Penny Dreadful: Season 1

Abstract

(Who knew that British colonialism and the Victorian patriarchy had their downsides?) Equally unsubtle is the depiction of Dorian Gray's (Reeve Carney) omnivorous sexual appetites and scandalous inclinations, which are emphasised by his penchant for silk dressing gowns, orgies, leather trousers, and S&M. In fact, Dorian's main job is to have sex with a sizable proportion of the cast, including one character whose attraction to him is actually particularly surprising (and revealing). [...]Victor Frankenstein's strong discomfort with (living) women, and immediate and intense bond with his needy male 'creations', are obviously intended to reflect modem readings of Frankenstein as a kind of proto-gay text. [...]Caliban rapidly outlives his welcome, mostly skulking around London like a melancholy teenager, popping up every now and then to murder whomever Victor happens to be chatting to at the time, glare through windows like a reject from Wuthering Heights, and ineffectually stalk silly young actresses. The much-anticipated final showdown between our heroes and the vampires is a definite disappointment, while hints about intriguing storylines (in particular, a plot thread involving Egyptian gods) are dropped into the first couple of episodes only to be apparently forgotten about by season's end.

Penny Dreadful: Season 1 (Showtime, 2014) (This review contains spoilers)

It must be admitted that this reviewer came to Showtime's new eight-part series Penny Dreadful with a certain degree of scepticism. The show posits a London-set late-Victorian 'Demi Monde' simultaneously inhabited by Dracula, Victor Frankenstein, Dorian Gray, the Wolfman, Egyptian gods, and (most terrifyingly of all) a demonically possessed Eva Green. It's a concept which for many viewers will bring back traumatic memories of the monumentally inept 2003 film adaptation of Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (1999). Happily, however, Penny Dreadful, created and written by Gladiator (2000) screenwriter John Logan, has turned out to be a beautifully crafted slab of hokum which easily ranks as one of my favourite new television shows, despite some not inconsiderable problems.

The pilot opens as some unfortunate but disposable tenement folk are bloodily ripped apart by an unknown attacker, prompting fears that Jack the Ripper may be up to his old tricks again. Token American Ethan Chandler (played by token American Josh Hartnett, who is better here than he has been in years) is a womanising, hard-drinking performer in a Wild West show, who may or may not be connected to the murders (a plot thread that runs throughout the series). His gun-slinging talents bring him to the attention of Vanessa Ives (Green), a mysterious gentlewoman who has a talent for showy tarot readings and is in need of some professional muscle to help her investigate the murders. Ives lives in a sumptuous mansion owned by the decidedly Allan Quatermain-like explorer Sir Malcolm Murray (Timothy Dalton), who needs Chandler's assistance in order to help save his daughter Mina (Olivia Llewellyn). We later discover that Mina's marriage into the middle classes has inevitably resulted in her being kidnapped by a nest of particularly bloodthirsty vampires, and Murray is determined to rescue her, whatever it takes. (The search for Mina is one of the major narrative elements connecting each episode.) Sir Malcolm soon adds to their ranks the reclusive, socially awkward young medical genius Dr Victor Frankenstein (Harry Treadwell), whose ease with the undead makes him an obvious recruit for our sombre band of misfits. Also tagging along is Sir Malcolm's African man-servant Sembene (Danny Sapani), who (like every other major character) clearly has 'Terrible Things to Hide', although we don't actually find out what they are in this series. In addition to the very solid main cast, the series also features a number of well-known British character actors in minor roles, among them Simon Russell Beale as an endearingly camp Egyptologist, genre stalwart David Warner as a (criminally underused) Professor Abraham Van Heising, and Helen McCrory as a spiritualist who may or may not be the real thing.

From the outset, Penny Dreadful looks so strikingly beautiful that it can't help but impress even the most sceptical viewer. Both the interior and exterior set designs are by turns grubbily and grandly atmospheric, with the cramped streets of central Dublin proving a creditable stand-in for the slums of Victorian London. The pilot, directed by Juan Antonio Bayona (best known for helming Spanish horror classic The Orphanage [2007]) sets the scene nicely. It juxtaposes powerfully eerie interludes (such as a sequence involving Green's character, a tormented Catholic, at prayer, which the more arachnophobic viewer may want to watch out for) with violence so extreme that even a hardened gorehound like myself was surprised that they'd gotten away with it. Yet for all of the action set-pieces and bloody murders on offer here, the show also displays a kind of languid confidence which may either enthral or infuriate, depending on one's televisual inclinations. In short, the pace may be far too slow for the more impatient viewer. As in Brian Fuller's masterpiece-in-progress Hannibal (2013 - reviewed in Issue 12), Penny Dreadful features a great many scenes in which, on the surface, nothing more exciting happens than a lengthy conversation between two very messed-up people. It often makes for genuinely compelling viewing, precisely because there's room here for both the characters and the story to breathe. One (perhaps inevitable) consequence of the leisurely pacing, however, is that it does sometimes feels as if the story is taking rather too long to get to the point.

It must also be admitted, though, that Penny Dreadful rarely errs on the side of subtlety in its evocation of the Victorian age. It comes as little surprise when the seemingly heroic Sir Malcolm is revealed to be an exploitative sexual adventurer whose explorations have more to do with ego than with the desire for scientific discovery; nor is it entirely surprising that his arrogance has had a devastating effect on his doomed biological children as well as his surrogate daughter Vanessa. (Who knew that British colonialism and the Victorian patriarchy had their downsides?) Equally unsubtle is the depiction of Dorian Gray's (Reeve Carney) omnivorous sexual appetites and scandalous inclinations, which are emphasised by his penchant for silk dressing gowns, orgies, leather trousers, and S&M. In fact, Dorian's main job is to have sex with a sizable proportion of the cast, including one character whose attraction to him is actually particularly surprising (and revealing). Similarly, Victor Frankenstein's strong discomfort with (living) women, and immediate and intense bond with his needy male 'creations', are obviously intended to reflect modem readings of Frankenstein as a kind of proto-gay text.

