Penny Dreadful: City Of Angels (Showtime) S01: C+

John Logan created the original Penny Dreadful series for Showtime that lasted three seasons and ended four years ago. Now he is back with a spin off of that fantasy project. The first time he brought Frankenstein, Jekyll and Hyde and some other monsters of British literature.

City Of Angels is set in 1930's Los Angeles around the rise of the white supremacist group, taking the Nazi regime in Germany as an example, and the Mexican community present in the city, the ones that did not cross the border, but the border crossed them.

In the middle of all of this is Santa Muerte (played by Lorenza Izzo) goddess of the death, venerated in latin cultures and her sister Magda a demoness (played by Natalie Dormer). She believes mankind is evil at heart and is willing to prove this to her sister, by manipulating men into a racial war.

Along with this we have the perfect art design, cinematography and production design, that I loved in Penny Dreadful, the story interesting and relevant enough for me to watch it.

Still, something was missing, the same slow pace that the original series had, it was way to slow at times that they were episodes that I felt nothing happened in them, and this is not a 22 episode per season series, that they tend to have filling episodes, City Of Angels is only ten episodes run, there is no excuse to have a filling episode.

It has great performances like Nathan Lane who portrays detective Lewis Michener, he works along side Tiago Vega, his partner, played by Daniel Zovatto, who also gave an amazing performance. They are both first row in this battle between the latin community, who oppose the construction of a freeway that would turn apart their district. The other side is a well connected developer a Nazi sympathiser.

Playing numerous characters is Magda herself. As Elsa a german immigrant separated from an abusive husband, that pushes her new love interest to put the help where they belong. As Rio a pachuco that helps heat the other's pachuco's head with thirst for revenge and fighting back the white community. And Alex a secretary for a Los Angeles councilman, manipulating him into approving the highway.

Santa Muerte on the other hand doesn't really get involved much in what her sister is trying to prove. Sadly this spin off is more real and with less fantasy elements than the original series. I was disappointed by this. I thought magic was going to play a bigger part in the show, as Tiago's mother María Vega, played by the extraordinary Adriana Barraza was an avid believer in Santa Muerte and a little bit of a witch.

There are a couple of epic battle episodes, the first and last one. A couple of others in the middle where the drama works, but overall I didn't really like this series. I thought they took a lot of time perfecting the visuals, but spend less time perfecting the script. All the elements where in place. The premise is very relevant nowadays, but somehow the slow pace in which is told bored me a little bit, maybe with a shorter episode run the series would have worked better.

To make matters a little bit worst or maybe good. City Of Angels overlapped for two Sundays with HBO's Perry Mason which has basically the same premise. A 1930's Los Angeles, a cult killing babys and a brewing war between races. Along with the coincidences both series feature a Christian Evangelist church that feels more like a cult. A charming voice, in City Of Angels played by Kerry Bishé, who also gave a great performance. This voice is being manipulated by her mother Miss Adelaide (played by Amy Madigan). Perry Mason's church also has a beautiful blonde as the face of the church with a matriarch behind her telling her what to do. Time will tell which of this series did it better.

There was a great phase from Showtime, delivering great shows, getting attention, award buzz, but Penny Dreadful: City Of Angels won't be a part of a new wave of great shows from this network.