Main cast: David Hewlett (Masson)
Director: Vincenzo Natali

Now this is more like it! Graveyard Rats is a far superior episode, maybe because it’s based on Henry Kuttner’s The Graveyard Rats and not some vanity piffle from Guillermo del Toro.

Yes, only David Hewlett gets top billing in this episode, but that’s because Masson, his character, hogs the screen time of almost the entire episode.

This character is a naughty grave robber that is falling behind on paying his debt. He thinks he has struck gold when he overhears a family discussing about how the deceased should be buried with “priceless” goodies, but that adventure only leads him into stumbling into a series of rat-infested narrow tunnels underneath the cemetery.

Ooh, he soon discovers a mysterious temple to some elder god-like thing (well, it is a story by Henry Kuttner, after all). Surely his night is looking up!

While this is a far more successful episode than the previous one, it suffers the same major issue as the other episode: pacing. While it is nowhere as badly paced as to push the fun bits of the episode into the last five minutes, like that other episode did, this one serves the claustrophobic, gruesome goodness only in the last 15 minutes or so.

Far too much of the episode is devoted to David Hewlett chewing scenery. Oh look, a nightmare! Oh, look at Mr Hewlett delivering exposition in animated, sometimes overly animated, manner! Look at the lovely scenery and costumes as Mr Hewlett prances around the place!

I know, Mr Hewlett and the director go way back, but what is this? Is Vincenzo Natali hoping to help Mr Hewlett win an acting award or something?

If this episode had removed much of its bloat, it would be a solid scared-stiffer. In its current form, only the final act is worth a second look.

Hopefully, the show will have nowhere to go but up from here. Hopefully.