Showtime’s Penny Dreadful was, for all of its supporting cast of “famous monsters of literature land,” the story of Vanessa Ives. An original character, played very originally by Eva Green, she became the focus of the the series’ story, and her arc was the overall arc that its writers concentrated on.

So when the time came for Eva Green to sign up beyond the third season or not… well, I don’t really know the nitty gritty, but she didn’t, and the show came to a pretty natural conclusion.

Showtime, however, wanted more. And they still do. We understand they’re making plans to get it.

It’s early days but the network is racing ahead in developing a spin-off to Penny Dreadful that will be set in and around Los Angeles.

What else do we know? That they’re casting now for lots of new roles and that, just like before, some of them are established characters from genre fiction.

We can smell the reek of Lovecraft from here, but… well, where else can they go with this? Who are the American equivalents of Frankenstein, Dorian Gray, Count Dracula? Most of the obvious candidates either seem too modern (that is to say, not in the public domain) or just not fictional (serial killers like Ed Gein, perhaps).

We’ll keep our ear to the ground and our eyes on the casting notices and see if there’s anything else we can bring to you soon. In the meantime, at least it’s nice that such a beloved show will be getting some kind of an afterlife.