Victor Frankenstein (Penny Dreadful)

Victor Frankenstein is a fictional scientist featured in the Showtime television series Penny Dreadful. He is one of the main characters from the series and is played by actor Harry Treadaway. He was introduced in the pilot episode of the show, "Night Work".

Biography
As a young boy, Victor Frankenstein discovered the emaciated remains of his beloved pet dog. His mother, Caroline Frankenstein, tried to console him and ease his troubled soul about the concept of death. Caroline, who had been ill for some time, suddenly experienced a violent seizure and began coughing blood all over her son. She died moments later. These two tragedies, in such close proximity to one another, spurned Victor Frankenstein to research solving the mysteries of life and death. His work would eventually become an obsession that would consume every waking moment of his life.

As an adult, Victor Frankenstein had little money and had taken up working as an assistant to a mortuary boss at an underground facility that provided fresh cadavers to medical students. Victor had access to a large chamber adjacent to the room he was staying at, the entrance of which was concealed by a large bookcase.

Victor Frankenstein foraged body parts from cadavers he had recovered and stitched them together to form a male figure. Using experimental electrical and chemical processes, he actually brought his creation to life. Victor was horrified to see this reanimated man howling in his birth pains and fled from him, leaving the creature to his fate.

Victor eventually returned to his experiments and attempted a second creation. As with his first born, he brought this being to life through similar processes. This second creature seemed more timid and manageable than his first experiment and Victor had him choose a name for himself out of the collected works of William Shakespeare. The creature selected the name Proteus. Unlike his first experiment, which Victor deemed a failure, he took great measure in looking after his new prodigal son. He took him out into the streets of London and was shocked when Proteus began recovering memories of the life he knew before.

Victor took him back to his laboratory, unaware that his first creation had returned to him. The Frankenstein Monster literally tore Proteus in half, and claimed that he was being merciful. Victor never expected to see his first born again, and was horrified to look upon him with Proteus' still-warm blood splattered across both their faces. The Creature had developed intelligence in the time since they parted ways and now wanted Victor to use his expertise to create a mate for him.

Joining the Cabal
At around the time that Victor Frankenstein had been putting the finishing touches on Proteus, he was also approached by Sir Malcolm Murray, the spiritualist Vanessa Ives and the American sharpshooter Ethan Chandler. They brought him a very unique body for examination. The corpse was not human, but actually that of a vampire. To make the specimen even more mysterious was that it bore an epidermal exoskeleton covering its natural flesh. Upon removing the outer skin, they found that the entirety of the creature's body was carved with Egyptian hieroglyphs.

Shortly thereafter, Sir Malcolm Murray invited Victor Frankenstein for a private meeting at the Explorer's Club. Murray admired Frankenstein's commitment and the fact that he showed no hesitation in literally pulling back the skin of this mystery to see what lied underneath. He invited him to lend his expertise in finding a cure to vampirism. Murray needed this cure in order to help his missing daughter, Mina. He offered Victor an impressive stipend for his services, and Frankenstein was not in a position to refuse.

Malcolm Murray later captured a vampire familiar by the name of Fenton, whom he kept secure in the basement of his home. He asked Victor Frankenstein to examine him. When Victor realized that the creature needed blood, he fed him a cat and then began performing a transfusion so he could analyze the results. As he was not a hematologist by trade, Victor consulted with someone much more experienced in the science of blood - a man named Van Helsing.

Notes & Trivia



 * Actor Harry Treadaway is also known for playing the role of Andy in the 2012 horror/comedy Cockneys vs. Zombies.