For weeks, we were hearing reports that Salman Khan will play the role of Chulbul Pandey, his iconic character from Dabangg , in the big Diwali release, Singham Again . And today, when it finally happened, the joy of people knew no bounds when they saw a very brief cameo of their favourite superstar. The cameo is significant as it ushers in a new era for cinematic universes.
Rohit Shetty, the director of Singham Again , was the first one to start this trend in Bollywood when he introduced Ajay Devgn’s cameo aka Bajirao Singham in Ranveer Singh-starrer Simmba (2018). It led to the creation of the Rohit Shetty Cop Universe. Then Yash Raj Films (YRF) began the YRF Spy Universe comprising Salman Khan aka Tiger, Shah Rukh Khan aka Pathaan and Hrithik’s Kabir from War (2019).
Dinesh Vijan, too, created the horror comedy universe and its films include Stree (2018), Bhediya (2022), Munjya (2024) and Stree 2 (2024). The common factor between all these cinematic universes is that the makers opted for characters from their own banners. No one tried to include characters made by a different banner to avoid copyright and IP issues and complexities.
But Rohit Shetty has shown the way that something of this sort is very much possible. The Dabangg franchise belongs to Arbaaz Khan Films and none of the producers of Singham Again own its IP. Hence, the cross-licensing that has happened with Singham Again is truly a landmark moment.
This move by Rohit is sure to motivate many other producer.
