Doğduğun Ev Kaderindir
Demo and Ibo as Zeynep and Mehdi (I love them YAH)
Overall thoughts
Oftentimes when I watch two-hour long dizis...I end up skipping around the episode. This happens even with my favorite shows. It definitely says some things about my attention span but it’s also a result of dizis being filled with side stories, filler scenes and characters that don’t serve a purpose. With Doğduğun Ev Kaderindir things have been different. Granted we’re only two episodes in but I have never been so glued to my screen before.
Each episode is crafted with great attention to detail that it DEMANDS the audience’s attention. Episode 2 in my opinion achieved a perfect harmony between romance and heartbreak, sweetness and angst, resolution and suspense. The scenes flowed smoothly into each other but the tiny twists and turns kept the audience on edge. Every dialogue was important. Every scene served a purpose. Every character had a story and was complex. It’s no wonder DEK is getting such high ratings and has already been purchased internationally.
Disclaimer
Now there is a lot to talk about with DEK. And I mean A LOT. Too much for one review. I can’t possibly outline the episode and talk about everything without taking up at least 10 pages. So, each week I will try to share some thoughts and facilitate discussion into a particular aspect of the drama. Today I’m going to talk about Mehdi. There is a lot confusion in regard to who Mehdi is going to be in Zeynep’s life. Many sources have referred to him as her home and personally I believe this will be true. Most promotions of the show suggest has ZeyMeh as a romantic pairing and talks about them healing togetjer. Also given what we have seen so far of Mehdi we can all agree he has a good core though perhaps some underlying issues that were not apparent to us at first.
The Curious Case of Mehdi
A key difference between Zeynep and Medi's relationship with the audience is we have different level of access. Zeynep is telling us her story directly. Through her conversations with her therapist we have access to her inner thoughts and feelings. We’ve seen her as a child and witnessed everything that she went through first hand. We KNOW who Zeynep is, so her actions make sense to us even when they confuse the people around her. Mehdi on the other hand is a closed book. We meet him through Zeynep, and he is as much a stranger to us as he is to her. Of course, now that we’ve met him, we are allowed to follow him around and piece together who we think he is, but he never tells us directly.
Up until the end of episode two, we’ve only seen Mehdi in a ‘positive’ light. He is beloved by his family and neighbors. He protects vulnerable people around him. He dislikes pretentense and snobbery. He fell for Zeynep seeing her graciously take care of a stranger. We know he has been taking care of Remzi and his father’s grave for years. In fact, he visits the graveyard EVERY Wednesday. He values honesty and can take "no" for an answer. He also brings up death quite often in his conversations. He asks his cousin, “where will we be in a week?” (translation; we might be dead). He says things like “My mind is complicated. It’s mixed a little. It’s different.” Mehdi says life isn’t good to people like him. He’s sad when Zeynep rejects him but sadder when she says yes! Through out the episode we subtly see how jaded Mehdi is. He is a kind, caring individual but one who has accepted that the the universe will never bless him.
We see this side of him throughout the episode but in the beginning we’re more focused on his being sweet and supportive of Zeynep to pick up on the clues. Mehdi has demons of his own. His demons don’t negate his positive traits but serve as a cold reminder that he isn’t Zeynep’s prince in shining armor. He is a human being. He’s struggling with his father’s murder, his relationship with his mother and a very pessamistic perspective of the world. He chooses to believe that “luck and fate never loved me” to protect himself from getting his hopes shattered. When Zeynep refuses to marry him on their wedding day, he says he knew this would happen. He knew there had to be a catch, afterall, “It (Zeynep) is a very beautiful thing that it can’t be real.”
Now at the end of episode 2, Mehdi gets into two fights. The first with Celal, the son of the man that murdered his father and the second with Faruk. That Mehdi was willing to resort to violence shocked Zeynep and many viewers but I think most of us understood when he punched Celal. He definitely deserved it and given Mehdi’s sensitivity towards his father’s death, we could empathize. Plus, Zeynep had refused to marry him last minute and now he was married not only to a stranger but an unwilling stranger. And say what you will, but we have no reason to believe Mehdi to be an unjust man. A forced marriage would not be something he’s comfortable with. (Side note: I loved watching Zeynep yell at him to calm down. I love whenever her fierce or sassy side comes out).
I don’t support Mehdi punching Faruk though. It was uncalled for. But it did perhaps reveal a new side of him, one that’s very possessive over Zeynep. They are married and a strange man tried to grab his wife away from him. In a situation where Faruk was not Zeynep’s ex-fiance (note: Mehdi does not know this) and Mehdi had not just beat Celal, his reaction might not have been so surprising.
Some fans are worried after these two fights that Mehdi might be violent. We will all have to wait and see but I don’t think Mehdi will hurt Zeynep. I saw these scenes as an extension of Mehdi’s personality. He is protective of those around him because he’s seen evil up close. If there is any violence related to Mehdi it will probably be of a mafia or gang sort. There is no reason to believe he will engage in domestic violence. Throughout this very stressful wedding night, he has been patient and reasonable with Zeynep. I noticed he did not yell at her (yet) and she felt comfortable enough to yell at him. In fact, when she tells him that violence begets violence and that he should turn to the law or the police, I was reminded that Zeynep is a lawyer. Her views on handling people like Celal are very different from Mehdi who grew up in a mohalla. I think this will create tension between them and at some point Zeynep might be endangered by Celal or Mehdi might get hurt in a fight.
Zeynep and Mehdi visiting Zeynep's foster parents next episode (THEY LOOK SO MARRIED)
I am super excited for the next episode! From the promos it looks like we will be blessed with an exciting episode again. Please share your thoughts in the comments! What did you guys make of Mehdi?
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AishaAA95
Also check out the Zeynep ve Mehdi MV I made after ep 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iObDic91GmM
