dabangg 3 *ing: Salman Khan, Sonakshi Sinha, Kichcha Sudeep, Saiee Manjrekar, Arbaaz Khan, Pramod Khanna

Rated: 6/10

A lot is always expected when the film has Salman Khan. The audience expects him to be OTT and better himself with each of his projects. This is more so when it comes to the Dabangg series that began in 2010. In these nine years, people have come to expect that Bhai will not only be better with each of the sequences.

This means that each film has to have better action, better songs, better story, better item number and most importantly a better Salman Khan who will show his swagger that will appeal to the masses. One of course, can’t forget that Bhai has to take off his shirt!

Dabangg 3 manages to deliver on some count and on some counts it fails miserably.

Let’s see the good first. The item song — Munna badnaam hua — will definitely bring back the  reverse song to which Malaika Arora had taken a patent. Salman Khan’s hand continues to down the baddies with just a single punch. His signature Chulbul Pandey grin is still there. The other good is that he has lost weight and the leaner meaner look is good. Even Sonakshi Sinha has lost weight and looks good. Pramod Khanna who stepped into Vinod Khanna’s shoes as Prajapati Pandey makes one nostalgic.

What is not good is Kichcha Sudeep as the villain. He is not a patch on Sonu Sood. Then there is a back story that drags for almost half hour; it film could have done without it.

The other songs in the movie are not worth humming. There are some glaring bloopers. We all know that Pandey’s relationship only got better towards the very end of Dabangg. Here, they show that the two are best buddies in the back story. One can’t have glaring mistakes in a Dabangg franchise.

Sadly, this one is not a patch on the original. is there a Dabangg 4? Maybe.