Which TV serial did the most justice to Arjuna's power?

Introduction - A easy answer could be BR Chopra's because hes the only one who did justice to virat yudh, while other tv serials barely came close, but a more keen look will tell a different story on which serial did true justice. So its possible that chopra will not be seen as the best.

The 7 serials i am considering:

Sanjay Khan's Jai Mahabharat (2001) & Maharathi Karna (2003).

Chopra's Mahabharat (1988).

Sagar's shri krishna series (1993).

Sony TV's suryaputr karn tv serial.

Karn Sangini - Kinshuk Vaidya was the guy who portrayed arjuna.

Jai hanuman was released in 1997, even for a little while it did focus on Mahabharat, they began with van parva & ended with kurukshetra, so i am counting it because they show arjuna fighting multiple times their.

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Why Starplus Mahabharat failed to do justice?

Answer - Because they showed arjuna losing to bhishma, even if arjuna is clearly holding back still i do not accept this. It was clearly unfair biased handling and writing. They showed that even when arjuna had his four brothers doing a group attack he would fail to win against bhishma.

So starplus mahabharat will not be considered as a option here. I will also exclude the 'Radha Krishna' tv serial aswell. And ekta kapoor too since she had not given arjuna enough scenes.

My GOAL in this post will be to answer which the question of which show did the most justice to his power, which tv serial made him the most capable? The first show i am discussing will be the one with hanuman's name in the title.

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JH - shows that he overpowered Karna before the curses kicked in (chariot wheel getting stuck):

Arjuna disarmed the kirata (Shiva in disguise):

They also showed that arjuna's arrow bridge could not be broken by hanumaan. But i will not provide a gif regarding that last achievement.

Explanation - The problem with his last 2 achievements is that they were done cause the characters were holding back, hanuman did not want arjuna to feel bad so he decided to not use his full power against that bridge of arrows. And shiva was dominating arjuna until hanuman appealed in front of him (with folded hands) to be mild which is why arjuna succeeded in disarming him their.

Apart from these 3 their's no achievement of arjuna in JH that is worth noting. Though the karna one was a fair achievement. Their were no defeats of Arjuna shown in JH because it was not focused on Mahabharat as the main/sole topic, and the character of arjuna did not have as many appearances as hanumana did. So JH's arjuna enjoys the factor of being the only one that never loses.

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Sanjay Khans Mahabharat (2001):

They showed him losing to Bhishma once.

GIF

However they also showed him defeating bhishma in virat yudh. So i guess it's balanced out.

They always portrayed him better than karna so no point in elaborating on that.

For Guru Drona their is one time where they show drona overpowering arjuna even if it is by just 1 percentage (on day 12). It looks like drona was holding back or arjuna was holding back too, its upto the interpretation of the audience but a cross reference existed in the show of Duryodhan claiming that their were many times where drona could have slayed arjuna but choose to not do so.

GIF

Conclusion - my opinion is that drona overpowers Arjuna here but he does not defeat arjuna. Because arjuna did not get injured or tossed off his chariot here. Though the bow he wielded fell from his grip so it does look bad for him on screen.

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SPK arjuna;

Had vaishnavastra, brahmastra & pashupatastra.

Also had fake astras (never shown in the book) like andhkar astra (used in rangbhoomi), and the bhaya astra (used to create fear).

The special astras they made him use in war itself, at day 2 he uses a illusionary type weapon which tricks ashwathama/duhsasana into fighting eachother. At day 14 he used nagastra on jayadrath.

His achievements without astras:

Rangbhoomi - built a throne of arrows for yudisther.

Guru Dakshina - cut off Drupad's bow.

Day 11 - injured karna in the stomach.

Kills a driver of Bhishma on day 2 of Kurukshetra Yudh;

Unarmed comparison with karna.

Karna (despite having kavach kundal) gets overpowered by Suyodhan:

Arjuna (on day 14) literally one shot's Suyodhan by throwing him back:

According to this tv serial duryodhan was also better than bheem with a mace (yet inferior to drupada) and bheem outmatched karna once in the same show. Using ABC logic arjun's achievement puts him far above karna (gautam rode).

Source - Ep 266 of spk

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KarnSangini;

They showed arjuna's variety as he defeated king Drupada by wrestling rather than the redundant style of archery.

Arjuna overpowers Karna himself in a fight (after tournament before lakshagrah):

[Gif]

Source - episode 11 of karn sangini.

No incident of Karna (aashim gulati) overpowering Arjuna existed in KarnSangini.

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Anti feats of arjuna khan [chopras arjun];

Loss to yudisther in tournament.

{gif that proved it}

Source - chopra's 24th episode.

The loss to yudisther brings chopra's arjun down alot.

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My opinion of 2 incidents which occur in the serial of Chopra:

Episode 84 - arjuna fought Drona & then avoids him.

Ep 88 - duhsasana dies, karna supposedly spared Arjuna.

