Drama
The Pitt
Max’s new hospital drama The Pitt strives to be medically accurate. But while that’s a noble goal, this show comes with a whole lot of content, too.
Being a spy is no walk in the park, if decades of movies and TV shows are to be believed. But being a spy that’s spying on an enemy spy agency while pretending to be one of their spies? Now, that’s just unfair. And confusing.
But “fair” has never really been in the cards for Diana. Her parents were collateral damage in a plane crash orchestrated to take out a target that had nothing to do with them, after all. Ever since their death, Diana has been obsessed with proving that the accident was no accident at all. Her mission leads her straight to the door of global intelligence agency Citadel—and straight into a plot much deeper than she ever imagined.
Nine years have passed since she joined Citadel, and while Diana’s goal remains the same, her circumstances have … changed, to put it mildly. She’s deep undercover now, posing as a spy for Manticore, an enemy agency carrying out calculated hits all over the world. Including the one that killed her parents.
But when a run-of-the-mill mission goes horribly wrong, Diana finds herself with a dead partner, one half of a mysterious and valuable weapon, all of Manticore on her tail … and no backup. She’s in this one alone.
Fans of Citadel, Amazon Prime Video’s flashy spy drama infused with dashes of steamy melodrama, might be a bit surprised to find that this Italian spinoff has brought things a bit more down to earth (well, except for the international espionage and impossible technology, of course). While the agents in Citadel brought evening gowns, tuxedos and casual quips to their spy work, Diana prefers a trench coat, a pistol and a quick kill, no mess required.
Not that the mess doesn’t find her anyway. Our heroine takes her fair share of lives, usually shown with a bullet hole and a quick spurt of blood. Her antics even lead to the death of a few innocent bystanders, which both Diana and the series make no comment on at all. Considering Diana’s parents were also innocent bystanders who lost their lives to deadly espionage, this seems odd at best, morally hypocritical at worst.
In terms of other questionable content, Diana stays mostly in the clear—for now, anyway. Previews for future episodes hint at an illicit relationship between Diana and the son of Manticore’s president, which could get fairly risqué, if the original Citadel provides any insight. The show’s TV-14 rating minimizes the threat of explicit sexuality or nudity, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t guard your eyes. You’ll be guarding your ears from f-bombs and foul language anyway, so it couldn’t hurt.
Citadel: Diana may be less flashy and salacious than its predecessor, but that doesn’t mean you’re in the clear. Take a page from Diana’s book and watch out for violence and moral ambiguity on this espionage thrill ride.
(Editor’s Note: Plugged In is rarely able to watch every episode of a given series for review. As such, there’s always a chance that you might see a problem that we didn’t. If you notice content that you feel should be included in our review, send us an email at [email protected], or contact us via Facebook or Instagram, and be sure to let us know the episode number, title and season so that we can check it out.)
[Note: this review covers the English-subtitled version with the original Italian audio. Language concerns may differ slightly due to translation in the English-dubbed version.]
While working undercover in the underground espionage network Manticore, Citadel agent Diana Cavalieri finds herself in deep water when she intercepts one half of a dangerous weapon.
As a highly trained and deadly spy, Diana is no stranger to killing, which she demonstrates numerous times in this premiere episode. She assassinates a man with a pistol in a highly crowded area; a small amount of blood flies and a bullet hole is briefly seen in the back of his head. A few pedestrians are killed, too, in the ensuing shootout, resulting in similar shows of blood. Diana expresses no remorse for these innocent deaths, simply ignoring that they happened at all. In the opening scene, Diana shoots herself in the arm to feign having been in a gunfight. A bit of blood flies as she muffles her cry of pain with her scarf.
In a flashback, Diana and her sister Sara dance to the song “Chandelier” by Sia, loudly singing the lyrics, “One, two, three, one, two, three, drink/Throw ‘em back ‘til I lose count.” In the present, beer is shown on the table while Diana and Sara have dinner, though neither is shown drinking.
The f-word is used nine times in the episode. God’s name is used in vain twice. “H—” is heard twice, while the s-word and “d–n” are each used once.
Lauren Cook is serving as a 2021 summer intern for the Parenting and Youth department at Focus on the Family. She is studying film and screenwriting at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. You can get her talking for hours about anything from Star Wars to her family to how Inception was the best movie of the 2010s. But more than anything, she’s passionate about showing how every form of art in some way reflects the Gospel. Coffee is a close second.
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