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The times are bad at Namma Seidhi, a formerly prestigious Tamil newspaper now being used to wrap hot snacks. Founder Chelladurai’s grandson Veera vows to keep the weekly newspaper alive with the help of his old buddy Azhagu, the intrepid Srivalli and unpaid intern Muthu. The Tamil show Local Times, out on Prime Video, explores the adventures of this very sincere, very clueless and very endearing quartet.

The debt-burdened Veera (Rishikanth) is obsessed with increasing the number of advertisements in the weekly paper – a challenge when he owes money to the local tea shop. His buddy Azgahu (Abdool Lee) is an eternal optimist, convinced that Namma Seidhi (Our Newspaper) will survive. Srivalli (Adwitha Arumugam) is the only sensible one around. Muthu (Maurish Das) is the wild-haired goofball who fulfils the screenwriting dictum that two’s company, three’s a crowd, and four is a party.

The seven-episode series, directed by Naveen George Thomas, isn’t aiming to be taught in journalism school. Written by Praveen Muthurangan and created by Abbhinav Kastura, along with Praveen Muthurangan, Satwik Gade, Thomas Manuel, and Visvaksen P, Local Times provides scant evidence of how the newspaper’s staffers put their edition together every week. Instead, the makers roll out numerous funny scenes punctuated by sharp lines and endearing...

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