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Ep. 23: Stephen King's Killer 2025: 'The Running Man,' A New Luke Skywalker and Beyond
13 Plays4 months ago
In this special mega episode of Adaptation: The Book to Movie Podcast, Nate and Chris discuss the famed horror author Stephen King and his titles that were adapted to film this year, including 'The Monkey,' 'The Life of Chuck,' 'The Long Walk' and 'The Running Man.'
Expect discussion about why King has been popular for so many decades, what these stories mean in the context of 2025, and more.
UP NEXT: 'Wicked' by Gregory McGuire & 'Wicked'/'Wicked: For Good' directed by Jon M. Chu.
Follow us on social media:
Nate's Letterboxd (@professor_n8)
Chris's Letterboxd (@cjanderson878)
Hosts: Nate Day, Chris Anderson
Producer: Nate Day
"Adaptation Theme"
- Written by: Chris Anderson, Jem Zornow
- Performed by: Chris Anderson, Jem Zornow, Nate Day
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast
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Speaker
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When the killer's identity is about to be revealed.
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00:00:44
Speaker
Welcome to Adaptation, the book to movie podcast.
00:00:47
Speaker
I'm Nate.
00:00:48
Speaker
And I'm Chris.
00:00:49
Speaker
And today we are talking about Stephen King's absolutely bonkers 2025, yet several book and story to movie adaptations happen.
00:01:00
Speaker
Before we dive into that discussion, Chris, how are you?
00:01:04
Speaker
Yeah, I'm good.
00:01:05
Speaker
I'm wonderful.
00:01:06
Speaker
Nice crisp fall day here.
00:01:09
Speaker
What have you been up to?
00:01:10
Speaker
Just getting ready for the holidays.
00:01:14
Speaker
So happy Thanksgiving if you celebrate, I guess.
00:01:17
Speaker
Have you been reading any books lately, Chris?
Current Reading and Movie Reviews
00:01:19
Speaker
What on earth have I been reading?
00:01:22
Speaker
Oh, well, prepping for the next one.
00:01:24
Speaker
In case anybody doesn't know, Wicked, this is the second movie coming out and they split the book that it is adapted from in half.
00:01:35
Speaker
Right.
00:01:36
Speaker
And we obviously did not have this podcast when the first one came out.
00:01:39
Speaker
So I'm doing some double duty here, getting caught up.
00:01:44
Speaker
So I've been working my way through that.
00:01:47
Speaker
And a fun little series that I've been away from for a long time.
00:01:52
Speaker
I started book five, but that's all I'm going to say for now.
00:01:54
Speaker
And I'll share a little bit more when I finish it between this and the next episode, because it's a delightful little morsel for some people to grab onto, but it also takes some explanation.
00:02:05
Speaker
Okay.
00:02:06
Speaker
Next time I will get that book more.
00:02:08
Speaker
Yeah.
00:02:08
Speaker
Fantalizing.
00:02:11
Speaker
You've been, you've still been busy watching.
00:02:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:02:14
Speaker
There, I feel like hot,
00:02:15
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hot flicks are coming out left, right and center.
00:02:17
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They are.
00:02:18
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And like I said, I think in our last episode, it's award movie season.
00:02:22
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So I'm at the theater quite a bit.
00:02:24
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So I'm just going to do another rapid fire.
00:02:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:02:27
Speaker
Yep.
00:02:28
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So The Running Man, which we'll talk about later here in this episode.
00:02:31
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I got to see Hamnet a little bit early.
00:02:33
Speaker
Incredible movie.
00:02:35
Speaker
We'll talk about that in a later episode as well as we get closer to the Oscars.
00:02:39
Speaker
Mm hmm.
00:02:40
Speaker
A couple of Netflix movies, Novelle Vogue, which is a French film that's, it'll be really fun for movie nerds.
00:02:45
Speaker
It's about the making of a famous French movie.
00:02:48
Speaker
So I liked it.
00:02:49
Speaker
I think a lot of people will find it boring, but I liked it.
00:02:51
Speaker
Train Dreams is another Netflix film and actually an adaptation of a novella that we might want to get to at some point because it was a really strong, beautiful movie.
