Citadel
It has not been a good month for the Russo Brothers, the upcoming directors of the new Avengers movies, but a pair with quite bad luck outside of the MCU.
Their Netflix The Electric State blockbuster debuted with shockingly poor critic scores (a 15% on RT) and does not seem to be putting up the kind of numbers that justify its $320 million budget, making it one of the most expensive films ever made.
But now we can hop over to the show they produced for Amazon, Citadel, which you guessed it, had one of the most expensive first seasons of any show ever at a reported $225-300 million, which would be second only to Amazon’s The Rings of Power.
Citadel was supposed to spawn an entire network of linked series, and while a few of those did make it out and the original got a season 2 renewal, The Hollywood Reporter now says that things are “in flux.”
Citadel
Currently, Citadel season 2, which was supposed to be out in late 2025 has apparently been pushed to Spring 2026. In addition to that, all other Citadel spin-offs have been paused, maybe until after season 2, maybe indefinitely. Supposedly Amazon is not happy with season 2, though they have not commented on that report.
While Citadel did not get utterly shredded by critics like The Electric State, the end result of the Richard Madden/Priyanka Chopra spy series was that it was…fine. It had a coinflip 51% critic score and an okay, not great 62% audience score. Its spin-offs were actually better received, for the most part.
But that’s the problem, you don’t really want the second most-expensive show in history to be “fine.” Citadel did not reach the highs of other Amazon hits, cheaper productions that range from Invincible to The Boys to Reacher. But its other big-budget series is not doing great either, with Rings of Power’s viewership reportedly cut in half for season 2. The point being, throwing money at projects isn’t necessarily a golden ticket.
If Amazon is unhappy with season 2 of Citadel and season 1 was not all the great to begin with, this idea that the series is going to launch into some popular, sprawling spy universe for the service seems in doubt. Not that it ever really seemed destined to happen, but now more than ever, it does not seem like it will work out.
There was at least one bright spot for the Russos this week, as even if it was oddly formatted and the casting was picked apart, the chair-based reveal of the Avengers: Doomsday cast was the most watched Marvel livestream ever by far with 275 million views over the five hours. It is still the case that despite these other endeavors, the Russos have not made a bad MCU movie yet, and maybe that’s the universe where they simply have the magic touch. But outside of that? Apparently not.
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