There is one potentially intriguing aspect of the show's representation of Frankenstein's creation (played by Rory Kinnear, and dubbed 'Caliban'); unlike many of his on-screen predecessors, this Creature is as eloquent and well-read as Shelley's original. What's more, his truly startling first appearance provides one of the best moments in the entire series. However, Caliban rapidly outlives his welcome, mostly skulking around London like a melancholy teenager, popping up every now and then to murder whomever Victor happens to be chatting to at the time, glare through windows like a reject from Wuthering Heights, and ineffectually stalk silly young actresses. Ultimately, then, although Treadwell's nervy, pallid depiction of Frankenstein as a repressed young nerd is an interesting one, his relationship with the Creature quickly becomes one of the more tiresome elements of the show.

The show's other major problem lies with Chandler's love interest, Brona Croft. While she is a likable actress who shows winning flashes of vulnerability, Billie Piper is sorely miscast as the consumption-ridden young prostitute who quickly enters into a relationship with fellow heavy-drinker Chandler. The main difficulty lies with her Northem-Irish accent, which represents the worst disservice to the Belfast brogue since Julia Roberts tried one on for size in Mary Reilly (1996). Piper's accent is all the more unfortunate given the fact that, as noted, the show is filmed in Dublin, and has many Irish off-screen personnel. One would have thought that finding an actress who could realistically portray the only Irish character in the entire cast would not be inordinately difficult. It's a painfully distracting facet of her performance and, most egregiously, it makes almost every scene in which she appears cringe-worthy, a feeling compounded by the fact that Brona must also cough blood into a handkerchief every thirty seconds or so in order to highlight that her days are numbered. In addition, in what is only one of the most obvious examples of the show's propensity for hamfistedly telegraphing twists several miles in advance, even the most dim-witted of viewer will rapidly make a connection between her terminally ill state and Caliban's longing for a 'bride'.

Having said that, one of the series' most interesting (and potentially problematic) characteristics is that it so explicitly dramatises the male fear of 'unrestrained' female sexuality and power that informs so many classic horror tropes. There are moments here when it genuinely feels as though Logan has just finished working his way through a beginner's guide to the female gothic, and is eager to demonstrate this fact on screen, principally by channelling his responses through the character of Vanessa Ives. Green has a compellingly eccentric on-screen presence, and has already depicted any number of witches, femme fatales, psychos, and deranged warrior-princess types on the big screen. Penny Dreadful may well represent her finest hour in this regard, though. As the series progresses, Vanessa's propensity for dramatic eye-rolling, convulsive fits, levitation, and speaking in tongues increasingly comes to the fore. It's hard to imagine many actresses (literally) throwing themselves into the action in the way that Green does in the remarkable séance scene that provides the climax of the second episode. Her intense physicality is also highlighted in the season's two most Vanessa-centric episodes, 'Closer than Sisters', and 'Possession' (essentially a late-Victorian re-hash of The Exorcist), in which we find out just why it is that she feels so very guilty about her friend Mina's terrible fate, and discover the true nature of her unique religious burden. Once again, originality isn't one of the episode's (or the series') strong points, but Green does get to recite a particularly pointed yet compelling monologue in which she discusses the psychosexual reasons behind the Victorian male fascination with dead and dying women. It's a moment that not only underlines Logan's undoubtedly heavy-handed approach to the material, as well as Green's absolute ease with it, but it also explicitly links Vanessa's arc with that of Brona, the show's other major female character. Of course, it could be argued that Logan is trying to have his cake and eat it by acknowledging the horror genre's reliance upon graphic depictions of female suffering, while graphically depicting female physical and psychological torment throughout the series. Certainly, none of the male characters are put through the wringer in the way that Vanessa is. And yet, the fact that she is by far the most intriguing (in part because of her compelling back-story, and in part because of Green's unique performance) and potentially all-powerful member of the group means that, unlike Brona or Mina, Vanessa is ultimately much more than a victim.

Penny Dreadful can be undeniably uneven, illogical, and even rather silly at times. There are quite a few moments where characters suddenly change their minds about an issue for no other apparent reason than it says so in the script (Sir Malcolm's vacillating relationship with Vanessa is a particular offender here). The much-anticipated final showdown between our heroes and the vampires is a definite disappointment, while hints about intriguing storylines (in particular, a plot thread involving Egyptian gods) are dropped into the first couple of episodes only to be apparently forgotten about by season's end. It's also difficult to see what shallow fop Dorian Gray or love-sick bore Caliban add to the proceedings either: they're both catalysts for the dreadful actions of others rather than fully developed characters in their own right. And yet, for all that, I'll certainly be tuning in again next year. The question posed by the final moment of the series, 'Do you really want to be normal?' is one that raises all kinds of intriguing opportunities for Penny Dreadful's future. Every major character in the show is 'monstrous' in some sense or another, and yet Logan's script manages to invest Chandler, Ives, Frankenstein, and Sir Malcolm with a degree of psychological complexity that renders their stories, and their relationships with each other, truly absorbing. For those reasons, I'll tactfully ignore the fact that none of the classic texts that the show has plundered for inspiration - Dracula, Frankenstein, The Picture of Dorian Gray - were, technically speaking, penny dreadfuls at all. It's a good title, and a little creative licence never did anyone any harm - except, perhaps, the unfortunate Victor Frankenstein.

Bernice M. Murphy