*
SIR MALCOLM: Previously on Penny Dreadful...
FRANKENSTEIN: Man does not live only in the empirical world.
We must seek the ephemeral.
SIR MALCOLM: Dr. Frankenstein,
thank you for coming.
FRANKENSTEIN: Life and death,
the flicker that separates one from the other.
Everything else is insignificant.
BRONA: Our young doctor has a secret.
ETHAN: How about dinner tonight? Anywhere but here.
I don't know London much.
I do.
Mina?
She came to me. There was such a need in her eyes,
and then something monstrous.
(SCREECHING)
Father, Mina's waiting.
It's so cold and dark and wet like the jungle.
I am crying. I am so afraid, Father.
Save me! Save me!
LYLE: This is the spell foretelling the coming of the beast.
Amunet, Amun-Ra conjoined.
I would not tell Miss Ives this.
Who wants to know they're hunted by the devil?
Who the fuck are you people?
VANESSA: A wise man would walk away from this house
and forget everything that occurred.
ETHAN: That sounds like a warning.
It's an invitation.
FRANKENSTEIN: As you grow up,
you'll learn we all do things which cause us shame.
(GASPS)
Your firstborn has returned...
Father.
YOUNG VICTOR: "There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream
"The earth, and every common sight
"To me did seem
"Apparell'd in celestial light
"The glory and the freshness of a dream
"It is not now as it hath been of yore
"Turn wheresoe'er I may
"By night or day
"The things which I have seen I now can see no more"
CAROLINE: Victor, I'm sorry about Bradshaw,
he was a good dog.
YOUNG VICTOR: When the poets write of death,
it's invariably serene.
(INHALES)
I wonder if that's what it is really.
This death,
this ending of things.
Is it an ending though, Victor?
Or merely a movement?
A gesture toward something else.
Toward heaven? Who can say?
There are some things we're not meant to know.
Or know too soon, anyway.
(CHUCKLES)
(SIGHS)
I shall miss Bradshaw.
As will I.
'Tis just thee and me now.
Ourselves alone.
(GAGGING)
(CHOKING)
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
(CAROLINE COUGHING)
Come away, Victor.
(GAGGING)
Will she die today?
No, no, lad. Of course not.
Death is not serene.
(CAROLINE GASPS)
(COUGHS)
PRIEST: We now commit the body of our sister, Caroline Frankenstein,
to the ground.
Earth to Earth, ashes to ashes,
dust to dust.
(SOBBING)
(SHUDDERING)
CREATURE: Your firstborn has returned...
Father.
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
CREATURE: Did you think I wouldn't find you?
(FRANKENSTEIN GASPS)
Did you imagine that I was dead?
That I could die?
You know better,
Frankenstein.
I would seek you even unto the maelstrom
of the blackest tempest of the darkest night.
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
Stand and face me!
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
Look upon this face anew.
Is it not well made?
Is the language not rich with felicity of expression?
Are the eyes not alert?
Are these not the eyes that you looked into...
Once?
(GASPING)
Hear how I bled.
(THUNDER CRACKING)
(GASPING)
(SCREAMING)
CREATURE: That it was a difficult birth there can be no doubt.
I was born in sheer, terrified agony.
(CLATTERING)
(GROANING)
But surely this was not the Protean man you'd envisioned.
This was not a golden triumph over mortality,
the lyrical Adonais, of which Shelley wrote.
This was abomination.
(GROANING)
No!
(BOTH SCREAMING)
And so you fled.
The first human action that I experienced was rejection.
(PANTING)
(CREATURE SCREAMING) (CLATTERING)
So do not wonder at my loathing of your species.
(MOANING)
I waited.
But you did not return.
Has there ever been a creature so alone?
So utterly helpless?
Was every new-born creature abandoned the moment they were born?
Was this what life was?
(HORSE WHINNYING)
(WHIP CRACKING)
(MAN GRUNTING)
That upstairs window became my salvation and my tutor.
I learned how people were.
What the people of the village valued and what despised.
How animals were treated.
There was no doubt in my mind that I was an animal.
How could there be a doubt?
Was it not a countenance made for predation?
Eventually I learned words.
Your beloved volumes of poetry were my primers.
From your penciled notations
I learned that you favored Wordsworth and the old Romantics.
No wonder you fled from me.
I am not a creation of the antique pastoral world. (SCOFFS)
I am modernity personified.
Did you not know that's what you were creating?
The modern age.
Did you really imagine that your modern creation
would hold to the values of Keats and Wordsworth?
We are men of iron and mechanization now.
We are steam engines and turbines.
