Hemlock Grove is an American horror streaming television series produced by Eli Roth and developed by Brian McGreevy and Lee Shipman. It is a production of Gaumont International Television. The series is based on McGreevy's 2012 novel of the same name. The series premiered on Netflix on April 19, 2013, with all 13 episodes made immediately available for online viewing.
The show examines the strange happenings in Hemlock Grove, a fictional town in Pennsylvania. Roman Godfrey, heir to the town's wealthy Godfrey family, befriends the town's newcomer, Peter Rumancek. Recent brutal murders in the town have stirred up rumors, and the two work together to shed light on the case while also hiding their own dark secrets.
On June 19, 2013, Netflix renewed Hemlock Grove for a second season of 10 episodes, to air in 2014. On July 18, 2013, Netflix earned the first Primetime Emmy Award nominations for original online-only streaming television at the 65th Primetime Emmy Awards in 2013. Three of its online original series—Arrested Development, Hemlock Grove, and House of Cards—earned nominations.
The second season premiered on July 11, 2014. On September 2, 2014, Netflix renewed it for a third and final 10-episode season, which premiered on October 23, 2015.
Netflix announced on September 21, 2022 that all three seasons of Hemlock Grove will be removed from the service on October 22, 2022.
In November 2022, it was announced that FilmRise had acquired the streaming rights to the series.
Plot
The series is set in the town of Hemlock Grove, Pennsylvania. The town is a mixture of extreme wealth and poverty, as the closing of the town's steel mill many years earlier caused many to lose their jobs. The town's main sources of employment are now the Godfrey Institute for Biomedical Technologies and Hemlock Acres Hospital. Heading the Institute—which is rumored to conduct sinister experiments on a daily basis—is the imposing Olivia Godfrey (Famke Janssen), while Hemlock Acres' lead psychiatrist is Olivia's dead husband's brother, Dr. Norman Godfrey (Dougray Scott).
As season one opens, the town's rumor mill turns even more twisted, as two teenage girls are brutally killed and their bodies left for unsuspecting people to find the next day. Peter Rumancek (Landon Liboiron) a 17-year-old Romani boy, is suspected of the crimes by some of the townsfolk; he is also rumored to be a werewolf. Secretly, he is, in fact, a werewolf, and he sets out to solve the mystery of the murders along with the heir to the Godfrey estate, the troubled Roman Godfrey (Bill Skarsgård).
Rounding out the main cast of characters of the first season are Norman's daughter (and Roman's cousin), the beautiful Letha Godfrey (Penelope Mitchell) who claims the father of her unborn child is an angel from Heaven, and Christina Wendall (Freya Tingley), a lonely girl who becomes interested in Peter.
For season two, two former supporting characters were promoted to the main cast of characters: Peter's con-artist older cousin Destiny (Tiio Horn), who makes her living as a psychic medium, and Dr. Johann Pryce (Joel de la Fuente), the lead scientist of the Godfrey Institute, a brilliant but ruthless man of science, gifted with super-strength. A cult has arisen that is bent on destroying the supernatural creatures in Hemlock Grove by any means necessary. To make matters worse, both Peter and Roman struggle with their nature, as Peter risks becoming the same killer from the first season and Roman, after his full immersion with his true nature in the first season, has developed an insatiable hunger to kill. As they fight their enemies and deal with their situations, they must also deal with the monsters they are becoming, or have already become.
Cast
Main
Famke Janssen as Olivia Godfrey
Bill Skarsgård as Roman Godfrey
Landon Liboiron as Peter Rumancek
Penelope Mitchell as Letha Godfrey (season 1) Freya Tingley as Christina Wendall (season 1) Kaniehtiio Horn as Destiny Rumancek (season 2–3; recurring season 1) Joel de la Fuente as Dr. Johann Pryce (season 2–3; recurring season 1) Dougray Scott as Dr. Norman Godfrey (season 1–2) Nicole Boivin (recurring season 1) and Madeleine Martin (season 3; recurring season 2) as Shelley Godfrey, Roman's heavily deformed but good-hearted sister. While Boivin and Martin are the main actresses portraying the character, Shelley's remarkably large figure is provided, when seen from a distance, by Amazon Eve for the first five episodes, and by Michael Andreae thereafter. Camille De Pazzis as Annie Archambeau (season 3)