Citadel: Diana series premiere recap and review: "Split in Two"

Citadel: Diana opens in the way that any spy drama, should. It’s all about intrigue. Let’s take a look inside the events of the series premiere.

Caution: This post contains SPOILERS for Citadel: Diana season 1, episode 1

After the disappointing way Citadel turned out, I admit that I was worried about Citadel: Diana. With a different team behind it, it did offer some hope, though. It meant that different minds would be behind the story, hopefully getting rid of some of the cliché storytelling that made Citadel fall flat.

The first episode did not disappoint. It didn’t get weighed down by complicated backstory. Of course, it helps a little that we know about Citadel and Manticore from Citadel, but I didn’t feel like we needed it. We’re told the information that we need to know for the spy drama to work if this is the first jump into the world.

Problems within the Manticore network in Citadel: Diana

One thing that is clear is that the Manticore network is global, but not all agencies are on the same page. Manticore Italy is under some extreme sanctions among the rest of Manticore, and this is due to events from years earlier. Naturally, Italy is not happy about this. It means three more years of no voting powers, and Italy wants to understand why.

Italy hasn’t learned its lessons from the past. This is where we get a great tease of a backstory. We also get a tease of how things will play out. Naturally, when you push someone in a corner, they are going to fight back.

Cecile, the head of Manticore France, has an offer for the son of Italy’s head. She suggests that the Italian territory is split in two, which is where the title of the episode comes from. It would allow this part of Italy and the whole of France to work together and turn Manticore into something they would like. It would mean marriage, as well. Edo isn’t going to commit to this just yet.

This is a great start to the drama. We can see the stepping stones for the rest of Citadel: Diana to build on. That is if things can build up considering everything that Diana is doing.

Diana will not earn any “Best Spy of the Year” awards

Citadel: Diana wastes absolutely no time in showing us that Diana doesn’t follow orders all that well. She makes bad calls, although it’s clear that’s because something else is going on. We have to just look at the synopsis for the series to remember that she was a Citadel agent who is a spy in Manticore. However, with Citadel now shut down, she has no choice but to stick with Manticore and pretend to be loyal.

The episode opens with someone dead and Diana shooting herself in the arm. It takes to around the halfway mark of the first episode to find out what that is all about. Diana and Luca were sent out on a recon mission. They were not supposed to get involved, but Diana goes rogue. She shoots a mark, realizes that he wasn’t an apple, and then she and her partner, Luca, rush off.

Luca is going to shoot Diana for what she did, but she fights back. In the end, she kills Luca and then shoots herself to make it look like a real fight happened.

Naturally, when Diana is taken in for interrogation as the only one to return, she puts all the blame for the shootout on Luca. She shares that Luca was seeing someone and wanted out of Manticore. How much of that is true? There must be some sort of truth to it because this would be easy to look into. Diana has clearly thought of everything.

We learn that the interrogation included a lie detector test, which she passed. This tells us a lot about Diana’s capabilities. She can remain extremely calm under pressure despite her going rogue at times. While she won’t win any “Best Spy of the Year” awards in terms of secrecy, she could win some “Best Double Agent of the Year” awards.

She has her own plan going on. She’s the other apple that the German was looking for, and she offers her half of whatever this German is looking for in exchange for money. It’s her way out. It hasn’t taken long to get into the grittiness of the bigger story. I appreciate a series that doesn’t waste time in explanation.

There’s just a tease of a backstory for Diana. We cut back to nine years earlier, where she’s at home with someone called Sara, presumably her sister. They are watching the news of a plane crash and crying, which suggests that people they love were on the plane. Diana quickly takes a look into the search for the black box, giving us a look at how much she has always planned ahead and seen things that others don’t.  Someone is watching Diana, clearly impressed with her deduction work. Is this how she gets pulled into Manticore?

What disease does Diana have in Citadel: Diana?

We also find out that Diana isn’t the healthiest spy around. She has Ménière's disease, which is an inner ear disorder that can cause vertigo. There’s no cure, but there are ways to manage the symptoms. Clearly, being a spy is not a way to manage the symptoms. However, she hasn’t had an attack for eight years, so what has she managed to do in all that time and why has it changed now? It adds another layer of intrigue, and also creates a fuller character who isn’t your cliché spy. Of course, it’s clear that this is going to play a part in the grander scheme of things.

Overall, the first episode of Citadel: Diana does a great job of pulling us into the story and setting up the starting blocks for the rest of the series. So did the first series in the universe, though. This series needs to avoid doing too many cliché spy things and focus on the characters; that is where the heart of the story is. More work is needed on developing the supporting characters, but there is time for that.

Citadel: Diana is available to stream on Prime Video.