00:03:02
Speaker
Yeah, put it on the list.
00:03:03
Speaker
Okay.
00:03:04
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Sentimental Value is a really big Norwegian film this year.
00:03:07
Speaker
Loved it.
00:03:07
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It's fantastic.
00:03:09
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And then also very recently saw Wicked for Good.
00:03:13
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And I'm going to save my thoughts on that one for our next episode.
00:03:17
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So busy.
00:03:18
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Lots of movies.
00:03:19
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Yeah.
00:03:19
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Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Critique of Recent Movie Adaptations
00:03:20
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Blair and I went and saw Frankenstein.
00:03:22
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Oh, right.
00:03:23
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What do you think?
00:03:24
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incredible you liked it good not a fan of the changes that they made sure i am actively displeased with some of the changes that they made wow wow i think it was to the detriment of the story which is a strength to them that it's still such a cool movie i just it's a little bit of a shame to me there are some parts that i don't understand why they chose to stray from the originals
00:03:50
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's going to be a conversation that we have maybe a few times over the next few months, particularly with Wicked and Wuthering Heights in February, I think, because that's kind of a common theme in adaptation right now.
00:04:05
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Yes.
00:04:06
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Especially, I think, in the critical analysis of them is trying to navigate sort of on the receiving end, navigate why they did it that way.
00:04:18
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Yes, yes.
00:04:18
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And I know it's often there's a pragmatic reason.
00:04:22
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In this case, we have now discussed in multiple episodes Guillermo del Toro's vision and how he chose to interpret, you know, so I understand.
00:04:31
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And I do not want to be just another book lover that's knee-jerk reaction.
00:04:35
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Right.
00:04:36
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Well, the book's better because it's a book.
00:04:39
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You know,
Stephen King's Body of Work
00:04:40
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that is not what I think.
00:04:42
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I would imagine exactly what you said.
00:04:44
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There's probably good explanation.
00:04:46
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Yeah.
00:04:47
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For many of these changes, I just, yeah.
00:04:51
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But fantastic movie.
00:04:52
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Super fun.
00:04:53
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I'm glad you guys saw it, and you saw it in a theater too, right?
00:04:56
Speaker
Yeah, really cool.
00:04:58
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This old theater across from the park right by our new place.
00:05:01
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It's only four rows of seats, and the waiter comes through throughout the night.
00:05:06
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You just put a little piece of paper up when you want another bowl of popcorn.
00:05:09
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It's fantastic.
00:05:10
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Cool.
00:05:10
Speaker
Great.
00:05:11
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So we will be, I think it is our new haunt of choice in the neighborhood.
00:05:15
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Good.
00:05:15
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I can't wait to visit and see a movie there.
00:05:18
Speaker
Yes, you're going to love it.
00:05:19
Speaker
Good.
00:05:20
Speaker
Should we talk about the man of the hour?
00:05:22
Speaker
Yeah, let's do it.
00:05:23
Speaker
Let's talk about Stephen King and all of his work that got adapted this year.
00:05:29
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:29
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Basically, Stephen King has been working forever and has such a body of work that is so continuously adapted.
00:05:35
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Nate and I have elected to, rather than doing individual huge titles, because he has many, or...
00:05:44
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individual titles that have been adapted versus not or something again because he has many we'll just do year at a glance yeah here's what he did this year and even this was tough to get to all of it right yeah there's some there's a lot that you and i didn't even get to yeah it's crazy he was a busy guy this year yeah and he's and it seems that he is just one always a busy guy two he has been writing for a long time so only one of the three of these is a recent
00:06:14
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literary publication.
00:06:17
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And obviously, for the most part, it's not him sitting there and spearheading these adaptations.
00:06:23
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So we have this kind of wombo combo that he continues writing and other people continue mining through his decades of work to make modern adaptation.
00:06:37
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It's crazy.
00:06:38
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It's crazy.
00:06:39
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So that's, that's at least my disclaimer, I think kind of our disclaimer of this is not exhaustive by any means, nor, I mean, if we started trying to do them one by one, the shining and misery in it, we would just become a Stephen King podcast.
