Ratu Ratu Queens: The Series Review
Director: Lucky Kuswandi
Date Created: 2025-09-14 02:21
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Ratu Ratu Queens: The Series Review: Directed by Lucky Kuswandi and produced by Muhammad Zaidy. Starring Nirina Zubir, Tika Panggabean, Asri Welas, and Happy Salma. The Netflix Indonesian drama spans six episodes and takes us back in time to show the moments in New York City where four women: Party, Biyah, Ajeng, and Chinta, first met each other. Set years before the context of Ali & Ratu Ratu Queens, the series is about how these women became an unlikely sisterhood and chased their dreams in a place that did not hesitate in making them feel cold and unforgiving.
Indonesian drama Ratu Ratu Queens is about survival, endurance, and the bittersweet relationship of friendship. They all arrive in Queens with a collection of disappointments, hopes, and secrets. Gradually, they discover that regardless of how bad life in a different country becomes, they are more resilient side by side.
Ratu Ratu Queens: The Series Review
What I like about Netflix’s Ratu Ratu Queens: The Series is how the immigrant experiences in the friendships are the focal point. Instead of showing the high accomplishments or the happily ever after endings, the series focuses on the details, such as having dinner together, supporting each other after a loss or basking in the small achievements. These are the moments that make the story believable even for the non-expats.
The show also should be commended for the way it portrays New York. It is not the bright, postcard New York we are used to in the movies. It is noisy, grimy, and expensive. You see squalid tenements, hard work, and the worn faces of people struggling along. It gives the drama a kind of realism and a chance for you to feel the isolation of the characters, yet the promise upon which they are nourished.
The best thing is definitely its cast. Nirina Zubir pours passion and energy into playing Party, and you can feel how much she craves acceptance. Asri Welas balances the storytelling with warmth and humour, and through this makes Biyah very likeable. Tika Panggabean injects earthy strength into Ajeng, and Happy Salma captures Chinta’s vulnerability.
Both of them successfully manage a believable friendship. The argument, laugh and cry appear real as they lived through these experiences. The chemistry of the four main protagonists was, for me, the one aspect which kept me going during the down moments in the storyline.
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But whereas the series does possess a kind heart, it is not at all times gripping. Certain episodes repeat the same ills about finances, inability to communicate or fitting in and self-identity concerns, without a great deal of variation. Here and there, I was certain that I had seen the same done elsewhere in another immigrant drama and therefore already knew what was going down next.
There is also the question of tonal mismatch. It very abruptly jumps cuts from humour to very intense drama. One is laughing at a comedic point, and then one is in the midst of a serious confessional. The tonal shifting can work at times, and at others it is jerky and not fluid, and leaves me a little detached.
Character development was also something the series did not accomplish completely. While the characters’ personalities for Party and Biyah are shown early enough for them, in the cases of Ajeng and Chinta, they sound at times as underwritten. What individual woes they have are established but not always consistently. The series left me wishing the series had taken more time to dwell upon its emotional arcs rather than rushing them.
For me, Netflix’s The Ratu Ratu Queens The Series was a combination of warmth and slight exasperation. In one respect, of course, I did immensely enjoy the way it portrayed the reality of the female friendship in which women had very little but nevertheless drew strength from each other, but it was a good reminder of how much the family you create in difficult circumstances does make a difference.
Netflix Ratu Ratu Queens Review: Summing Up
Ratu Ratu Queens: The Series is a flawed show, but it’s got enough heart for the experience to stick. It does a good job of managing the personal relationships of the solo leads and the bittersweetness of making a life in a new world. While equally bound by defects, a stationary pace, tonal inconsistency, and underdevelopment of lines of character, it doesn’t quite reach the level of a very good show.
If you liked the first Ali & Ratu Ratu Queens movie, then the prequel adds depth for the characters you already know. Whether or not you did see the movie, the series functions as a lovely survival and friendship story.
