Finally, a new set of faces. But alongside young girls with straight hair and straitjacketed in pin-striped jackets, are some old acquaintances in Shireen and Arup. And Jujhar Singh who like Kyunki’s Mihir has decided his face was too young for his hair and so dyed it — the hair, of course. Brand Headlines Today, he does that thing with his mouth which gives him a unique way with words.

Unfussy, old-fashioned. But what to say of the black/grey and yellow crossbow X? Rather sinister, which might be what the channel thinks of the news but would be more appropriate for Johnny Depp and the Pirates of the Caribbean. As for the signature tune, NDTV might slap it with a copyright infringement.

When there are so many news channels, a new one must have a very good reason for joining them. Merely to launch another news channel in English or Hindi like News 24, is no reason. So far, NewsX is without a rationale. It has a faintly Doordarshan air about it without DD’s wide news coverage, looks amateur, unfinished, is poor on news and views: why watch it? If you want to be BBC — guess that’s the model — you have to be sophisticated. To be simple, precise and still say a great deal is astonishingly difficult — which is why our garrulous channels don’t bother.

Welcome back, Shah Rukh Khan — not that he had gone anywhere what with his commercials and IPL. But he’s returned as the quiz-master a year after KBC. Kya Aap Paanchvi Pass Se Tez Hain? — perhaps the longest title on TV — is enjoyable if your taste runs to embarrassed adult contestants who cannot answer Class I-V questions. Shah Rukh is winsome, childishly pleased by their discomfiture as the kids know the answers to questions they don’t, like which is the deepest ocean, or which is the largest planet? (Who knows and who cares?).

... contd.