Krrish is the latest in a country full of superheroes

India is crowded with superheroes. Look at the Hindu pantheon of gazillion gods, the stars of our movies, and our main man of the moment, Sachin Tendulkar. If an outsider were looking in, he’d see a country that worships a Smurf-blue, _bhaang-_guzzling man with three eyes, married to a tiger-riding woman with way too many arms, who gave birth to a son who ends up half-elephant and makes his way about town on the back of a mouse. If that’s not already more trippy than watching The Matrix after stuffing your face with magic mushrooms, I can’t think of anything that will live up to your expectations. [caption id=“attachment_1207787” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] A still from Krrish 3.[/caption] No, wait. Maybe Rajinikanth? India’s Chuck Norris. On steroids. And speed. This ridiculously successful and constantly amazing 62-year-old Tamil actor continues to move faster than light, defies gravity, stops bullets with his mind, and lights cigarettes (which he invariably double-flips into his mouth) by shooting a bullet from his gun. These are signature staples, never mind what the rest of the movie is about. If urban legend is to be believed, Rajinikanth once got into a fight with a guy, and it was decided that whoever lost would have to wear his underwear on top of his clothes for the rest of his life. Today we call that loser Superman. That’s right. Close at his heels are the rest of Bollywood’s heroes. Over the last ten decades, the Bachchans, Khans, Kapoors, Deols and Darsheel Safary’s teeth have all taken turns saving the day in the most impossible situations. And they do it through interstate base jumping, turning invisible, crashing through glass walls, flying across oceans in Scootys, thrusting their pelvises at unsuspecting victims, ducking bullets with gobsmacking ease and singlehandedly Jujitsu’ing the pants off several dozens attackers at once. Like Hinduism, Bollywood also believes strongly in rebirth, both temporarily and long-term. Whether you’ve just ingested cyanide, or had your brain fly out of your skull and across the room, been shot in the face or buried alive, taken off life support in the hospital or eaten by crocodiles…you’re unlikely to leave any unfinished business behind. Because in those last few seconds before you succumb to the light and whatnot, you’ll experience a second wave. Dying heroes of Indian cinema have used this sudden and final surge of strength to do everything from finishing their sentence to deathslamming the bad guys, saving the girl they love, kicking lions in the jaw, uncovering buried treasure, escaping prison and/or changing into a bright yellow tuxedo. Take your time, guys, your script doesn’t read ‘exit, stage left’ until much after it should have. My point is that Indian cinema has had superheroes covered for decades already—we just haven’t specifically called them that. By the time Hollywood caught up and decided it was trendy to explore superheroes and their lives, we’d already pretty much exhausted our imaginations. But we can be a competitive lot, so when the likes of Superman, Spiderman, Batman and all the X-Men came out to play, we went back to the drawing board anyway. Caught between a delirious state of confusion and extreme enthusiasm, we spent enough hundreds of crores to come up with some serious champions. Let’s look at just five of the most talked-about guys in the last 10 years, and I’ll leave you to conclude why nobody in the world will ever take India’s superheroes seriously. DRONA (2008) Superhero: Drona, the warrior, played by Abhishek Bachchan. Superpowers: Looking serious. Punching things. Catchphrase: “Humey shrishti ko bachna hoga.” (Shrishti Arya is the name of the film’s producer, so I suspect they were counting on some subliminal messaging, as a back up plan. Unfortunately for Arya, Plan A and B both bombed.) ENTHIRAN/ROBOT (2010) Superhero: Chitti, the emo-robot, played by Rajinikanth. Superpowers: Emotions. Cloning himself by the hundreds. Runs on a rechargeable battery, which it charges by itself on detection of low battery. Being Rajinikanth. Catchphrase: “I am Chitti. Speed 1 Tetrabyte, Memory 1 Zetabyte.” RA.ONE (2011) Superhero: G.One a.k.a. Good.One (!), the videogame star, played by Shah Rukh Khan. Superpowers: Turns his head 360 degrees. Resurrection. Electric muscles. High voltage power surges. Catchphrase: “I’m ON!” ZOKKOMON (2011) Superhero: Zokkomon, the superstition buster, played by Darsheel Safary. Superpowers: Flying (oh wait, is that a jet pack on his back?). Vanishing into thin air. A cracked voice. Catchphrase: “Mann me hai vishwas, to har darr hai bakwas." KOI…MIL GAYA (2003), KRRISH (2006) & KRRISH 3 (2013) Superhero: Krrish, the superhuman do-gooder, played by Hrithik Roshan. Superpowers: Eidetic memory. Ability to communicate with animals. Superhuman strength, speed, stamina, endurance, and leaping prowess. Master of various martial arts. Catchphrase in Krrish 3: “Insaan hona meri kamzori nahin, taaqat hai.” A bit ironic for a guy with alien gobbledygook in his DNA to be saying this, but never mind those details. This week we hold our breath for Krrish 3, which promises to be the closest thing to an above average Indian superhero movie we’ve ever had. Will it work? We hope so, because we’re starting to look rather foolish now.