Citadel review: Amazon Prime’s high-octane spy thriller

This six-part drama reportedly cost Amazon Prime “somewhere north of $250m”, said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. So was it worth it? “You betcha. It’s Mission: Impossible meets The Bourne Identity meets James Bond while glancing off Indiana Jones a few times along its irresistible way.”

Richard Madden stars as Mason Kane, a spy for a global espionage network, whom we first see causing chaos on a train with his “permanently pouting” partner and ex-wife (Priyanka Chopra Jonas). The drama then skips forward eight years, with our agents now living normal lives in separate cities with no memory of their previous existence as swashbuckling spies.

“Twists, turns, explosions, old-fashioned fisticuffs”, outrageous gadgetry and glamorous locations are all “parcelled out in one glorious stream”; and just as you’re thinking “I could do with a quiet moment”, up pops Lesley Manville as the series’ baddie. “It’s basically televisual crack.”

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The trouble is, “for all the stunning visuals, startling choreography and traditional wisecracking”, I realised after the first episode that I was suffering from “a profound lack of giving a toss”, said Hugo Rifkind in The Times. And even when I’d watched more, I’m afraid that didn’t go away.

It does at times feels like “007: The ChatGPT Years, doling out clichés like an espionage-themed vending machine”, said Barbara Ellen in The Observer. “Still, subtlety be damned: if spy thrillers are your bag, this show is stylish and full throttle, and knows how to have a good time.”