First Teaser For New Italian TV Series DIABOLIK

No one knows anything about it. There's still no director attached and no cast has been announced. All we know is that Italian broadcaster Sky is producing a new Diabolik TV series  through their production company, Sky Cinema. The famous comic celebrated its fifty year anniversary in 2012, and at the end of the year a teaser was presented to introduce the series along with a second highly anticipated new show: Gomorra, adapted from both Matteo Garrone's movie and Roberto Saviano's book.

Diabolik is the 007 of the dark side, he's a violent and ruthless thief far from any possible comparison with Arsenio Lupin or Robin Hood. He's a greedy man who, together with his fiancé Eva Kant, loves to steal gold and jewels and to live in comfort and luxury, always trying new ways to pursue is goal with surreal or absurd technologies.

It's hard to say if we should start having any expectations after watching the two minute long teaser, where Italian swimmer Lorenzo Benatti acts as the body of Diabolik but not as the character. It tries to impress the audience with a couple of action scenes clearly set in the center of Rome, while Diabolik's blonde lover Eva Kant and inspector Ginko are both turning their back on the camera. 

We're now in the middle of 2013 and maybe someone has now been called to direct the 13 episodes that should try to get their distance from Mario Bava's cult classic Danger: Diabolik - a well known and appreciated action flick outisde Italy, where the great director is hardly remembered with pleasure. Which is one of many reasons to fear what Sky Cinema is producing in its studio, a company that barely shows a satisfying curriculum with both its productions and co-productions, with just a few titles worthy of remembering (Il Divo, Balancing Act), and too many that we are still trying to forget.

The state of contemporary of Italian television can't be considered healthy or even bearable, and the main problem lies with the Italian directors now working in both TV and cinema, of which no one seems suitable for the job, unless they're willing to resurrect those directors who tried to stand up and declare their individuality. If we had to pick someone for this, perhaps Marco Risi is the right one, with his brief career in dramas and thriller in the nineties now reprised with his new drama Cha Cha Cha due to be released next week in Italy. In a perfect world, Mario Bava would have reprised his role as director and given us a new take on his wonderful iconic character, but what we can do now, is just a comparison between the two products down below.