LCU – The Mega Magnificent Lokesh Kanagaraj Cinematic Universe…
As the Tamil director Lokesh is all set to blow the theater screens from October 19 with his highly anticipated second collaboration with super star Vijay, the expectations are its peak – as fans are still in confusion whether Leo is LCU banded or not. Hints are here and there, but has to grasp tight and wait serene till tomorrow morning.
The trailer cuts suggest that the movie could be another recto of India’s most ‘wanted’ shared universe, a spectacular employment of lone fiction king Lokesh.
So what’s LCU? And why there is so much in expectation by the zealots for the 37-year-old director who has just 4 films in his bag and the fifth is just one more day ahead?
Nothing else. Because his name is Lokesh Kanagaraj and what he did in a short time is unbelievable, like an epic saga.
Lokesh began his career with the 2016 Tamil-language anthology film Aviyal which is consisted of four short films, each directed by Alphonse Putharen, Shameer Sultan, Mohit Mehra, Guru Smaran and Lokesh Kanagaraj. His short film Kalam was included in Aviyal, and was produced by renowned director Karthik Subbaraj. Lokesh was a bank employee then for four years and was also married. In 2017, he made his directorial feature debut with the hyperlink film Maanagaram.
The next came the big roar Kaithi, an action-thriller featuring Karthi in the lead role as an ex-prisoner. And the movie marked the beginning of big-bold three letters – LCU.
No entertaining songs, no comedy, and no dance numbers – Kaithi was a complete Lokesh universe, shot entirely at night without any daytime sequences. It was the Diwali release of 2019 with an esemplastic set of suspense, action, and thrilling elements having Narain, Arjun Das, Harish Uthaman, George Maryan, and Dheena in pivotal roles. The story with a root from the character of Narain (featured as Inspector Bejoy), which later incorporates Karthi (featured as Dilli) unveiled a grand plot of smugglers and drug peddlers under an undisclosed shredded gangster, revealed through the second installment of LCU.
The Adaikkalam gang, a wanted, dangerous smuggler bunch from Tamil Nadu’s Trichy and their attempt to recover the Bejoy seized 900kg of cocaine by murdering the entire city’s top ranked police officers became an interesting roller coaster as Diili joins with Bejoy to rescue the officials. The fights and chases marked gory but were perfectly set suited the craft which Lokesh dreamed for. Dilli was presented as someone who accidently put in between the Adikkalam gang and police but by the climax, Lokesh hinted a connection between Dilli to the gang directly, may be to a more powerful criminal who controls the gang for his drug dealings.
But the audience were left to wait till 2022, until the release of Vikram, to get a glimpse of Lokesh’s ultimate ‘Villian’ – Rolex. In between he pushed his first collaboration with Vijay, an action-drama titled Master. Master was a commercial success and became the highest grossing Indian film of 2021.
“Naayakan Veendum varaar ettum thikkum bhayam thane”, the Anirudh music with Vishnu Edavan’s lyrics was a perfect description for the star actor Kamal Hassan, in 2022, presenting a return to the big-breaking box-office after several years through Vikram. “Once upon a time, there lived a ghost, he was known to be a killer, and feared the most…” as the music clutches the heart beats, Lokesh launched the second emperor of his cinematic universe – Vikram. The huge success of the movie catapulted Lokesh to a stardom and the multi-starrer with an ensembled cast catalogue including Vijay Sethupathi, Fahad Faasil, and Kalidas Jayaram.
Narain and his inspector Bejoy came repeated in Vikram and also has mentions of the previous Adaikalam gang. The new chapter with a plot around another offshoot of Rolex – the Sandhanam gang by Vijay Sethupathi – features Amar (Fahad Faasil) and his covert black-ops team to bring justice to a group of masked vigilantes responsible for the deaths of Stephen Raj, who was accused for helping Adaikkalam.
The plot turns more bigger and more complicated as – similar to Kaithi – Santhanam and his drug syndicate search for two missing containers of drugs. The masked vigilantes, including Vikram and Bejoy, were all some way or the other affected by the wrath of Rolex in his drug dealings. Vikram was the former commander of the black ops squad, which Amar leads now. After a botched mission, the government hunted and brutally killed all squad members and their families; only Vikram and three other team members survived.
It was the mission to bust the Rolex ruled drug syndicate was continued through Vikram. There was long wait to know who plays the role and theatres erupted with huge loud as they witnessed their favourite actor Suriya in the role – an antagonist – a cold-blooded inhumane criminal.
Next is Leo. And if expectations meet reality, the Vijay led record-beater will be the third instalment in the staggering LCU. Both Kaithi and Vikram had open-ended plotlines, and Lokesh established a shared universe. Even though the name LCU was coined by fans, he accepted it and announced more projects lined to be released in future under the same banner. Narain is the only actor to have reprised his roles in both the films in the universe in a major role.
He is expected to be soon working on Kaithi 2, reported as a prequel to the character of Dilli. Vikram 2 is also possibly hit the screens in coming years and would be a part of LCU. As Suriya mentioned in an interview, a spin-off of Rolex is also in development.
The Lokesh Cinematic Universe, which is currently the 4th highest grossing Tamil film franchise should expand more and more and once Lokesh would rose to the face of Indian cinema.
