I must have been about 11 when I read the book Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, which I read, over and over again.

I've been writing so much. And what happens with TV is that they split [Taboo] into two blocks, so you get a director that does four and another director that does another four. You commit yourself to seven days a week, for 12 or 13 hour days for a long time. I couldn't really do that.

In other words, when you have someone [like Ridley Scott] with that authority, then you tend to be left alone. But they were good and they're really good people, and I'm a big champion of the BBC and I think that like minds find each other and I think that FX and BBC is a perfect match.

What I wanted to do [in Allied] was get two characters who fall in love for real, across the barricade, and then it transcends the war.

Obviously, television is a writer's medium, so you get a lot more power and authority. With a film, the discipline is having a beginning, middle and end, and having it work in a specific space of time.

Sometimes you take something because it's an offer and it's big and it's good money and you have to absolutely respect that process, because it's not easier.

It was great fun to do because of the central character. With The Girl in the Spider's Web, the girl is really the central character. She's the whole thing.