00:06:52
Speaker
Right.
00:06:53
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Right.
00:06:54
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Uh, so this is the approach we've chosen.
00:06:56
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Yeah.
00:06:56
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But obviously I'm not going to give the full author rundown that I usually do.
00:07:01
Speaker
Okay.
00:07:02
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just because we will be back to him at some point.
00:07:06
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So the real quick introduction to the man that, I mean, thankfully, everybody has heard
Impact of Stephen King on Literature and Film
00:07:11
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of.
00:07:11
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If you're listening to this, you've heard of Stephen King.
00:07:14
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Born Stephen Edwin King in 1947 in Portland, Maine.
00:07:19
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Maybe you knew better than I did, Nate.
00:07:21
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I was shocked to see how old he was.
00:07:23
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I think I, I mean, I understood that he was old.
00:07:27
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He's been working for decades and decades, but yeah.
00:07:29
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Forever.
00:07:30
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The actual year of his birth is a little bit like, whoa.
00:07:35
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Yeah, yeah, really, really shocked me.
00:07:37
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Also partially because I obviously don't look at pictures of Stephen King often.
00:07:42
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But to his credit, he has not physically appeared to age much in two or three decades.
00:07:49
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He kind of reached a point and settled in there.
00:07:53
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Which would make for a really good Stephen King story.
00:07:56
Speaker
A phenomenal story.
00:07:57
Speaker
A man that never ages.
00:07:59
Speaker
Sir, because obviously you're going to listen to this episode.
00:08:01
Speaker
You're welcome.
00:08:04
Speaker
A modest 5% royalties is all we ask.
00:08:07
Speaker
Yep.
00:08:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:10
Speaker
What do we say about potentially one of, you know what, maybe this was the wrong way to put it, potentially one of the most famous, well, yes, that.
00:08:17
Speaker
Maybe most well-known or maybe most, you know, still actively working contemporary.
00:08:23
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I don't know.
00:08:23
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I don't have a good description.
00:08:25
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This is an author of such a magnitude.
00:08:28
Speaker
I told you a little bit about our mutual friend Colton that I used to work with in Colorado.
00:08:33
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Right.
00:08:33
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Yeah.
00:08:34
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Has a copy of every single book King has ever written.
00:08:38
Speaker
Wow.
00:08:39
Speaker
God.
00:08:40
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I made the poor decision of saying yes to help Colton move.
00:08:44
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And this collection is just amazing.
00:08:48
Speaker
It looks crazy on paper.
00:08:50
Speaker
It looks unreal in person when you see the physical copy of every single one, just otherworldly.
00:08:58
Speaker
That's got to be a sturdy shelf for those books.
00:09:01
Speaker
Many, multiple shelves, multiple, multiple bookshelves.
00:09:05
Speaker
So because of this fame, we've left out much of the depth.
00:09:08
Speaker
We'll return to him later.
00:09:10
Speaker
Maybe I'll find some more info about his life each time.
Stephen King's Views on Storytelling
00:09:13
Speaker
But the very abridged TLDR,
00:09:17
Speaker
His father went to World War II.
00:09:19
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I didn't really find it.
00:09:20
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Well, I didn't look for much information.
00:09:22
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I believe he was just a soldier in World War II.
00:09:24
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Maybe that's incorrect.
00:09:26
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Came back when Stephen was just two years old.
00:09:29
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Father left the family, abandoned them.
00:09:31
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His mother raised him and his older brother, David, I think.
00:09:37
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Bounced around the country a little bit, but at a very young age, started reading everything he could get his hands on and writing.
00:09:46
Speaker
So I think that's a big part of both.
00:09:48
Speaker
He is fairly old and in good health.
00:09:50
Speaker
So he's continued publishing and began publishing very early.
00:09:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:09:55
Speaker
Well, well-rounded.
00:09:56
Speaker
Yes.
00:09:57
Speaker
Yes.
00:09:58
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I found some, some very interesting quotes from him because I have three different books that I talk about in this episode.
00:10:07
Speaker
Some cool, you know, the author's forward at the beginning of the book.
