Citadel S2
Directors: The Russo Brothers
Cast: Priyanka Chopra, Richard Madden, Stanley Tucci, Lesley Manville, Ashleigh Cummings, Jack Reynor, Lina El Arabi, Gabriel Leone, and Rayna Vallandingham
Rating: ★★★
The first season of Citadel was a puzzling mess for me. On paper, the show had everything. Backed by the Russos, starring Priyanka Chopra and Richard Madden, and filled with enough lore to generate new fans for a gripping spy thriller. The problem was that the show never gripped. It remained convoluted, mundane, almost. Priyanka kicked butt, but the action thriller never kicked into high gear. It is ironic that season 2 flips that problem. This time, the show is more fun, more engaging, and infinitely more watchable. But the problem is the leads. Richard Madden and Priyanka Chopra, carrying that intensity from season 1, look like misfits amid it all.
What are Mason and Nadia up to
Season 2 takes off right where season 1 ended. Mason has discovered he was the mole who dismantled Citadel. Bernard (Stanley Tucci) has been held captive by a billionaire who wants him to build him the perfect assassin. And Nadia is on the run with her identity exposed. Bernard breaks out with the help of Hutch (Jack Reynor), a renegade CIA agent, and he must bring together the warring former partners, Nadia and Mason, to stop a high-profile assassination plot. But the super spies have their own agendas for being on the mission.
A potpourri of genres and intentions
Season 2 makes it clear from the start that it will be more fun. The vibe is more Ocean’s Eleven and James Bond than Jason Bourne or John Wick. So, there are more wisecracks, many more jokes, and much more fun fighting sequences. All this is shouldered by the very capable Stanley Tucci, who takes more of a centre stage this time around. Aiding him in the fun section of Citadel are Jack Reynor and the pair of Michael Trucco and Rahul Kohli, who play two CIA agents who will remind you of Thomson and Thomson from the Tintin comics. Everything from the lines to the situations is very Russo this time around. You can feel the makers’ effort to make things engaging. You begin to feel more for the characters, have fun in their banter, and even care about the stakes, which were all absent in season 1.
But here comes the biggest problem. Both Nadia (Priyanka) and Mason (Richard) are carrying life-altering baggage from season 1. Their animosity and personal struggles leave no room for being frothy. It would have been too jarring to convert them into chirpy characters immediately. Hence, they remain suspended somewhere between the two genres. This means that the narrative becomes a snoozefest the moment these two enter the frame. Make no mistake, it’s not the actors at fault here. But they are crippled by writing, which itself is held hostage by a dull season 1.
At some points, it does feel like you are watching two different shows – one where Priyanka and Richard are trying their best to infuse intensity and pain, and one where Jack Reynor and Stanley are having all the fun in the world. The end result is a bizarre amalgamation that is less than the sum of its parts.