Let The Right One In morphed from a novel by Swedish author John Ajvide Lindqvist in 2004 to a film directed by Tomas Alfredson to a television series by American writer Andrew Hinderaker in 2022. In between, the novel was also reimagined into another film called Let Me In, helmed by Matt Reeves, as well as into a stageplay.
We caught up with Andrew Hinderaker to uncover his compelling urge to bring this enduring vampire story back to life. “Developing something for television is a different beast than film because it expands the scope and span of the story.” The writer stepped up to honor the spirit of the novel which took the condition of being a vampire incredibly seriously. “It explored what it meant to be allergic to the sun and never be able to eat or drink anything but human blood. This gave it gravitas and grounding.”
Andrew Hinderaker. Photo by Ben Hider/ SHOWTIME
Hinderaker was particularly drawn to the amount of love expressed in Let The Right One In. At the core of the novel, Eli the vampire bonds with the bullied 12-year old boy Oskar. “It’s a complicated form of love. It’s destructive, but it’s beautiful.” The writer was also captivated by the secondary love story between Eli and the caretaker Håkan with whom she lives. “It was a study of sacrifice, devotion and service to others.” The characters of Eli and Hakån were expressed in the TV show through Eleanor Kane (Madison Taylor Baez) and Mark Kane (Demián Bichir) respectively. Isaiah Cole (Ian Foreman) became the avatar for Oskar. The stakes of the TV series were also raised by a time lock of Mark searching for a cure for his daughter.
The novel was mainly tilted towards the horror/ romance genre, while the first film leaned more into a character exploration between father and child. Hinderaker stayed true to the story’s horror roots, but also focused on the relationships. He looked to The Orphanage and Penny Dreadful for creative inspiration. “The horror genre inspires me the most. My favourite works of horror are truly works of horror, but they also defy genre categorization.” He quipped that sparking a debate about whether his TV show is a horror or a drama would delight him.
A Story Of Addiction
The original story has been tinkered with over its various incarnations with genre bending and role switches. Hinderaker’s take on Let The Right One In was to tell a parable of addiction. There’s a defining moment in the film that the writer referenced where Eli has just fed off a victim, doubles over and cries. “It was a moment depicting addiction,” he declared. “It shows how destructive it can be to the person addicted and to the person taking care of them.” The topic of addiction is both timely and timeless. The writer expands his view of addiction beyond the current drug epidemics, but also to social media and tribalism which can topple civilizations. “We overtly explore the opioid epidemic in the show,” he added.
Isaiah Cole (Ian Foreman) & Eleanor Kane. Photo Credit: Francisco Roman/ SHOWTIME
This scene from the film was replicated in the television series after Eleanor consumed the blood Mark has brutally procured for her and they hold hands after she feeds. “This is the heart of the show… how bonded and connected they are.” Andrew Hinderaker stated that this moment was loosely scripted as, “He reaches out for her hand. The simplest of gestures to remind her you’re not alone. As long as I’m here, you’ll never be alone. She reaches out to him and holds on tight.” This captures their relationship in a single moment and a single image. Mark periodically self-exsanguinates small quantities of blood to top up her feeding.
Let The Right One In is more than an examination of a father’s love for his daughter. It also explores how far a father might go for his daughter. “Is that sacrifice going to save your child or destroy you both?” This love also applies to her relationship with her newfound friend Isaiah. “Will their love save them or drag Isaiah into the darkness?”
Prey Or Protect
On a deeper level, the show explores how humans treat one another – with predation or protection. “We’re in a moment of extraordinary predation. We’re in a period where we’ve lost our ability to truly see each other and practise true empathy. We’re happy to eat other people alive because we see each other as monsters..”
At its essence, vampirism is predation
To really bring home the theme of the show, “The monsters of the show are humanized. They are deeply human.” Hinderaker’s grand ambition for Let The Right One In was to create a multi-season, multi-chapter story. The first season has only scratched the surface of the vampire mythology, and chosen to focus on the Mark and Eleanor relationship. (The first film adaptation similarly bypassed the key tenets of vampirism).
The series introduced a second vampire later in the show which opens the door to the ancient mythology and a condition which is hundreds of years old. Eleanor has only been a vampire for a decade so there is plenty of room to expand. The show also lays down the groundwork for questions of faith.
The outlining process for Andrew Hinderaker was meticulous. He took the essence of the novel and films and laid out a plot and emotional beats. “The two go hand in hand. You don’t lay one top of the other.”
A great scene is a Trojan horse with a great emotional beat
He described an outline as a construct rather than a scene breakdown. “Mark is doing the killing for Eleanor to spare her the sin of murder while trying to preserve her humanity, her childhood, and her soul.”
Andrew described Mark as a “Renfield” servant, a reference to a character in Bram Stoker’s Dracula who is fanatically and unquestioningly devoted to his master. “This speaks to more than Mark wanting to fundamentally cure his daughter and give her her life back. It also speaks to whether Mark can actually see his daughter for what she is.”
Mark loves Eleanor in spite of what she is and Isaiah loves her for what she is
The midpoint of the season posed a special challenge to Hinderaker. It involved a major structural and tonal change with a dramatic time shift. “I had to take every character’s story and thread them together,” he said. “The goal was to create something sophisticated and complex with clarity and simplicity. There were many moving parts and I didn’t want it to feel confusing.”
Andrew Hinderaker summarized the essence of Let The Write One in in five words:
- compassion
- connection
- compulsion
- complexity, and
- conflict
