Cancelled Showtime series Penny Dreadful has decided it isn’t quite over yet: a sequel series set in 1930s Los Angeles is on the way.
The new series, which has been titled Penny Dreadful: City Of Angels, comes from Penny Dreadful creator John Logan. Logan will return as showrunner, writer and executive producer.
The show comes with the tagline: “Sometimes what’s dead doesn’t always remain.” It is being described as a “spiritual descendant” of Penny Dreadful. Its setting of Los Angeles is “a time and place deeply infused with Mexican-American folklore and social tension.”
According to THR, the series will be rooting in the conflict between characters connected to the deity Santa Muerte and others allied with the devil, and will “explore a mix of the supernatural and the combustible reality of that period, creating new occult myths and moral dilemmas within a historical backdrop.”
The show is worlds away from its Victorian London-set counterpart, and new characters and storylines will feature.
In a statement, Logan said: “Penny Dreadful: City of Angels will have a social consciousness and historical awareness that we chose not to explore in the Penny Dreadful London storylines.
“We will now be grappling with specific historical and real-world political, religious, social and racial issues. In 1938, Los Angeles was facing some hard questions about its future and its soul. Our characters must do the same. There are no easy answers. There are only powerful questions and arresting moral challenges. As always in the world of Penny Dreadful, there are no heroes or villains in this world, only protagonists and antagonists; complicated and conflicted characters living on the fulcrum of moral choice.”
“We were so thrilled when John Logan came to us with this wildly original take on the Penny Dreadful mythology that explores both the human spirit and the spirit world here in California,” said Showtime programming president Gary Levine. “Penny Dreadful: City of Angels promises to be an extraordinary saga of familial love set against the terrifying monsters that are around us and within us.”
Logan will produce through his Desert Wolf Productions banner, with Michael Aguilar and Neal Street Productions’ Sam Mendes and Pippa Harris executive producing alongside him. James Bagley will co-executive produce.
Penny Dreadful: City Of Angels doesn’t yet have a release date. Get all the latest horror news with every issue of SciFiNow.