Citadel Diana Review: A Journey Between Morality and Power in a Dystopian Milan
Cast: Matilda De Angelis, Maurizio Lombardi, Filippo Nigro, Lorenzo Cervasio
Created By: Gina Gardini
Streaming Platform: Prime Video
Filmyhype.com Ratings: 3.5/5 (three and a half stars)
On October 10, all six episodes of Citadel Diana, the Italian TV series starring Matilda De Angelis and a spin-off of the mother series of this so-called Spyverse created by the Russo Brothers, namely Citadel, were released on Prime Video. Specifically, Citadel: Diana focuses on the European front, particularly the Italian one, of Manticore, the “evil” spy agency against which Citadel operates, and provides some details on the background from which the mother series started, and shows up close to the Zani family, already mentioned in Citadel. But in our opinion, not everything works properly in this Italian series. Before saying what, let’s briefly summarize and without spoilers the plot of Citadel: Diana. The espionage genre lives and breathes through specific creative models and characters that have practically shaped its world history. With this project, the authors have decided to play with exactly what fans might suppose to modify its possibilities then and even expand them, in a world with precise rules and some names with fundamental weight.
The attraction of the Citadel project lies precisely in its broad and international scope and in the fact that each single piece is nourished by a creative freedom specifically connected to the authors and artists who worked on it. As anticipated, with Citadel: Diana we find ourselves in Italy. This particular story, divided into 6 episodes, draws from what we saw in the first season of the mother series (in terms of the universe in which the characters move) available on Prime Video, immediately finding its own path in this sense. Moving between intrigues, shadows, and masks, Citadel: Diana offers an interesting look at a world with a lot to say and tell through its protagonists and mechanisms, shaping writing in continuous movement and with profound human reasons. With Matilda De Angelis, Lorenzo Cervasio, Maurizio Lombardi, Filippo Nigro, and Giordana Faggiano but not only, it is a story of characters and feelings, not just action. It has an interesting protagonist and fewer eyes on it. Privilege of the collateral story; under certain conditions (the main story doesn’t engage, less pressure on), the spin-off can try to be better than the original. It’s a strange stake.
Citadel Diana Review: The Story Plot
Set in Milan in 2030, Citadel: Diana follows the events of the independent spy agency Citadel, which eight years earlier was destroyed by a powerful rival organization, Manticore. Since then, Diana Cavalieri (Matilda De Angelis), an undercover Citadel spy, has been alone, trapped between enemy lines as an infiltrator in Manticore. When the opportunity finally presents itself to get out and disappear forever, the only way to do so is to trust the most unexpected of allies, Edo Zani (Lorenzo Cervasio), the heir of Manticore Italy and son of the organization’s leader, Ettore Zani (Maurizio Lombardi), fighting for supremacy against the other European families. The first season of Citadel, starring Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra Jonas, and featuring Stanley Tucci and Lesley Manville, debuted in 2023. Citadel and subsequent Amazon Original action-espionage series boast the executive production of the Russo Brothers and span the globe developing the story of the Citadel spy agency and the powerful rival organization Manticore.
This spinoff series is the second to debut in the world of Citadel and will be followed by the Indian series Citadel: Honey Bunny, starring Varun Dhawan and Samantha Ruth Prabhu. A series, the one debuting on Prime Video on Thursday, October 10, which is in Italian and boasts an entirely Italian writing and direction, which, for an international production, is absolutely no small thing. It always starts, and it couldn’t be otherwise, from the formula, from the combination of ingredients: spy story, adrenaline-filled action, feeling. The frame of reference is the genre, it is espionage, reread in the light of muscular speed, frenetic rhythms, of an action indebted, in mood and aesthetic style, to so much contemporary commercial cinema. The novelty – it’s not the correct term but in the absence of alternatives it passes anyway – of Citadel: Diana is the attention paid to the intimacy of the characters.
Of one character, above all, the enigmatic and elusive protagonist. Her name is Diana Cavalieri (De Angelis) and she is a spy, with many secrets about her and a cumbersome past. Diana’s past haunts her like a ghost and the story adapts, running back and forth (in time) to let us enter the two lives of the protagonist. The before and after in Diana’s life are worlds apart in warmth, hopes, and opportunities. The present is Milan in 2030, a disfigured Milan. The Duomo or what remains of it is the backdrop to a cold and liberticidal society, not so democratic. Diana is an agent of Manticore Italia, the branch of the super-secret spy agency that fights against Citadel for control of world affairs. Everything she knows about the spy profession – the training, the technical skills, the impenetrability of character – was taught to her by the mysterious Gabriele (Nigro).
