Showtime is in my good graces this week. Not only have they announced Twin Peaks’ return to television, but they’re already teasing the Season 2 return of the literary-minded horror series Penny Dreadful, which you can see in the video above. Can our lives handle more Vanessa Ives?
To be expected, there isn’t a lot of meat (werewolf or otherwise) on this trailer, but it does make Season 2’s destination more clear: the past. We can hear Eva Green’s Vanessa asking, “Do you believe the past can return?” And then we hear an unidentified male voice responding, “More than that. It never leaves us. It is who we are.” Boom! Then we get the morbidly beautiful blood blot of a scorpion, the very predator that Vanessa wears on her necklace.
If we may delve into mythology for a moment - since this is a show about preconceived stories, after all - the scorpion is best known as the animal that Greek goddess Gaia sent to Orion to kill him once he started threatening to kill every beast on the planet. Will this reference make its way into the world of Penny Dreadful in the future? Will Vanessa have to take on someone that threatens to kill all of her friends and monstrous associates?
We already know that Vanessa’s past is a major part of this story, as one Season 1 episode (“Closer than Sisters”) was devoted entirely to giving viewers the backstory between the Ives family and the Murrays, including former best friend Mina (Olivia Llewellyn) and patriarch Sir Malcolm (Timothy Dalton). Vanessa witnessed one controversy and caused another one herself, embracing darkness and ruining lives in the process. She later spent time in the crazy house, but was guided to the hunt for Mina with the help of an evil spirit. You know, exactly how every young girl's life goes.
But it’s not just Vanessa’s past that will come to light. We’ll be finding out more about Ethan Chandler (Josh Hartnett) and his hateful father. Presumably, Dorian Grey (Reeve Carney) will get some past-dwelling exposition, too, as we still don’t know much about this guy other than he’ll fuck anything that moves. And Madam Kali (Helen McCrory) will be a major bad guy in Season 2, so we can expect her earlier years to get attention as well. All in all, everyone on Penny Dreadful could use their own history lesson.
It’ll still be a long while before we get to witness Penny Dreadful Season 2, as it isn’t set to premiere until 2015. Find Season 1 on Blu-ray and DVD starting Tuesday, October 14.