00:10:11
Speaker
Sure.
00:10:12
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And so this was him talking about this experience for himself.
00:10:16
Speaker
He said, it was so far as I could remember the first book with hands, strong ones that reached out of the pages and seized me by the throat.
00:10:25
Speaker
It said to me, this is not just entertainment, it's life or death.
00:10:30
Speaker
To me, Lord of the Flies has always represented what novels are for and why they are indispensable.
00:10:37
Speaker
So this is a quote, obviously, about he was very young, between seven and nine, if I remember correctly.
00:10:44
Speaker
He approached a teacher and said, give me a book that shows kids how they actually are.
00:10:49
Speaker
And the teacher went for Lord of the Flies.
00:10:53
Speaker
Yeah, which is...
00:10:55
Speaker
objectively the correct choice but a wild choice for if i remember correctly and he was seven years old right i don't know that i would do that but clearly a paradigm shifting moment for this very very successful author so maybe the right choice i don't know
00:11:15
Speaker
But I think seeing his thoughts so concisely, distinctly, immediately, this is life or death.
00:11:26
Speaker
This story has hands that reach out and grab you.
00:11:29
Speaker
I think that really says a lot about how he views what he's chosen to make a living at, you know?
00:11:34
Speaker
Right.
00:11:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:35
Speaker
Horror.
00:11:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:40
Speaker
I meant the import of the written word, but yes, horror as well.
00:11:44
Speaker
Indeed.
00:11:44
Speaker
Yes, horror.
00:11:47
Speaker
almost certainly inaccurate, but just a brief by the numbers.
00:11:51
Speaker
I believe I counted 58 adaptations.
00:11:55
Speaker
That's got to be like half.
00:11:58
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, yeah, I doubt that that is accurate, but that's bonkers.
00:12:02
Speaker
Yeah, that's a lot.
00:12:04
Speaker
Movies, TV shows, I think I saw four video games, comic books, series, graphic novels.
00:12:13
Speaker
Just absolutely absurd.
00:12:15
Speaker
Absolutely absurd.
00:12:16
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His bibliography of just his personal works, because obviously, as we said, a lot of those adaptations are not his work, the adaptation.
00:12:24
Speaker
They're based on his writing.
00:12:27
Speaker
His personal bibliography, again, I would guess these numbers are low.
00:12:32
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This is as close as I could get quickly.
00:12:34
Speaker
Includes 65 novels, 12 story collections, which contain his over 200 books.
00:12:42
Speaker
published short stories.
00:12:44
Speaker
Good God.
00:12:45
Speaker
Absolutely crazy.
00:12:47
Speaker
I know.
00:12:47
Speaker
I saw that and I'm like, I've read 1% of the total short.
00:12:52
Speaker
Okay, cool.
00:12:53
Speaker
Cool, bud.
00:12:54
Speaker
Five works of nonfiction, one on writing is also on many bestseller lists, very highly regarded beyond, you know, that he's primarily this horror fiction writer, right?
00:13:06
Speaker
Right.
00:13:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:13:08
Speaker
19 screenplays, a very, very interesting miscellaneous or other section, including his comics, his graphic novels, his essays on other people's writings, and an entire opera libretto.
Personal Reflections on King's Writing
00:13:23
Speaker
What?
00:13:24
Speaker
I want to see that.
00:13:26
Speaker
I do, too.
00:13:27
Speaker
I would be very curious.
00:13:29
Speaker
Honestly, almost as much in his writing as who...
00:13:33
Speaker
wrote an opera and thought, you know who I want for my lyricist, Stephen King.
00:13:39
Speaker
Well, it's interesting too.
00:13:40
Speaker
I don't like music doesn't really stick out as a theme and in what I've consumed of his work.
00:13:47
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:13:48
Speaker
Like it's, he's, I guess I'm saying the same thing.
00:13:50
Speaker
Like what a weird pick, what a weird zag.
00:13:53
Speaker
No, I agree with you.
00:13:55
Speaker
Yeah.
00:13:55
Speaker
It makes me wonder, you know, was he interested and kind of introduced himself?
00:13:59
Speaker
Was he approached?
