The upcoming Stephen King and J.J. Abrams horror series Castle Rock will debut on Hulu later this week and we spoke to key player Bill Skarsgård at San Diego Comic Con to get a little insight on the highly anticipated original series.

For horror lovers, there is this definitive excitement when a new addition comes around, but with both King and Abrams being a heavy influence, there’s an even bigger sense of elation that genre fans begin to feel. At this year’s San Diego Comic Con, we had the opportunity to discuss what to expect from the series, his elaborate reserach for the role and and the appeal of the horror genre with Bill Skarsgård who plays the role of “the kid” in this new King inspired project.

After his successful and enchanting performances in Hemlock Grove or IT, Skarsgård tells us, “I haven’t particularly tried to pursue horror, that’s how it’s been working out though. I love the world of horror, there’s always a lot of really fun, big or bold characters that have some heavy or dark characteristics.” He adds, “This character was so mysterious to play and he doesn’t talk much so it brought different challenges. But I haven’t particularly pursued the horror genre, It's just that I’ve been presented with really fun characters that happen to be in horror.”

Since the actor’s role doesn’t include heavy dialogue, Skarsgård says that he has done research on the effects of solitary confinement and explains, “He starts out as someone who has been in this cage for god knows how long, and the psychological toll that would be put on someone is something that was important to me to explore.” The actor continues, “So I researched the effects of solitary confinement, watched documentaries, read interviews, and some people have experienced it for over 60 years before being released to the world.”

The mental anguish one might experience from that little to no interaction with individuals apparently was the one thing that he really felt was a big piece of the puzzle for ‘the kid’ and he elaborated by telling us,“I also lost weight to get the character looking gaunty or spooky and skinny, but it was important to have a performance where I wanted the audience was like ‘What’s going on? What is he thinking about? He’s hard to read.’ because if you’ve been alone or in isolation for so long, you forget how to socially interact.” Skarsgård later adds, “There’s some horrific stories I’ve read where after someone comes out with this sensation of not understanding social cues. When you talk to someone there’s this interaction of nodding or responding, and there was a story [I read] where someone went into a panic attack because of not understanding that." Skarsgård quips, "The closest we could get to that would be getting really high or something [laughs] but that was important to me in finding this character.”

Skarsgård has found himself with quite a fanbase, which lead to the question if people will generally find his character to be someone worth rooting for and he tells us, “I don’t know if people will [root for] my character. People who have seen it so far are still not sure how they feel.” He teased, “This isn’t an ongoing show, there is an ending. Watching an episode is like watching 20 minutes of a movie. But there’s definitely a roller coaster journey for the audience in relation to The Kid.”

Hulu will debut the first four episodes of Castle Rock starting July 25, with each following episode airing on a weekly basis. Based on the excitement of Skarsgård and the first footage we witnessed during SDCC, we can wholeheartedly promise you that the horror series is one to watch.

Are you excited for Castle Rock? Let us know your thoughts below!