Is Anyone Actually Watching Amazon’s $300 Million ‘Citadel’?

I consider myself pretty plugged into the major shows on TV or streaming services at any given time, and yet here we are with Citadel’s second-to-last episode airing yesterday on Amazon Prime, and I swear at least anecdotally, I have not heard a single person, in my online or real-life circles, talk about this series unprompted.

Is anyone actually watching Citadel, Amazon’s big-budget spy series that supposedly cost $300 million?

That’s what I’m attempting to find out, but Amazon has essentially said next to nothing about the show since it’s launch. At the time, the headline was that Citadel debuted to “big viewership” on Amazon, with Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke saying “Citadel, the #1 title on Prime! In its series debut, this show attracted one of the largest global audiences in the history of Prime Video – such an incredible performance for new and original IP.”

So, it’s true that Citadel is still the #1 series on Prime for episode 5 here, but what does that really mean? Unlike Netflix’s rapidly-changing Top 10 list with loads of rotating shows, Prime has far, far fewer original productions. Looking at their list right now, for instance, also on the top 10 list are four different movies, which include 2016’s The Accountant with Ben Affleck and 2012’s Safe House with Ryan Reynolds. The Country Music Awards are on there. Even Reacher is still on there, a big Amazon show that debuted in February…2022. It’s practically a year and a half old, and still hanging out inside Netflix’s top 10 list. So yeah, the point being, I’m not sure being the #1 show on Amazon Prime is all that hard in its current state.

Past the chart, however, the show was reported to have done about 25 million viewers for its premiere, which would indeed make it Prime’s biggest debut since Rings of Power, the also-insanely expensive Lord of the Rings series on Amazon.

But besides those numbers, how big is this fanbase? I really do wonder, given some other data here. I know Priyanka Chopra Jones has a huge global fanbase, but a lot of the chatter based on that is mainly about her, not the quality of the show itself.

On review sites, Citadel is in a weird place. The show isn’t reviewing great, 54% from critics on Rotten Tomatoes. While a 71% audience score is better, I’m more focused on the fact that there are only 500 or so audience reviews in, period. On IMDB, Citadel only has a 6.2/10 with 12K reviews in. Netflix’s Queen Charlotte, which debuted a week ago, has 22K reviews in. Citadel has also dropped to the 7th most popular show on IMDB behind the likes of Queen Charlotte, Silo, Succession, Ted Lasso, The Diplomat and Love and Death, and it’s the lowest scored of all those.

Finally, this idea that Netflix has greenlit this sprawling Citadel universe may not actually be the case. I believe two other international versions may already be in the can, but there was reporting that the show had already been pre-renewed for season 2. As of this week, maybe not? Here’s producer David Weil talking about how that’s not officially true, and it sounds like any other series trying to get picked up again:

“Well, so we’re not officially… I know, there was reporting on it. We’re not officially greenlit for a second season. However, what I can say is that, you know, the Citadel universe is robust, and there are so many threads by the end of the season that would be very thrilling to pick up in a second season and hopefully beyond. So there’s a lot of mythology to unpack. You know, myself and the other members of the creative team – we’ve been living with this series for so many years now. So, you know, sort of strap in, I would say, because there’s certainly a ride to come, hopefully.”

The overall impression I get is that Citadel is performing well…for an Amazon series, at least initially, but we’ve seen little bragging since its premiere. And it’s not just that it needs to do okay, it needs to be a blockbuster with that kind of price tag attached to it, and I’m not seeing evidence that is the case. Hell, it may not even get renewed.

Something is off here. I don’t think this is going well.

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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.