My analysis; the drona fight cant be seen as a bad performance or a loss because arjuna was still able to destroy the chariot of drona & he only begins to run away from drona after drona switched chariots by taking another. Though arjuna did not win & drona did not lose still he overpowered him by destroying his chariot once.

Gif that proves it.

The 88th episode incident is what i consider the true anti-feat/embarrassment. But i have a semi counter to this one. My counterargument is that the fight began as arjuna dominating karna by injuring him with 3 arrows while karna pulled those out of his limbs & only started to gain a upperhand once he fired the snake weapon. After that arjuna doesnt fight in a calm, cool or collected manner instead he began shooting arrows recklessly which couldnt touch karna.

So Karna is able to then wound him with 2 arrows & use another arrow to pierce his gandiva bow in a way where its basically stuck on the chariot's axle.

Based on who injured who more its 3-2 a scoreboard in favor of arjuna, but based on the arrow attacks of karna (cutting crown, getting gandiva stuck) he would get 2 additional points making it 4 to 3 in favor of karna. The point i am making is that this was only possible due to arjuna losing self control over his emotions and still it was a very close match between both of them.

Even if the 16th day incident is a win for Karna then it can be rendered irrelevant because of the number of incidents where arjun defeated karna in that same show:

1st - swayamvara duel

2nd & 3rd - matsya battle

4th - sammohan astra

5th - day eleven

6th - day fourteen

All six duels were fair fights. Basically arjuna wins 6 fights karna won 1 fight, its 85 percent in arjuna's favor only not karnas.

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Maharathi Karna serial;

Over here the issue is it was a incomplete show and that arjuna really only had 3 action scenes, one was the incident of him capturing droopad:

Logic - this matters cause in this tv serials continuity droopad was a student of Parshuram like bhishma, drona & karna.

The 2nd incident was a duel against Karna which ends in a draw.

The 3rd is a duel against a Yaksha where he does win;

Logic - its possible that yaksha was Angaraparna (whose a gandharv warrior in adi parva) but his identity is upto speculation because it hasnt been mentioned what his name is.

Chopra's never shown a battle where arjuna fought a character that is deva, yaksh or gandharv, so when it comes to the VARIETY of enemies then MK did a slightly better job.

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Shri Krishna serial (1993).

I know their exists a incident where he killed bhishma, drona & suyodhana but what the audience doesnt realize is that it was a dream sequence, which was filled with internal thought's in arjuna's own mind, it was apart of the bhagavad geeta segement of this tv show. It does not count as an achievement here.

Sandeep Mohan was immune to fire-damage:

Arjuna kills Bhayasur (after subhadra-vivaha pre dice game);

Arjuna overpowered Bhishma (ep 163):

LogicalQuestion - who was more wounded afterward's?

Answer: its clearly bhishma who was in a worse condition after that fight.

Arjuna defeated guru Drona (ep 164);

Bonus - it's the only tv serial which knew theirs a difference between Brahmasheer & Brahmastra so they gave Sandeep Mohan the honor of being the only arjuna actor to possess the brahmashir astra.

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Difference between the representations of virat yudh.

Sagar's Shri Krishna - their are many cross references of it taking place but no presentation it was never shown on screen, also its implied only karna/kouravas participated no involvement of kripa, drona or bhishma or even ashwathama is mentioned.

Sanjay Khan's Jai Mahabharat - here they've shown that the battle happens onscreen but their was no sammohan astra, instead of beating karna twice they show arjuna defeated karna only once not twice, same with all other enemies.

And kripacharya was absent, one more difference is that they showed the army of matsya accompanying arjuna in the war, so the army of hastinapore fought matsya desh's army at the same time when arjuna was dueling the kaurav warriors.

Chopra's Mahabharat version does not need a introduction but its clear that chopra did the best work when it comes to virat yudh alone but this post is not meant to be specifically limited to just virat yudh only, its about arjuns power so all other things should be taken into account too.

Besides these 3 TV series none bothered to highlight or give attention to virat yudh except for SPK their they allow drona to lose against Arjuna but they do not allow karna to lose legitimately instead they make karna surrender to arjuna out of a vow to Kunti mata. While bhishma's character is white washed as not even fighting in the war yet being their to witness the battle.

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CONCLUSION; If its just about virat yudh then i believe that Chopra did the best work, if its about a win/loss ratio then JH did the best job cause their arjuna never loses, but if you consider the amount of different astras they show him using then SPK did the best job.

Cause in spk they gave arjuna the nagastra, vaishnav astra, tvashtrastra, brahmastra & pashupatastra. Along with fan made weapons like bhayastra/chakravaan astra.

He just didn't have brahmashir astra but sagar's arjuna (sandeep mohan) did have it. Sandeep Mohan did not use the same number of astras that navi bhangu did. A good thing about both of them is that they never lose to yudisther.