Were you really so naive
to imagine that we'd see eternity in a daffodil?
Who is the child, Frankenstein,
thee or me?
(CHOKING)
You ran from me once.
Never again.
We are the Janus mask.
Inseparable.
(GASPING)
(SOBBING) How could you do that?
That?
Aborting your child
before it could know pain?
It is a mercy.
You bore me for nothing but pain!
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
(TIGER ROARING)
(SNAKE HISSING)
(MONKEY SCREECHING) (GASPS)
(SCREECHING)
(FALCON SCREAMING)
(MONKEYS CHITTERING)
(LION ROARING)
(GASPS)
Vanessa...
(GASPS)
Help me.
Mina...
(LOW GROWL) (SHUDDERING)
Where are you?
They are all about me.
The beasts that feed at night.
And they are hungry.
Please, save me.
(GASPING)
(FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING)
VANESSA: I need to talk to you.
(FRANKENSTEIN BREATHING HEAVILY)
CREATURE: Do you want to hear the rest of our story?
Once I resolved to find you, I knew where to look.
I knew in which occupation I would find you engaged.
The cutting of flesh,
the work of the surgeon
and the butcher.
And so I came to your city.
London.
Cruel as the Harlot's curse.
(HORSE NEIGHING)
(PEOPLE TALKING INDISTINCTLY)
MAN: Watch it! (BARKING)
(EXCLAIMS) (GASPS)
Ahhh!
Stay away from her!
(WHIMPERING)
Get him.
Come here. No. Ahhh... No!
(MEN GRUNTING) (CREATURE GROANING)
Freak! Ahh!
That oughta show you! Ugh!
CREATURE: And so it was I learned mankind's capacity for hatred,
and mercy,
in a single night.
What in the name of all the tender mercies happened to you?
An accident.
Only one thing for it then!
(GASPS)
(CHUCKLING)
(GAGGING)
Well, yes, not the finest potable in creation, I grant.
But we poor theatricals
must accept the compromises of our lowered circumstances.
That must have been an accident operatic in scope, you poor lamb.
Industrial, was it?
One of those dreadful clanking machines
with gears and cogs and...
I shall buy you dinner.
I know what it is to have no prospects, son.
I've suffered the pains of whoremaster fate
beyond human endurance.
Not an industrial catastrophe to be sure,
but something even more insidious.
The denigration of one's art.
You know Shakespeare, yes?
Some.
The Immortal.
That was my stock in trade,
when there was a value placed upon the ineffable and the exalted.
When this city aspired to Jerusalem!
Do you need work?
Yes.
Your...
Visage, creates challenges?
It is a horror.
Not everywhere.
There is a place where the malformed find grace,
where the hideous can be beautiful,
where strangeness is not shunned but celebrated.
This place
is the theater.
BRAND: My friend, there was a time
this modest hall resounded with Shakespeare,
seasons of it, great vomits of it.
My last turn was when I gave my Leontes!
"I have drunk and seen the spider!"
Ah, but that was many seasons ago.
Times have changed.
Nowadays, it's all...
Ibsen.
Come! Let us make our entrance.
Oh, no. We do not enter here.
We use the stage door.
(SCREAMING)
STAGE MANAGER: Oi, oi, oi!
Who's on the blood pump?
We are in rehearsals presently for a new offering.
The old penny dreadful Sweeney Todd, demonic tonsorial.
(MIMICS GAGGING)
We present three of the little blood plays at a shot, twice nightly.
Our fare is mayhem and malice
with all the ingenious gore we can devise.
You shall be our new stage rat,
responsible for the machinery and rigging.
The limelight and gas as well.
And if you like, you can live here.
Yes. Very good.
You know, occurs to me,
given my total self-absorption,
I never asked your name.
Fear not.
You shall have a nom de theater.
Do you know The Tempest?
No.
You shall be Caliban.
Caliban.
Who's he?
Ah! We'll add it to the bill next week and you'll see.
Of course in our version Caliban eats Prospero.
WOMAN: Vincent!
I'll be back soon.
Such a pleasure, my true friend.
Welcome to the Grand Guignol.
CREATURE: And so I discovered what kindness was.
And I found a home.
(BRAND TALKING INDISTINCTLY)
That's wonderful.
Thank you.
Yes. (LAUGHING)
CREATURE: Could there have been a more appropriate place for me?
Night after night, the players died gruesomely
and then came back to life again for the next show.
They were undying, like me,
creatures of perpetual resurrection.
(ALL GASP)
(GASPS)
(AUDIENCE CHEERING)
CREATURE: I was not welcomed by all.
