I Watch TV: Citadel: Diana

 

Citadel: Diana

Diana is an agent for Manticore Italy, a secret agency controlled by the Zani family, who in turn own a weapons company. Edo, the surviving son, is a brilliant weapon designer. Manticore Italy has been under sanction from two other Manticore groups – Manticore France (run by the ambitious Cécile who used to be Edo’s lover) and Manticore Germany (run by the Kleins). In this future dystopian Italy, there are political attempts to legalise guns, also track people within secured zones (central Milan is one after a bomb attack on the Duomo eight years ago).

We know what happened eight years ago because we see in flashback (and maybe because we watched Citadel). Diana’s parents died in a plane crash and she discovered there was a cover up. Before she could find her way to the second level of the cover story she’s intercepted by a Citadel agent. He trains her to go undercover, to defeat any possible interrogation; unfortunately this gives her a syndrome that sometimes when under stress (and it’s dramatic in the story) she has panic attacks. The plane was bombed by Manticore Italy. Citadel don’t believe in Manticore, so he keeps her off the books. She joins Manticore, pretending to an idealism of stopping corruption in governments (the plane bombing second lever cover was the Italian Secret Service killed someone to hide corruption). Then one day she finds herself attacking Citadel, and kills the elder Zani son to destroy the Citadel secret files.

That’s all doled out slowly in amongst the present scenes in much the same way as in Citadel, though without the memory erasure/recovery to make it diagetic. In the present Manticore Italy learn that Manticore France and Manticore Germany have recreated parts of a Citadel weapon. Diana and her partner are sent to Switzerland to spy on the meet. She goes rogue, tries to capture the weapon parts, gets one. She then plays agents against each other, Edo against his father, while struggling with what to do as an abandoned agent who can’t tell her sister any of this.

This is if anything a bit more tightly written and plotted than Citadel (originally in Italian, dubbed). Which is not to say a lot, every episode Diana plots a bit, lies, contacts people, has some backstory doled out and gets into a spectacular high concept fight/chase/stunt sequence. It keeps promising things and only delivering action; Diana is put into an interrogation cell, I'm looking forward to an interrogation sequence; she just tells the boss something to get out. Edo has built backdoors into things, disillusioned with Manticore Italy, with Cécile, annoyed that his brother’s death has made him heir, but his father keeps him on a short leash. Diana has a cool stylish look that ought to not be too prominent, except with her asymmetric hair, icy good looks and long coat she always stands out. Not great for a secret agent.

Watch This: Cool European spy techno-thriller
Don’t Watch This: Tying this to the Citadel plot does little for it, and makes some of the timeline rather odd