Entering the industry as a script consultant and associate director in the early 2000s, Khan recognized a vacuum in mainstream Hindi cinema. "The popular media of the time was either pure melodrama or formulaic action," Khan noted in a rare 2019 interview with Film Companion . "There was no space for the moral ambiguity of the anti-hero or the psychological depth of the femme fatale."
. During a Mammoth Media Asia podcast with Pooja Bhatt, she revealed that industry peers claimed she "only stripped because she couldn't act," highlighting the prejudices actresses face for taking on "bold" roles.