Viral clip: This Kuch Kuch Hota Hai criticism from the 90s show is golden. Karan Johar gets schooled on regressive tropes

You can stream Hip Hip Hurray on OTTplay Premium.

Not for nothing they say, nothing dies on the internet. You never know what might pop up on your timeline. Some memories may put a smile on your face, some might make you feel a little awkward. The latter could be true for filmmaker Karan Johar, who is now facing criticism on the internet for the movie he made in 1998. 

Karan Johar made his directorial debut with Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, starring Shah Rukh Khan, Kajol, and Rani Mukherjee. The movie is a love triangle, which was the flavour of the season at the time. And the film played up some gender serotypes to make it appealing to a wider audience. And not many were aware that the popular campus-based television series Hip Hip Hurray had given a scathing criticism of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, the biggest blockbuster in 1998. 

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The clip from one of the episodes shows, a group of teenage students discussing the movie. While the boys in the group find Kajol's saree look appealing, the girls find the movie "stupid and pathetic." The girls rue that even though Karan was a "young filmmaker" at the time, he perpetrated regressive tropes to increase the "commercial value" of the movie. 

One of the major criticisms of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai" is the way it portrays the female characters. The film perpetuates the idea that women are helpless without a man in their lives and that their sole purpose is to find a suitable partner. The character of Anjali, played by Kajol, is depicted as a tomboy who transforms into a stereotypical feminine character in the second half of the movie. Rahul, played by Shah Rukh Khan, didn't find the tomboy Anjali attractive. But, he finds the saree-clad Anjali irresistible. In a way, it reinforced the notion that women need to change themselves to be accepted by men.

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The clip from the old television series is going viral and winning the admiration of many. The show was created by Nupur Asthana and it's available for streaming on Zee5 and also on OTTplay Premium . And it won't be a surprise if the popularity of this series gains a lot of fans among the current generation, courtesy of this clip.