Amazon's Sexy Spy franchise is flipping the script

The word “Citadel” isn’t spoken until the very end of the fourth episode of Citadel: Honey Bunnythe latest entry in Prime Video's attempt to launch an international franchise by any means necessary. It's almost as if the new show – set in India, developed by Sita R. Menon and directed by Indian filmmaking duo Raj & DK – refuses to embrace its own title or at least openly acknowledge its connection to the unfortunate first entry in the series that debuted last year to scathing reviews and public disinterest. This is a feature, not a bug. While one of the characters in the spin-off is a younger version of Nadia, the spy played by Priyanka Chopra Jonas citadel Mothership, a spectator could watch Honey bunny without knowing other shows (including the current Italy set). Citadel: Diana) exist and have no difficulty following the plot.

More importantly, they would probably enjoy the loud, sophisticated entertainment Honey bunny even more so if they didn't even have to think about what Chopra Jonas and Richard Madden were up to in the earlier series. It's both a much better example of the original recipe citadel has tried, and a franchise entry that mostly manages to work independently of its siblings.

The six-episode first season splits its time between the year 2000, when Nadia is an elementary school student (played by Kashvi Majmundar) living an eternal refugee life with her ex-spy mother Honey (Samantha Ruth Prabhu); and 1992, when Honey, a struggling actress, discovers that her stuntman pal Bunny (Varun Dhawan) is actually a secret agent who moonlights in action films. Where too many modern dramas are hindered by an unnecessarily disordered narrative order, the parallel timeline structure works Honey bunnybecause there is action and intrigue in both eras, and not an emphasis on fun at the expense of coherence.

There is also a lively dynamic in each period. In 1992, Honey is a young agent who finds herself trained by Bunny in a way that has deliberate parallels to her film work. Bunny is introduced performing an absurd wire-work stunt involving a motorcycle jump, in one of the series' many examples of leaning into the ridiculous, larger-than-life nature of the main story. (It's not unlike the Gosling/Blunt Fall Guyjust with much higher stakes and a seemingly smaller budget.) And he and Bunny flirt for the first time as he tries to teach her how to act more convincingly, like she's just been shot. In 2000, the two part ways largely for reasons that are eventually explained, but the way Nadia was trained for surveillance and other espionage tasks from a young age creates an appealingly unconventional bond between her and Honey; Meanwhile, Bunny has some endearing time with long-time allies Chacko (Shivankit Singh Parihar) and Ludo (Soham Majumdar). Prabhu and Dhawan are in tune for days whenever they're together, and only on the rare occasions – usually at the start of the finale – when people remember to talk about the citadel itself does the storytelling really falter

. There are also a few obvious murders in the finale that feel off

Samantha Ruth Prabhu in Citadel: Honey Bunny.

Trending stories Related content Amazon came up with this whole thing citadelconcept to make it as bass-heavy as possible, and the flagship show clearly suffered as a result. But “sexy spies go on adventures” is a durable and elastic concept that can work well regardless of what else it is associated with. You don't have to have seen a second of the other two shows to appreciate them Honey bunny. But hopefully if more

citadel When it's finished, they'll learn a lesson or three from how well this works as a largely stand-alone story. People don't love franchises because they're connected. They love that the individual parts are good. All six episodes of