'Penny Dreadful: City Of Angels' Trailer: Natalie Dormer's Demonic Femme Fatale Heads To 1930s L.A.

It's been almost four years since Showtime's Penny Dreadful wrapped up its three season run, but creator John Logan is back with a "spiritual descendant" series that's set in a totally different time period. Penny Dreadful: City of Angels moves the action from Victorian England to Los Angeles in the late 1930s, and the newest trailer shows how Natalie Dormer (Game of Thrones)'s shape-shifting demon character slices through the new show like a knife. Check it out below.

"You take our heart, we take yours" is the rough translation of the message written in blood on the concrete banks of the L.A. River, and it's a message that seems to strike an appropriate amount of fear in detectives played by Daniel Zovatto and Emmy winner Nathan Lane. Racial tensions are boiling over in the city, and the appearance of a shape-shifting, demonic femme fatale probably isn't going to help matters much – especially when a grisly murder threatens to throw Tinseltown into chaos. "All mankind needs to be the monster he truly is is being told he can," Dormer's character purrs, and with this show's swirling intersection of culture clashes, Nazi imagery, law enforcement, and crime, it seems poised to reflect our current society in a potentially unsettling way.

Kerry Bishé, Rory Kinnear, Adriana Barraza, Michael Gladis, Jessica Garza, and Johnathan Nieves round out the rest of the primary cast, and you can read the show's official synopsis below:

A spiritual descendant of the original Penny Dreadful, Penny Dreadful: City of Angels opens in 1938 Los Angeles, a time and place deeply infused with social and political tension. When a grisly murder shocks the city, Detective Tiago Vega (Zovatto) and his partner Lewis Michener (Lane) become embroiled in an epic story that reflects the rich history of Los Angeles: from the building of the city's first freeways and its deep traditions of Mexican-American folklore, to the dangerous espionage actions of the Third Reich and the rise of radio evangelism. Before long, Tiago and his family are grappling with powerful forces that threaten to tear them apart. Penny Dreadful: City of Angels explores an exciting mix of the supernatural and the combustible reality of the period.

The original series has been sitting in my queue for years and is streaming on Netflix right now. I really need to finally devote the time to watch it, and there's enough time to catch up before Penny Dreadful: City of Angels premieres on Showtime on April 26, 2020.