How could this face, this form,
fit with ease amongst the mortal and the beautiful?
I learned to stay in the shadows
to protect such a heart as this you gave me.
But still, I was a member of the company in my way
and I proved an able and agile worker.
You made me strong and tireless.
If only you had made me handsome.
Once I found my occupation at the theater
it was a simple thing to slip out at night and hunt for you.
And then I followed you and I waited.
I saw your progress with my lamented younger brother.
Did you not feel me near, I wonder?
Did you not feel my gravitational pull?
My inexorableness?
What do you want of me?
To suffer?
You've done that.
I'm sorry I left you.
I'm sorry for the cruelty you've endured,
that I inflicted upon you,
but... (INHALES SHARPLY)
I cannot unmake the past!
I'm not concerned with the past,
only the future.
Rise and walk with me, creator.
I'll show you what I want.
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
(MEN TALKING INDISTINCTLY) (SEAGULLS SQUAWKING)
(GASPS)
(ETHAN BREATHING HEAVILY)
(BRONA MOANS)
(EXHALING)
(SIGHS)
(BRONA MOANS)
(BOTH BREATHING HEAVILY)
(MOANING)
Hmm. (GRUNTS)
(COUGHING)
Do you have medicine?
(SIGHS)
For the lungs you mean?
No, who has money for that?
Not when there's eating to be done, my lad.
SIR MALCOLM: No, no, no.
I'd say we'd do better to come in off the boardwalk, up by the Chester Road.
Somewhere about there.
Sir, Mr. Chandler is here.
Send him in.
Sir. Miss Ives.
Mr. Chandler.
I'll not waste your time. I'm looking for money.
I'll work for it.
Well, I must say your timing couldn't be more fortuitous.
We are intending to undertake another expedition.
Whatever it is, yes.
Miss Ives will explain the details as far as she sees fit.
Excuse me.
Are you seeking passage back to America then?
Not much for me there, except my father.
There's no love lost between us.
You don't miss your home?
Landscape's nice.
Legal system less so.
Sir Malcolm hasn't found her?
No. But she came to me.
I take it you don't mean knocked on the door and said hello.
I...
I see things sometimes.
I am affected by forces beyond our world.
You don't question that?
There's a lot I question about all this,
but not that.
Will you sit down?
So, what we're planning is...
What happened to Mina?
She was working as a governess
and became engaged to a Mr. Jonathan Harker.
But then,
she became embroiled with another man.
But not entirely a man,
something else altogether,
perhaps one of many like him, we don't know.
This creature
influenced her behavior
and now she has become his slave,
hovering between our world and his.
Who's the man?
If man he be.
We don't know.
But you think you know where she is?
We might.
Have you ever been to London Zoo?
CREATURE: You've learned much since you created me.
Your new child was elegant,
both of form and limb.
Sweet-tempered, too, from what I gathered.
And he learned more quickly than did I.
Of course he had a teacher.
He had a name.
You gave him a name?
He picked it himself.
He was called Proteus.
(SIGHS)
What do you want from me, demon?
So now I have a name,
and yet you will not look at me.
What do you want from me?
You know what I want.
Don't torment me.
You say this to me?
Tell me.
In this life, there are hungers that compel us.
Food, shelter, warmth,
even poetry.
But one thing stands titanic.
Name it.
Love.
(CHUCKLES)
Top marks.
I can never love you.
I do not seek your love, demon!
I do not seek what is not there.
I would weep for you if ever I'd learned how.
No.
I seek
a companion.
Look around.
Take your pick.
You will make me an immortal mate.
A woman.
Like myself,
everlasting.
This you shall do.
Or I will strike down all those you love
and render your brightest day
your darkest night.
You seek to threaten me with death?
If you seek to threaten me,
threaten me with life.
Do not test me, Frankenstein.
You have not known horror until I have shown it to you.
(TIGER GROWLING)
ETHAN: You had a vision then, of Mina here? That's it?
VANESSA: Mina wouldn't have appeared to me but for her great need.
I interpret these signs as best I can.
(SOFTLY) Whatever happens tonight with Miss Ives, let it unfold.
Meaning what?
Her gifts make her vulnerable.
They also make her desirable.
To whom?
Let's carry on then.
(BIRD SQUAWKING)
(BIRDS CHIRPING)
Is she here?
(SHUSHES)
There's something wrong here.
What haven't you told me?
(WOLF GROWLING)
(GUN COCKS)
(GROWLING)
(WOLF GROWLS LOUDLY) (GASPS)
(ALL GROWLING)
Don't fire.
Don't move.
Miss Ives, do not turn your head.
