Guillermo Del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities ‘Lot 36’ review: Tim Blake Nelson fights terrifying storage war in new horror anthology

Guillermo Del Toro's new horror anthology kicks off with a greedy man getting more than he bargained for when buying a demonic storage locker.

Cabinet of Curiosities launches on Netflix tomorrow (October 25), the series curated by ‘Master of Horror‘ Guillermo Del Toro, who has hand-picked some of his favorite directors to helm individual episodes.

This first run consists of eight mini-movies, and those collaborators include including Catherine Hardwicke, Vincenzo Natali, Jennifer Kent, Panos Cosmatos, and Ana Lily Amirpour.

The first episode in the run – ‘Lot 36’ – is co-written by Del Toro (with Regina Corrado) and directed by Guillermo Navarro, who worked as Director of Photography on some of the showrunner's best films, including The Devil's Backbone, Pan's Labyrinth and the Hellboy movies. Though since then he's moved into TV, helming episodes of Hannibal, Narcos, Preacher, and Luke Cage.

Each Cabinet of Curiosities episode begins with Guillermo Del Toro addressing the audience to set the scene for that specific story. But being the first instalment out the gate, ‘Lot 36’ is slightly different, with Del Toro explaining what a ‘Cabinet of Curiosity’ is…

"In centuries past, when the world was full of mystery, and traveling was reserved for the very few, a new form of collection was born – the cabinet of curiosities. Now this collection could be lodged in a building, a chamber, or a piece of furniture.

"In these private collections, one would find books, paintings, or specimens of natural and unnatural history. A dragon's tooth, a Fiji mermaid, a unicorn horn. And behind each of these, a story…"

Del Toro then finds a set of keys in his own cabinet; keys for storage locker Number 36. And so the story begins…

The story kicks off in the 1990s with the man who owns locker Number 36 keeling over and dying while cutting up meat. The narrative jumps ahead to more recent times, where we meet Nick Appleton (Tim Blake Nelson), a troubled former soldier who makes his money buying storage lockers and selling the contents.

He drives up to one such facility, where the owner explains – for the benefit of the audience – that thanks to death, divorce, and debt, there's potential treasure on the other side of each door. He then gives his customers a peak, and a whiff, before starting the bidding.

Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates on Esports, Gaming and more.

Nick – described as "a shy man with deep pockets" – wins Lot 36 with a bid of $400. And it quickly becomes clear that he needs whatever's inside to be worth a pretty penny, as Appleton owes much more than that to some very violent people.

There's a mystery attached to Lot 36, thanks to CCTV footage of its previous owner doing very odd things while visiting the room.

Nick isn't interested in such strangeness however, and enters the lot with only money on his mind. The place is filled with unusual objects, the first being a photo album with troubling pictures therein. But what really catches his eye is a beautiful candelabra that looks like it might be worth something, an ornate necklace made from strange material, and a beautiful table with locked drawers.

Nick heads to appraiser to figure out what they are worth, who in turn summons an expert in the field. And the answers are shocking, both in terms of what the objects are worth, and what they might be for. Unfortunately, Nick is so interested in the former that he doesn't care about the latter, with dire, and ultimately deadly consequences.

Lot 36 is a solid start to the series. Guillermo Del Toro has worked with Tim Blake Nelson twice of late – on Nightmare Alley and the forthcoming Pinocchio – and they are forming a fruitful partnership that wallows in the weird. Nelson is great here as a man for whom greed isn't good, and who becomes less likeable as the story progresses, which really works for the direction in which the narrative goes.

The episode also allows for Del Toro to indulge in one of his great passions, and that is Lovecraftian horror. We won't spoil where or how this comes into play, but Navarro shoots the hell out of said sequence, being the best scene in this suitably unpleasant opening instalment.

Guillermo Del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities is streaming on Netflix.