Amazon was likely hoping that 2023 spy series Citadel would be a hit. With a reported budget of $300 million (making it the second most expensive TV show ever) and multiple sequel series and spin-offs greenlit before it even hit Prime Video, it was almost definitely a shock for the company when Citadel was poorly received. It currently stands at 51% on Rotten Tomatoes, which usually likely wouldn’t be enough for a follow-up.
However with the first spin-off teased at the end of the first season of Citadel, the company had no choice but to plough on with the franchise… and I’m glad it did because Citadel: Diana is the action-packed spy show that I was hoping the original series would be.
Set at the same time as the main show (and featuring some nods to it, like memorials to certain characters), Citadel: Diana is about an Italian woman who was hired to spy agency Citadel and placed as a double agent for its rival Manticore… shortly before the former fell. She’s been working since to maintain her cover until an opportunity arises for her to try and escape.
We also learn about how this Manticore agency, the Citadel universe’s version of Spectre, works.
In case you forgot, Citadel itself is about an everyday man who slowly regains his memories and realizes that he was a secret agent for Citadel who had his memories wiped after it fell to Manticore, and he begins to piece things back together. Over six episodes we learned a lot about the back story of the agencies but there was surprisingly little spy work or action in the spy action series, something which viewers took ire with.
Our heroine of Citadel: Diana, the titular Diana, apparently took that to heart, because she undertakes more infiltration, detective work and combat in one episode than I remember seeing in half of Citadel. In episode one alone we see her spearheading a long-winded investigation into a plane crash, deceiving her sister and her fellow agent amongst other people, and engaging in gun-and fist-fights as well as a car chase in Switzerland.
As a result, I’ve found that Citadel: Diana is everything that I hoped Citadel would be — it's a bona fide spy show that fulfills everything I love in classic James Bond, another Amazon-owned franchise.
Despite being set in a relatively limited locale (it’s known as the Italian Alps spin-off of Citadel, as each is distinct geographically) we see a fair bit of globe-trotting; there are loads of semi-futuristic gadgets that the characters use (one of our baddies seems to be an Italian version of James Bond’s Q) and there’s a league of baddies with evil representatives from around the place.
At the time of writing, I've not finished the show but it's already reinvigorating me with interest in this series that I wasn't expecting to continue watching. The action and espionage is great but it’s also simply more interesting as a near-sci-fi tale, as it’s set in 2030 and has some examination of geopolitical changes in that time. It’s also given me more motivation to watch the next spin-off Citadel: Honey Bunny, coming at the beginning of November.
Diana isn’t quite the perfect show, and I think lots of people will bounce off of its confusing cold open in the first episode. I did — I thought I’d opened the wrong episode by accident as I had no idea what was going on. I also can’t comprehend Diana’s baffling hairstyle — have mirrors been outlawed in 2030? I persevered and the introduction made loads of sense; hopefully flashbacks will fill in the feud between Diana and her hairstylist.
My hope is that Amazon uses the high quality of Citadel: Diana and continues it for Citadel season 2, which is expected to come out at some point in 2025. If that series can maintain all the key pillars of a spy story like espionage, gadgets, travel and great action set pieces that Diana has, it could really improve on the first series.
