The cast for director Guillermo del Toro’s next film, the haunted house thriller Crimson Peak, just keeps getting better.  Emma Stone and Charlie Hunnam (Sons of Anarchy) are already set to lead the pic, and now none other than Benedict Cumberbatch has signed on to join the cast.  Plot details are being kept firmly under wraps, but the immensely talented del Toro previously described the project as “very set-oriented, classical but at the same time modern take on the ghost story. It will allow me to play with the conventions of the genre I know and love, and at the same time subvert the old rules.”  Hit the jump for more.

News of Cumberbatch’s involvement with Crimson Peak comes courtesy of Variety.  Production on the thriller will get underway in February, after del Toro has released this summer’s highly anticipated tentpole Pacific Rim and shot his pilot for the FX series The Strain.  Del Toro recently told Steve that the plan is to shoot the entire first season for The Strain this fall, winter, and spring, but del Toro is only helming the first episode of the series.

Cumberbatch is currently filming the third season of BBC’s Sherlock and will next be seen as the villain in Star Trek Into Darkness next month.  The versatile actor recently wrapped The Fifth Estate, in which he plays Julian Assange, and also appears later this year in the drama August Osage County and as the titular dragon in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.  If you missed Steve’s interview with del Toro from WonderCon, click here.