‘The road to hell is paved with good intentions’ is the phrase that this gripping two-season series embodies. The show follows the life of Ramy Hassan, an American millennial with roots in Egypt, and captures how he grapples with his conception of the ideas of spirituality, love, religion, family, and judgement. The comedy-drama encapsulates snippets of what constitutes a sense of belonging for a minority, immigrant community in the United States and humorously captures the cultural conflicts and politics of the two nations that Ramy identifies with, the USA and Egypt.
While the first season gives us a glimpse of the characters and their ideas, the second season grips one further as Ramy finds himself in unfamiliar terrain in Egypt, falling in love, drifting in and out of religious ideals and finding a Sufi spiritual instructor in Mahershala Ali. The show highlights contradictions between belief and faith, religious practice and understanding, family and loyalty and portrays the characters’ struggles with religious practice in a world of sin and vice. The show takes pace as it highlights religious biases, perceptions about Muslims and Ramy’s ‘well-intentioned sins’ as he tries to navigate between the ‘haram’ and ‘halal’ life while judging those around him.
Quick-one liners, puns on Trump, Islam and its relationship with the USA and a representation of religious performance and faith is what makes Ramy a must watch. Each character in the show has a different story, slowly unfurling in the background as Ramy struggles to juggle between Friday afternoon prayers and Friday night parties.
OpenAxis 