Nepo kids – Janhvi Kapoor, Ananya Panday… are all over in Bollywood, and it is a matter of concern or so I thought! Let me, Sumita Chakraborty, Editor-in-chief, TheGlitz, start with a disclaimer: I have nothing against fluff or star kids. In fact, I thoroughly enjoyed Emily in Paris. It was lively, fun, and the fashion was on point. Sometimes, all you need is a bit of light-hearted escapism, and I’m all for it. So when I sat down to watch Ananya Panday’s Call Me Bae, I wasn’t expecting Citizen Kane. But what I wasn’t expecting was just how puerile and soulless it would turn out to be.

Call Me Bae was, in one word, excruciating. There was no depth, no spirit. Ananya, poor girl, looked utterly lost, like she was flung into the world of OTT acting without a map. I couldn’t finish the series, and trust me, I tried. The sheer effort of getting through it felt like a marathon with no finish line. It was in that moment, sitting through cringey dialogues and flat delivery, that I realized I had finally reached my saturation point with Bollywood’s nepo kids.

Ah, the nepotism debate. It’s been done to death, I know. And I’m not here to bash star kids for merely existing. It’s just that after Call Me Bae, I began to wonder if these second-gen stars had anything new to offer beyond their surnames.

Which brings me to Janhvi Kapoor.

I’ll be honest: After the Call Me Bae debacle, I was hesitant to watch anything starring another nepo kid. So when Janhvi’s latest film Ulajh – produced by Junglee Productions – came up on my radar, I wasn’t exactly rushing to hit play. The premise sounded intriguing enough: Janhvi Kapoor as an Indian Foreign Officer entangled in a diplomatic conspiracy. Yet I couldn’t shake the looming shadow of the nepo tag and my recent disappointment.

But in the name of fairness, I decided to give it a go. And boy, was I bowled over.

First of all, let’s address the elephant in the room: Janhvi Kapoor is constantly accused of being a nepo kid, especially in Uljhan, where her character, an Indian diplomatic service officer, also happens to be the daughter of a highly respected civil servant and India’s new representative at the UN. I mean, you can’t make this stuff up—it’s like the scriptwriters leaned into her real-life narrative. But here’s the twist: it worked.

Yes, the film’s plot was a bit convoluted, and I’m still not entirely sure who was behind the grand conspiracy – was it the Indian government? The Pakistani government? The ISI? Or maybe the Pak Army? Honestly, I might need a flowchart to untangle the web of alliances and betrayals that peppered the storyline. But what surprised me wasn’t the geopolitical chess game at play – it was Janhvi Kapoor.

Janhvi was revelatory. She embodied her character with a depth I didn’t expect. She wasn’t the wide-eyed ingénue that we’ve seen before in her earlier roles; she had a quiet, simmering intensity. There was strength, vulnerability, and poise all in one performance. It didn’t feel like I was watching a star kid coasting on her last name. For the first time, I saw Janhvi Kapoor not as the daughter of the legendary Sridevi but as an actor in her own right.

Now, I’m not going to make unfair comparisons between Janhvi and her iconic mother. That wouldn’t do justice to either of them. They are two distinct individuals with their own journeys, and it’s time we give Janhvi the space to carve out her own legacy. And in Ulajh, she took a giant step towards doing just that.

In many ways, Ulajh wasn’t just a test for Janhvi’s character in navigating diplomatic turmoil; it was a test for Janhvi herself, proving that she has the chops to stand tall in Bollywood’s often ruthless arena. Sure, the plot could’ve used some tightening, and sure, I still don’t have all the answers when it comes to the tangled conspiracy at the webseries’ core. But in the end, it didn’t matter because I still enjoyed watching every minute of it. But what stood out most to me wasn’t the muddled storyline, but Janhvi’s transformation.

So yes, while Call Me Bae may have left me cringing and further skeptical of the nepo kid phenomenon, Janhvi Kapoor’s Uljhan did something quite unexpected – it restored my faith. She’s not just another famous last name. She’s someone to watch.

And watch, I certainly will.