Showtime Revives Penny Dreadful with City of Angels

Showtime is continuing the Penny Dreadful saga with Penny Dreadful: City of Angels.

Set in Victorian-era London, the next chapter opens in 1938 Los Angeles, a time and place deeply infused with Mexican-American folklore and social tension. The story is rooted in the conflict between characters connected to the deity Santa Muerte and others allied with the Devil. It will feature all-new characters and storylines, exploring a mix of the supernatural and the reality of that period, creating new occult myths and moral dilemmas within a historical backdrop.

John Logan, creator, writer and executive producer of Penny Dreadful, will continue in those same roles.

Penny Dreadful premiered in 2014 and ran for three seasons. The series has been honored with 13 Primetime Emmy nominations, as well as a Golden Globe nomination for lead actress Eva Green, and it won three BAFTA Awards.

“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 Gary Levine, president of programming at Showtime Networks. “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.”

“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,” Logan said. “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.”