Manu Ashokan’s on shaping his web series, ‘Eyes’, which delves into stalking and the trauma that comes with it

Being stalked is terrifying. Bringing home the enormity of many such scenarios is the new Malayalam web series,Eyes, streaming on SonyLIV.

The seven-episode series is the first web series by Manu Ashokan, who has directed two talked-about movies in Malayalam – Uyare, the story of a resilient acid attack survivor, andKaanekkaane, a narrative about love, betrayal and guilt, both scripted by the duo, Bobby-Sanjay.

Eyes has Manu teaming up with the duo again, with the story written by Anjana Nayar, Sanjay’s wife. The series is about a five-member team that uses a software, Eyes, to monitor and intercept stalkers and thus prevent any crime that could happen. The team has psychologist and software expert Vidya (Shruthi Ramachandran), psychologists Ayesha (Nikhila Vimal) and Tanvi (Riyaa Jithu), along with two police officers Tina (Kani Kusruti) and Justin (Prabhu Murali Krishnan).

Manu says that he was planning his next movie after Kaanekkaane when SonyLIV approached him with an offer to make a web series. “This was three years ago, and the platform was stepping into the long-form series format then. When Anjana chechi came up with this thread the platform was enthused about the project,” says Manu.

The filmmaker avers that the extent of damage stalking can unleash is scary. “Just like Pallavi, the acid attack survivor in Uyare, achieves the tangible dream of becoming an air hostess, Eyes also is a dream which we wish had existed. It is futuristic. In fact, several people have commented on my social media handles about having such a system in place,” says Manu.

He says that Eyes addresses Gen Z, especially girls. “After our preview show, some girls came up to me and said that they could relate to several instances in the series. Mostly it is women who are at the receiving end of stalking,” Manu says, adding, “Sadly, these situations are misunderstood as love. Obsession, control, madness, possessiveness… everything seeps in. And this is not restricted to any particular strata of society. For example, take the case of IAS officer, Sajin (Dev Mohan), and wife Shobitha (Saniya Iyappan), daughter of an influential politician.”

The series has a female-driven narrative, which, Manu says, was an organic decision. “Just like one of the characters says, women can understand the situations better and from different angles.”

Manu observes that the biggest challenge was giving enough time for the viewer to understand each character which explains the duration of the episodes [majority of them 50 minutes]. “There has been criticism about the length. We deliberately did that because it is not just another thriller, and that much time was needed to present each character and their predicament. In fact, the challenge was actually in telling the story within that time frame. We had to make it convincing but it was not easy to write and execute it.“

The web series format came handy in that scenario. “I found more freedom and could go into the details. It would not have been possible to cover the nuances of each character in any other format.”

With so many characters in the story, the writing was not easy. “The total duration would be equivalent to that of three movies. It was challenging to work with a large crew and so many actors, around 150 of them, with the shoot being held in over 100 locations,” Manu says.

The performances have come in for a lot of praise. While familiar faces such as Nikhila, Shruthi and Kani proved their mettle yet again, Manu is pleased about giving meaty characters to the likes of Dev Mohan, Saniya Iyappan, Anand Manmadhan (Priyanandan) and Parvathy R Krishna (Jessy).

The best takeaway was working with a bunch of new faces – Prabhu Murali Krishnan [Justin in the Eyes team], Riya [Tanvi in Eyes], Vasudev Basu, who plays Milan, the delusional photographer who stalks actor, Rithika played by Anagha, and Aadie as Hemanth, the possessive lover of Varsha essayed by Athira Patel.

“The energy you get while working with new actors like these is incredible. The best thing that came out of this experience was launching my acting workshop, Chhaaya, which has completed two sessions so far. I have identified some amazing actors through the workshops.”

He continues: “The new talents are like a blank slate; they were very receptive when I acted out the scenes. I had to ease the pressure they would feel as newcomers. For example, in their combination scenes, Aadie, a School of Drama find, and Athira, who has done a few roles, made everything look so easy that I only had to support them,” he says.

The filmmaker bats for bringing in more new faces to the industry. “There are so many out there waiting for a chance. They are so good that we just have to handhold them. Of course, their survival depends on many other factors.”

Talking about the long-standing bond with Bobby and Sanjay, Manu says that their relationship goes beyond cinema. “We came in touch through late filmmaker Rajesh Pillai. The bond we share is not just of a director and writers. We discuss everything under the sun, and make several rounds of calls a day. Several stories have come out of these discussions,” he adds.

Eyes is streaming on SonyLIV