4 stars for this lavish and colourful production.
Indian Summers is a period drama from Channel 4 set in the last years of the Raj in India’s Little England, Simla.
“India wants freedom on her own terms or not at all.”
Series One was set in 1932, now Season 2 is set three years later in 1935. Things have changed quite dramatically since the end of Series One.
The current Viceroy, Lord Willingdon (Patrick Malahide – Game of Thrones) is due to finish his term in a year and the ambitious Private Secretary Ralph Whelan (Henry Lloyd-Hughes – Man Up, Madame Bovary) has his eyes fixed on the prize, encouraged by the manipulative owner of the Royal Simla Club, Cynthia (Julie Walters – Paddington, The Harry Hill Movie).
Aafrin Dalal (Nikesh Patel – London Has Fallen) is now Under Secretary of the Home Department, a position which has allowed his family privileges they had never dreamed of. However, his growing involvement with terrorists Naresh Banerjee (Arjun Mathur – My Name is Khan) and Kaira (Sugandha Garg – Patang) looks to spell trouble for them all.
He visits his true love Alice Whelan (Jemima West – The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones) only to discover that her dastardly husband Charlie Havistock (Blake Ritson – Da Vinci’s Demons) has followed her to India and resumed their marriage.
Against a backdrop of unrest and approaching revolution the regulars of the Royal Simla club continue their lives of excess and debauchery, all the time aware that they are looking at the end of an era.
Indian Summers Series 2 is an excellent watch, full of action, plenty of political intrigue and romance, mostly illicit, and the acting is as good as you would expect from a cast such as this. It is rather disappointing that this is the final series, as I feel they had more to give.
If you were a fan of the first series then this is a must own, colourful, exciting and reminiscent of a very different time.
“Though I suppose they would say ‘if our cause is just and if the other side has all the might and power in the world and will not turn the other cheek like Mr. Gandhi’, well men like that, they would say ‘What choice do we have?'”
Indian Summers Series 2 is available to buy now on DVD
| Genre | Drama |
| Starring | Henry Lloyd-Hughes, Nikesh Patel, Jemima West, Julie Walters |
Available to buy on :  | |