with another event. Even if you miss just a scene while watching, you’re going to lose a lot of points of the mystery that are unfolded with each passing minute. Each episode of the series is filled with twists and turns that leave you carving for more.

The lead actors as well as the supporting actors have done their parts with excellence. Each of them seems to be invested in the characters they are playing.

Asur, as a web series, is not just a crime thriller but it shows the dark reality of humans, and at the same gives us a hidden message.

We all are aware that ‘we’, humans, have both good and bad characteristics in us. Any of these can these characteristics can be triggered by external influences, situations, environments, and scenarios that surround us. Good character is awakened by love, care, respect, affection, and all the positive aspects around us. On the other hand, the bad character is triggered due to hatred, harshness, cruelty, and the negative influences we encounter. Many times, it’s in our hands to choose the path of good or evil. However, it’s not always. Our actions are not always just ours. They are influenced by the people, society, politics, government, the market, and everything around us. We don’t always decide anything at our own will. We get influenced by the ideologies of other people.

In this series, the antagonist becomes the Asur or demon because he didn’t get the love and affection he needed from his father. Instead, the hatred that he experienced transformed him into an Asur or demon. A genius mind that could have been a great gift to mankind turned to the path of evil just because of hatred and harsh words. This is what hatred does. It destroys everything. And that’s why we need to spread love and compassion in society, not hatred. Unfortunately, the reality is quite the opposite. We are spreading hatred and paving the way for the creation of ‘Asurs’ in our society. (When I refer to hatred, I am not limiting it to any specific field or topic; I mean it in a broad sense, encompassing our daily activities.)

The mythological tales depicted in this series simply point out that there will be a day of apocalypse when this world will be destroyed. This is what every religion and even science says. We are heading towards it each day; the day when the whole world will be consumed by hatred, evil, and bad deeds. Good and evil exist at the same time in the world to create a balance. However, the increase in evil will ultimately lead to an apocalypse. The Asur says in a scene that he was killing good people because they were slowing the pace of destruction. It means goodness and humanity can save us from destruction or at least delay its arrival.

The series also teaches us how someone can manipulate our minds and actions by creating unwanted scenarios and forcing us to do what he wants. We might remain unaware and the mastermind can deceive us with his ‘Maya’ and can influence us without our knowledge. We do not get to know that someone is controlling us. The only thing that can save us from the trap of evil is love and our inherent goodness and humanity which must be continually nurtured. We don’t have to let anyone awaken the ‘Asur’ that resides within each one of us.