Filmmaker-producer Siddharth P Malhotra is turning a strong 2026 into a returning slate rather than a one-off hit. In an exclusive chat with Bollywood Hungama, he confirmed that Netflix is developing a sequel to his Sunny Deol and Akshaye Khanna film Ikka and a second season of his Parineeti Chopra-starring thriller series Shaque: Trust No One.
Malhotra put the decision in commercial terms. Both titles, he said, broke records on the platform.
“Ikka has broken records. There is Ikka 2 being worked on. Shaque has now broken records and Shaque Season 2 is being done.”
That is the clearest kind of renewal signal: a platform moving quickly to keep a proven property alive instead of waiting for a long data tail.
A sequel and a reset
Malhotra said Shaque Season 2 will not continue the first season’s story. It will be a new story, and the writing is already underway.
- Ikka 2: a film sequel in the works after the original’s record run, according to Malhotra.
- Shaque Season 2: a new story, not a continuation of the first whodunit.
- Early performance: Malhotra said Shaque is at number one a week after release and in the top 10 in 20-30 countries.
The series was not originally built as a series. Malhotra said director Rensil D’Silva had cracked the idea as a feature about 8-9 years ago. The team later wrote it as a series, saw that the format had legs and potential, and sold it to Netflix.
Why the format pivot matters
The film-to-series shift is more than production trivia. It is a slate-strategy lesson: a story that stalls as a feature can become scalable IP in a series container. It also explains why Shaque can reset for Season 2 — the show was developed as a format, not a single close-ended plot.
Malhotra acknowledged that the show’s whodunit climax is vulnerable to social media spoilers, but said that cannot be controlled. The bigger test, he argued, is whether people keep watching after the reveal. If they do, that is the writing team’s victory.
The franchise play
For media planners and streaming marketers, the fastest renewal signal is the difference between a one-campaign title and a repeatable franchise. Shaque arriving in the top 10 across 20-30 countries, per Malhotra, gives Netflix India a reason to treat the IP as a returning brand rather than a single drop.
Malhotra also addressed the production call around Chopra, who learned she was pregnant after filming began. The team kept her at the shoot location to avoid travel, and Malhotra framed it as a responsibility rather than a challenge.
He credited Netflix’s collaborative team, including VP Content Monika Shergill, for the partnership. The takeaway for the trade is to read early binge signals and spoiler chatter as renewal indicators — and to treat a sequel as a brand extension, not a plot continuation.
Source: bollywoodHungama.com
