The first impression of Penny Dreadful: City of Angels, is that it’s going to be intense and insanely messy, both from a social and political standpoint. In fact it feels safe to say that this show is going to tweak a few sensibilities since we currently live in an era when racism is seen around every corner and anything that disturbs people on an emotional level is typically called out simply because the person can. But speaking of the show, it looks as though it’s bound to be the type that will either force people to pay attention to every glaring detail or leave them behind in a rush as it continues to move forward at its own pace. Natalie Dormer and Nathan Lane are already looking to be two of the biggest standouts in the coming series as one will play the supernatural force fomenting the trouble that will come to the 1930s landscape of LA, while the other will play the very human aspect that will be attempting to make sense of the madness that’s come to his city while dealing with an ever-widening issue between its people and the prospect of all hell breaking loose as citizens consider taking matters into their own hands at some point, leaving the police no other recourse but to do whatever they can to quell the situation. That’s how it feels at this point at any rate, and come April 26th it’s bound to pop off in a way that’s going to be extremely enticing for those that are interested in tuning in.
One thing about shows such as this, both historically and fictionally speaking, is that cities such a Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, and any other major metropolitan city tend to draw a lot of attention when it comes to big stories that have the capability of spreading out and affecting a mass number of individuals while still telling a very central and focused story. There are plenty of shows and movies that focus on small towns and locations in the middle of nowhere as well, but from a social standpoint the bigger the city, the deeper the story can typically go. From the supernatural on down to the mundane some cities simply present themselves as a bigger draw for certain stories and as one of the bigger cities on the west coast, LA is definitely a site of interest since the mix of so many different cultures and people tend to collide in a way that makes a story appear all on its own without any prompting. As Eric Diaz of Nerdist points out there is a very real thought that the series might have something to do with the real-life story of the Black Dahlia, which has tinged the story lines of other shows, but the main difference here is that the murdered female has traditional Day of the Dead markings, meaning it’s likely to be similar but not exactly tied in to the real killing that took place long ago.
The racial tensions are going to be present in a big way though since 1938 Los Angeles was, as historians might want to remind people, an uncertain and difficult time in the city since the growth of southern LA had skyrocketed and as one could imagine the racial divide in a town that was once dominated by white residents was bound to increase at some point. This series does look as though it’s going to be touching on that idea, though it’s also a wonder if it’s going to cover the disastrous flood that happened in 1938 as well, since it was a huge disaster that occurred early in the year. Perhaps though considering that it happened in the first part of 1938 it might get a mention instead of a place in the series, but we won’t really know until we start watching. What is known from the trailer thus far is that things are bound to take a turn for the worst for some of the characters very quickly and that the dividing line between Mexican-Americans and their neighbors is going to be drawn fairly quickly and will be likely to cause a great deal of strife and struggle between folks that by all rights should have been able to air out their differences in the past, just as people should be able to now. You know that saying about learning from the past to avoid the mistakes of the present and future? Shows such as this, entertaining and exciting as they are, manage to remind us that we haven’t learned all that much yet, and there’s always a way to slip back into old habits.
With that being said this series looks like it’s about to be something that people will be talking about in the days to come and will likely hold up as something that people should watch.
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