Locke & Key Author Explains Why Netflix Series Strayed Away From Horror

Fans of Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodríguez’s Locke & Key comic book series know that a major draw for the narrative is just how quickly the fantasy drama can pivot into the world of unrelenting horrors, though the Netflix adaptation of the narrative leaned more heavily into the world of fantasy than straightforward horror, with Hill confirming this deviation from the source material was the result of the story previously seeing struggles with adaptations that were more faithful to the source material. Despite these deviations, the program was a hit, with Netflix confirming earlier this year that Locke & Key had been renewed for a second season.

“I loved the show. I loved what the show became,” Hill revealed to ComicBook.com. “Carlton Cuse, who’s the showrunner on it, is kind of a professor of television and he made himself a student of the previous two attempts to adapt Locke & Key, which had failed, and tried to crack the puzzle of why those versions did not work. I think that Locke & Key, the comic book, was always like ‘Harry Potter gone bad.’ It was always a little bit like R-rated Harry Potter. Scarier. More horror. It was less ‘Harry Potter,’ more ‘Horror Potter.’

He continued, “And I think that what he realized was there were the elements of this terrific YA fantasy thing there and that the solution to the problem was to lean into that. So the earlier versions of Locke & Key were two parts horror and two parts fantasy. And the Netflix version is one part horror, three parts fantasy, and that seems to be the right chemical mix for TV.”

Locke & Key isn’t the only of Hill’s works to score adaptations, as his novel NOS4A2 has been adapted as a series at AMC.

NOS4A2‘s second season picks up eight years after the events of season one. Vic McQueen (Ashleigh Cummings) remains more determined than ever to destroy Charlie Manx (Zachary Quinto). Charlie, having faced his own mortality, emerges desperate for revenge against Vic. This time, he sets his sights on the person who means most to Vic – her eight-year-old son Wayne. The race for Wayne’s soul sends Vic and Charlie on a high-speed collision course, forcing both to confront the mistakes of their pasts in order to secure a hold on Wayne’s future.

Stay tuned for details on Season Two of Locke & Key. The second season of NOS4A2 currently airs on AMC on Sunday nights at 10 p.m. ET.

What did you think of the adaptation of Locke & Key? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!