She met him in a complicated moment. Diana and her sister Sara (Faggiano) lost their parents too soon and their lives changed. Diana’s past was a past of warmth and freedom. Then there is the abrupt caesura, the arrival of Gabriele, the espionage, and the entry into Manticore. Despite the constant intrusion of flashbacks to break the fluidity of the present, the story runs linear, elementary in its geometry, and that’s not a bad thing. Diana is first happy, then in shock, then cold and determined; Citadel: Diana travels on the evolution of her personality. She is not looked upon favorably by the boss of Manticore Italia, Ettore Zani (Lombardi) while she cultivates a more complex relationship, with who knows where it will lead, with her son Edo (Cervasio). Dynamics that do not match with espionage as we are used to thinking of it.
Citadel Diana Review and Analysis
Let’s start with the things that we think work in this series. Starting with Matilda De Angelis is very good at representing the growth of her character and is perfectly at ease with guns and martial arts. We liked the action scenes, convincing and well-interpreted. More generally, we also appreciated the story as a whole, although some choices could be reviewed in the script. To give an example without spoiling, how Edo Zani (by the way, why make him and his father whisper throughout the series, forcing us to do acrobatics with the remote control?) makes his master key biometric system work seemed to us to be a really too “easy” choice to move the story forward. As if, in a certain sense, it served to speed up events, to fit everything into six episodes. And this is, in the end, the most critical element of Citadel: Diana: it has too much to tell in too little time to really captivate the audience.
Diana’s transition from an ordinary girl to a Citadel agent and then to an infiltrator inside Manticore would have needed more time to work better, to gain the viewers’ empathy. To, in practice, be more engaging. Instead, Citadel Diana seems to be in a hurry to tell us everything too quickly, leaving us with a feeling of incompleteness. One of the very first things that catches the eye in Citadel: Diana is the theme of dualism, an element that recurs in almost all the characters in the game. Diana herself is constantly broken in two because of the choices that led her to be what she is when we cross her path. The double game between the two agencies and the fact of being constantly undercover, in parallel with the consequences of an always risky sector in everyday life and on those who are unaware of the facts. The work done in this sense by Matilda De Angelis is very convincing, returning to the screen the broken face of a woman who must clash with the unpredictability of a life that constantly puts her to the test.
In parallel, there is the suppressed emotionality of a human being who finds himself serving real monsters without scruples, seeing with his own eyes how far human greed could go for power and control over others. Diana is a tool in the hands of many masks: we see her move among the shadows of her own existence, and it will be only her personal initiative that will shake things up a little. The abandonment of obedience makes Diana a character who is certainly interesting to come into contact with, as well as a spy who breaks all the stereotypes of the Spy genre, carving out a very personal path in which her determination, resolve, and strength make the difference on what surrounds her. In this, the close-ups given by the director of Citadel: Diana, Arnaldo Catinari, are extremely functional: we see an unrecognizable Diana/Matilda and cold to the core, but who always betrays a spark of inner humanity in her eyes.
Dualism, as anticipated, also returns in the character of Edo Zani (Lorenzo Cervasio), albeit in a different way. In this case, too we find ourselves faced with the construction of a multifaceted character split in two, with whom it is easy to empathize, but about whom we do not want to anticipate too much. The important thing is to underline that all of Citadel: Diana is fragmented in the lies and truths that she dispenses with such ease. The possibility of taking a look beyond enemy lines, into the folds of the Manticore, moreover, arouses an indisputable interest and some insights into this narrative universe that should not be underestimated at all. The concepts of good and evil return to reign, even if continually blurred by the individual visions of those who decide the fate of the world as we know it.
Another great protagonist of Citadel: Diana is Milan itself, where the main events of the story take place. Since the series is set in 2030 (with some previous flashbacks that serve to introduce the protagonist), science fiction also becomes central in the characterization of a context that immediately appears cold and suffocating to the eyes of the spectators. Technological modernity has taken over, providing some interesting ideas for the gadgets used by the agents, but at the same time it has relegated the world, or so it seems, to some geometrical shapes that return perfectly to the architecture of the aforementioned metropolis. So we see the protagonist of Citadel: Diana moving into this militarized and detached city, where control of power is perceived even without the need for dialogue or explanations. Her pace is marked by what she has inside and by the thoughts that seem to clutter her head. Time passes and events continue without stopping; there are choices to be made, with the general morality that clashes with the personal one. The series, therefore, uses Diana’s pain to explore the impenetrable depths of the Manticore, in this case, Europe/Italy, reworking every possible moral label in writing that prefers to hide rather than reveal itself, which contributes to the ongoing tension.
