Now that his time in Middle Earth is over, actor Richard Armitage is exploring the darker side with an upcoming guest stint on Hannibal as Francis Dolarhyde aka The Tooth Fairy. Speaking to Digital Spy, Armitage spoke about what drew him to the role of a psychotic serial killer. 

"I wasn't familiar with the show, and even before I'd read the script I was already saying yes because it was Bryan Fuller, I just wanted to work with him.

I suddenly realised that I was going back on something that I'd said a long time ago, which was that one of the genres I probably won't do is horror. But I just didn't see [the role of Dolarhyde] as horror, and I then went and watched Hannibal seasons one and two.”

Armitage went on the explain why he was willing to explore a genre he was previously disinterested in;

“To me it sort of sits in a very interesting place, it's the horror genre but there's something beautifully decadent and gothic about the way that it's shot, and the performances are extraordinary. Mads Mikkelsen and Hugh Dancy and Laurence Fishburne just give it this elevation, so I knew that the bar was high when I went in there.

Most movies are maximum two hours long and we get six hours to really explore the fine detail of what it means to be a psychopath, and understand the roots of that, the birth of a child that turns into a monster. It's going to be very interesting.”

The Tooth Fairy is the central antagonist of Thomas Harris first Hannibal Lecter book Red Dragon published in 1981. The character has been brought to life in the past by Tom Noonan in Michael Mann’s Manhunter and by Ralph Fiennes in Bret Ratner’s Red Dragon. In the same way the previous two season of Hannibal have been divided into two chapters, season three will skip forward in time after episode seven. 

Series creator and showrunner Bryan Fuller recently explained why the third season was delayed until the summer. Hannibal returns to NBC on June 4 in the US and will be shown of Sky Living in the UK.