(GROWLING CONTINUES)
(SIGHS)
Let's go.
(ANIMAL SQUEAKING)
(MONKEY CHATTERING)
(YELPING)
(GNAWING)
(MUFFLED GRUNT)
(GRUNTS)
No, no, Mr. Chandler. Forebear.
We shall need some sturdy chains, I think.
Sir Malcolm requires you.
What's your name?
My name is Fenton.
Her name is Vanessa.
How do you know about that, Mr. Fenton?
(SNARLING)
(GROANS)
(CHUCKLES MOCKINGLY)
Fear already?
You will not survive long in this cruel old world.
Tell me of your master.
(SNARLING)
(GROANING)
(LAPPING)
Where is your master?
Right behind you.
Don't you feel him in the dark?
On the back of your neck,
his breath.
(EXHALES) Now one finger reaching out.
Do you not feel it?
Well, you soon will.
And then...
All light will end
and the world will live in darkness.
The Hidden Ones will emerge and rule...
Amunet.
Amun-Ra.
Do you know the name Mina?
FENTON: I know the name Vanessa.
Naughty girl.
Mother will punish you,
you cock-sucking whore.
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
Where is your master? Hold on.
Will you beat me, Mother?
Have I been naughty?
I only wanna eat, like all poor creatures.
I am so hungry!
Ahh!
SIR MALCOLM: Where is your master?
Everywhere.
Where is your master?
I'm so hungry.
(GROANS LOUDLY)
Where is your master?
(FENTON WHIMPERING)
FRANKENSTEIN: Oh.
I'm late to the party.
SIR MALCOLM: He's the first real connection we have to Mina.
It is an invaluable opportunity we cannot afford to waste.
Even if it means beating him to death?
Suddenly sentimental about bloodletting, Mr. Chandler?
Maybe I don't take to torturing children.
FRANKENSTEIN: Killing redskins more your line?
You know nothing about it.
Whole Indian nations pacified into nonexistence, what don't I know?
How do you know I was in the Indian wars?
I didn't.
Gentlemen, the matter at hand...
SIR MALCOLM: Doctor?
FRANKENSTEIN: As a subject, he's promising.
If you seek a cure, you'll need a subject for experimentation.
A cure for what?
I'll have to make a proper examination,
but I would think the disorder is not mental,
the physiological symptoms are too marked.
I would begin treatment as if it were, say,
Dengue fever or one of the other rare blood disorders.
Perhaps transfusion.
To what end?
Removing the toxins from his system
and seeing if there are any improvements.
It may be a way to treat your daughter
if she is similarly afflicted.
The whole thing's steeped in blood,
so why not start there?
Why not?
You've got a kid chained up in your basement
and you're talking about experimenting on him
like he's some kind of rat,
when you're not talking about torturing him.
Then leave this house.
We here have been brutalized with loss.
It has made us brutal in return.
There is no going back from this moment.
If we are to proceed, we proceed as one.
Without hesitation
and with fealty to each other alone.
This, we seek, demands nothing less.
It is not for the weak or the kind.
No one in this room is kind.
That's why you're here.
Now look into each other's eyes.
And pledge to go as far as your soul will allow.
Swear it now.
Give your assent, Mr. Chandler,
or leave this company and its mysteries behind.
I'm with you.
And I with you, Ethan.
And since we're compacted,
I have a question.
Tonight, in the zoo,
Mina was not there.
Did you know? I feared.
Why?
I think it's possible the creature we seek doesn't want her.
He wants you.
For what purpose? I don't know.
Tell me.
(SIGHS)
Tell me. I don't know.
So I was bait?
Yes.
ETHAN: I took a room at the Mariner's Inn
on the other side of the river.
Why there of all places?
Mmm.
What's her name?
Brona.
It means "sadness" in Gaelic.
Does she live up to the name?
I can't tell.
She has consumption.
Then she will.
Who doesn't love a lost cause?
I've spoken to the hematologist I mentioned before.
He's short of funds so he'll consult with us.
Pretty sort of doctors we are,
bartering our services like this.
So you'll come tomorrow? Yes.
And I'll bring supplies for the transfusion.
You will have money for me? Yes.
There is one thing you need to consider.
When you transform a life,
you're making it anew.
Whatever happens to that creature downstairs,
we are responsible for it.
It is our burden now.
Every action builds another link that binds us to it.
That chain is everlasting.
Work tomorrow, Doctor. Get some sleep.
Who can survive the dreams?
(SIGHS)
(DOOR OPENS)
(DOOR CLOSES)
Master?
I am here.
Master...
*