The director behind blockbuster "Pacific Rim" and dark fantasy "Pan's Labyrinth" premiered his new TV thriller series "The Strain," based on a trilogy of books he co-wrote, on the FX cable channel this week.
"The Strain" chronicles the vampirisation of society through a viral outbreak and the battle by Dr Ephraim Goodweather (played by Corey Stoll of "House of Cards") as the New York City public health official trying to stop its spread.
Del Toro, 49, talked to Reuters about his fondness for television, anatomically correct gore and infusing love in tales of horror.
Q: Why did you make the move to TV?
A: I became very enamoured of the long-form narrative of TV and really loved the fact that you can develop notions and characters over a long period of time. In the case of something literary like "Deadwood" or "The Wire," it feels like you are reading a piece of literature.
You have the chance to explore ideas that ... don't open and close in the space of two or three hours, like they do in a movie. And that is a unique luxury.
The content also came from the fact that we have changed the way we consume stories on TV. So now an audience has a relationship with a drama that can last several years.
Q: Did FX put any restrictions on you?
A: Noooo (laughs). I wish I had a great story to tell, but the reality was the opposite. The week before I started shooting I got a unique phone call in my career from John Landgraf (president of FX Networks) and he said ... "You can be as off-kilter as you want." I certainly tried some things in the pilot that were edgy and it all went beautifully.
I wanted the idea that you can use these vampires and creatures and that you can use love; love as a guiding force that they remember and that guides them back to destroy the family. That is a concept I was very fond of in the book and that I really was afraid of losing. I wanted to make very clear these were not young, sparkling, beautiful vampires, but parasitic entities that are no-nonsense about the way they absorb and transform their victims.
Q: How far did you feel you could go in the gore department?