Although it develops from not very original ideas, Citadel: Diana works and captures until the end, thanks above all to the writing of its protagonists, rather than to the action scenes. The latter become almost a secondary component when they are confronted with the demons that each character carries within, in a context where nothing is ever as it seems. Therefore, the dynamics between Manticore and Citadel do not change; on the contrary, these have been placed as the basis for the structuring of the six Italian episodes. Diana, consequently, moves between espionage and counterespionage by playing a double game and controlling her emotions. While watching the series, you can feel that everything was packaged in Italy. There is almost a difference in structure very similar to what we are used to. In fact, despite the mythological anchoring, the sense of belonging to the Italian soil emerges predominantly. An element sought precisely in the conception of the entire “Citadel” project that here finds its support both in visual and production terms.
It will not be recognizing the background song that will make you say this but the structure of the plot. However, in Italy, it is good to remember, that the spy genre has been somewhat abandoned for a long time and the vision has been purely foreign-oriented. You will have to overcome the obstacle of the first episode, we warn you, because in this series spoken narrative explanations are avoided, but the desire to make known the details about Diana at all costs is immediately pushed. Everything is annoyingly obvious, exactly like her very particular haircut. Everything is practically cut with an axe even though gray is the dominant characteristic of these spies. From the second episode onwards, the direction that the narrative takes is far more interesting and the dynamics more intriguing.
It moves us, therefore, within gray characterizations and completely personal goals that, more often than not, are placed above the collective good. Interesting, in any case, is the reversal of the narrative archetypes of the genre because we see the coldness of Diana that contrasts us with the heart and fervor of Edo (Lorenzo Cervasio). Their relational dynamic can attract the attention of the public, much more than the entire construction of Manticore Italia and its clash with France and Germany. Italianness is felt right within the motivations that move Manticore: a transposition in futuristic terms of our reality made of corrupt politicians and mafias that fight internally for power. It is almost as if we did not move much beyond the umpteenth police series, even if the general environment could be more captivating. A “noir de’ no’ altri”, if you’ll pardon the colloquial term. The best characters, if you were to ask us, are definitely Ettore Zani (Maurizio Lombardo) and Gabriele (Filippo Nigro) because, beyond the acting skills of their interpreters, they perfectly manage to glue the audience to the screen.
Citadel Diana Review: The Last Words
Citadel: Diana is a new piece of the great narrative universe that will be Citadel. Using a very personal touch and some Italian workers, this new TV series, available on Prime Video from October 10, 2024, works in what it does, transporting you to a context that is both familiar and new. All the credit must be found in the construction of its protagonists and in the work done by the cast (especially that of Matilda De Angelis), convincing in its movement in a context that knows, for some things, quite classic. Ultimately, we are faced with a good product that lays the foundations between merits and defects. A series that is well anchored to its cultural context, an element that cannot be a defect if it was what was imposed “from above”, but which perhaps pushes the public to have to recalibrate their expectations. The spinoff series dedicated to the Citadel narrative universe is enriched with an unpublished story for the small screen (almost) entirely set in Italy. Following in the footsteps of the successful first season with Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra, Citadel: Diana is an adrenaline-filled and enthralling spy story, with a Matilda De Angelis ready to make the international leap.
Citadel Diana Review: A Journey Between Morality and Power in a Dystopian Milan - Filmyhype
Director: Gina Gardini
Date Created: 2024-10-10 13:08
3.5
Pros
- The thrilling and adrenaline-pumping action scenes
- Matilda De Angelis bears the weight of an international production
- In the cast, an enigmatic Maurizio Lombardi stands out
- The writing and characterization of the protagonists.
- The work the cast did in bringing them to the small screen.
- Some basic ideas in terms of context.
Cons
- Citadel: Diana works as a whole but also feels classic in some ways, especially for those more accustomed to the genre.
- Some action scenes are not too convincing.
- The Italian setting can have an effect
- The spinoff series doesn't hold a candle to the 2023 one
