In a move that was telling of the patriarchal society it was set in, women had precious little to do as goons, guns and gore took centre-stage in the first season of Mirzapur. The second edition brings a necessary change in that regard — where Rasika Dugal's Beena takes charge of her life, Shweta Tripathi Sharma's Golu trades her books for guns to avenge her sister and boyfriend's deaths. Isha Talwar's Madhuri Yadav too unapologetically harbours political ambitions.

Point out to director Gurmmeet Singh how the female characters, at last, have agency, and he credits creator-writer Puneet Krishna for the development. "Puneet doesn't analyse if he is writing for a male or female character. For him, every character is a hero. Women in Mirzapur are equally tough because they have to surive there. It was not a conscious call to empower the women."

Krishna admits that the female characters didn't enjoy much screen presence in the opening season. "They have more screen time in this outing, but we had not planned it; we went with the flow. They are equally prominent because they [pull the strings] and the dynamics are driven by the story."

It's common for the prime players to be written off, thus adding to the show's plot twists. Singh exclaims, "I am scared that if I begin liking a character, Puneet will kill him in the next episode! We are not scared of killing the important players because we can have fun with those alive."

While the series is criticized for its excessive violence, director Mihir Desai asserts they practise self-censorship. "If a scene doesn't call for violence, we don't show it unnecessarily. This time, the characters have matured after their loss."

On October 30, author Surender Mohan Pathak told mid-day how he was enraged that the second season of Mirzapur had wrongly depicted his book Dhabba as an erotica (below). On Saturday, the makers issued an apology to Pathak on social media. The apology, signed by Krishna, stated that within three weeks, either the "unrelated voiceover" will be removed or the book cover will be blurred.