No genre in Hindi cinema has become fodder for memes as much as the Bollywood war film. The never-ending disclaimers profusely thanking the armed forces (since 2020, all scripts depicting them need clearance from the Ministry of Defence), the green palette to portray any scene or character in Pakistan, the abrupt spike in Urdu words when a Pakistani character appears on screen, a version of ‘naya India (new India)’ and ‘yeh ghar mein ghusega (it will barge into an enemy’s home)’ featuring in the dialogue – it’s all been mocked to the point of exhaustion. Even filmmakers seem aware of the fatigue surrounding lazy, rabidly jingoistic films, forcing them to work harder to make nationalistic narratives land.

Operation Safed Sagar, created by Abhijeet Singh Parmar and Kushal Srivastava, knows the challenges of making another series on India’s armed forces in the current climate. It understands how they’ve been co-opted to preach poisonous patriotism, how Pakistan’s kohl-eyed forces have been caricatured beyond recognition, and how war films are often dumbed down to speak the language of manipulation. It tries to do better by lending ordinary lives to its officers. For most of its six episodes, it stays away from those impulses. However, eventually, it succumbs.

Named after the Indian Air Force operation during the 1999 Kargil conflict (which borrows it from the snow-capped mountain peaks of the Kargil region), the show begins as an antidote to the Bollywood war film. Built around the ‘Golden Arrows’ squadron, featuring the obligatory gung-ho pilots inspired by Top Gun, it offsets the heightened testosterone with........

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