Stan Against Evil won’t be your average horror series. Or your average comedy. But it will bring satanic barnyard animals to IFC.
The series, from writer-comedian Dana Gould, combines his two favorite genres into one. The former writer for both “The Simpsons” and “Parks and Recreation” has toured as a stand-up comic. He also loves scary things.
“Horror movies were my baseball” as a kid, Gould said Monday during a tour of “Stan Against Evil” set in Lithia Springs, Ga., about an hour outside Atlanta.
IFC released the above teaser for the show exclusively to writers who attended the set tour. The promo will air Friday during the midseason finale of “Comedy Bang! Bang!” and on ifc.com.
Executive producer and writer Gould also has a small role in the eight-episode first season, which will debut this fall. A reporter suggested “Stand Against Evil” is his baby, causing Gould to joke, “And like my baby, there’s a lot of discolored vomit.”
That vomit most likely will land on series stars John C. McGinley and Janet Varney. McGinley plays Stanley Miller, a disgruntled former sheriff in the small New Hampshire town of Willard’s Mill. He recently lost the job because of an angry outburst at his wife’s funeral.
The easily annoyed Stan isn’t the type of guy to help out with the transition of power, but when new Sheriff Evie Barret (Varney) convinces him that angry demons haunt Willard’s Mill, Stan begrudgingly teams with her to fight them off.
So how do satanic barnyard animals fit into the story? Those demons possess goats and pigs, among other farm animals.
On the day of the set visit, reporters observed two 4-week-old piglets playing a single piglet in a scene. The presence of Murgatroyd, a robotic pig suggested that the sweet little pig will turn into a sharp-toothed, red-eyed succubus.
Created by special effects company Autonomous FX, Murgatroyd looks extremely menacing. She fits right in with Gould’s vision for the show. He wants real scares despite it being a half-hour comedy.
“It does swing back and forth” between horror and comedy, he said, “but the trick is to keep them both … in the same reality. The humor works and the scares work and they exist in the same world.”
“Making it work is the gamble,” he added, “but I think we’re succeeding so far. It’s a very jam-packed, funny and scary half hour.”
I’ll have more from the Atlanta set visit closer to the debut of “Stan Against Evil.”
Murgatroyd from Stan Against Evil
Update: An earlier version of this story stated Greg Nicotero’s KNB EFX Group—the team behind the zombies of “The Walking Dead”—created Murgatroyd. KNB EFX Group supplied only a robotic goat for the production.