00:14:01
Speaker
Yeah, I agree.
00:14:02
Speaker
And, you know, the librettist is not, at least not that I saw, had anything to do with any of the music or, you know, necessarily the plot.
00:14:12
Speaker
They're the one who comes in and just writes the lyrics.
00:14:14
Speaker
Lyrics, yeah.
00:14:16
Speaker
So, yeah, I'm very curious how that came to be.
00:14:21
Speaker
Yeah, almost certainly will not experience it anytime soon, but fun little factoid.
00:14:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:14:27
Speaker
Prior to this episode, I tried to go back through, I had only read three Stephen King books.
00:14:34
Speaker
Okay, that's three more than me.
00:14:36
Speaker
Which three?
00:14:37
Speaker
So prior to this, I had read the first Dark Tower, which I cannot believe I didn't continue with that series.
00:14:43
Speaker
The Shining.
00:14:44
Speaker
Yeah.
00:14:46
Speaker
And then 11-22-63.
00:14:47
Speaker
Okay.
00:14:47
Speaker
That was yesterday.
00:14:49
Speaker
Whoa!
00:14:50
Speaker
That was yesterday.
00:14:51
Speaker
That's my dad's birthday.
00:14:57
Speaker
That's the book incredibly famous.
00:15:01
Speaker
It's kind of one of the earliest or maybe most famous, I don't know, I should not say earliest, novels of time travel to go and change history.
00:15:13
Speaker
Is it based on the Kennedy assassination?
00:15:16
Speaker
Yes, yes.
00:15:17
Speaker
11-22-63 is the day Kennedy was shot.
00:15:19
Speaker
Yeah.
00:15:20
Speaker
My dad was born on 11-22 several years after that, but interesting.
00:15:25
Speaker
Yeah.
00:15:26
Speaker
yeah because of what the story is about that's always my immediate thought i've never paid any attention to what the actual date was yeah i yeah i only know it because it's my dad's birthday and it's like one of those facts you know when you're born on that day it's like if your birthday is 4 20 they're like did you know until it's our way of his birthday yep yep yeah oh yeah i bet your dad heard about that for like a long time and maybe still does yeah
00:15:53
Speaker
So this, I had only read those
Exploring 'The Monkey' Adaptation
00:15:55
Speaker
three.
00:15:55
Speaker
And so preparation for this episode, two of the three are, of course, short stories.
00:16:00
Speaker
But still, this doubled my Stephen King consumption.
00:16:05
Speaker
We have kind of a couple of ways that we can skin this cat.
00:16:09
Speaker
I was thinking maybe we go chronological by publication.
00:16:13
Speaker
Is that okay with you?
00:16:15
Speaker
Yeah, that is fine.
00:16:16
Speaker
All right.
00:16:17
Speaker
So first up, again, by publication order, 45 years ago, King published The Monkey, a short story from the collection Skeleton Crew.
00:16:30
Speaker
Okay.
00:16:31
Speaker
Cool title.
00:16:32
Speaker
It is cool, and it's a super cool, very ominous looking book.
00:16:35
Speaker
It's like 650 pages or something.
00:16:38
Speaker
Whoa.
00:16:38
Speaker
So do you read the whole, did you read that whole collection of stories or just the monkey?
00:16:42
Speaker
No, absolutely not.
00:16:44
Speaker
Absolutely not.
00:16:44
Speaker
I just read the monkey.
00:16:45
Speaker
I was going to say, woof.
00:16:48
Speaker
this book i wrote this down immediately when i finished it so i could not forget it feels like you stayed awake for 72 hours living on caffeine and nicotine oh my god and then stared at a stuffed animal in the corner for too long yeah i've that tracks actually that's pretty accurate you know yeah well and there's always been this conjecture or the um
00:17:13
Speaker
Like the accepted cultural truths that are not like lore, old wives tales, I don't know what.
00:17:22
Speaker
You know, that like a number of some of his most famous books were just written in like crazy 1980s coke binges.
00:17:29
Speaker
And he doesn't even remember writing them or something.
00:17:32
Speaker
So who knows?
00:17:33
Speaker
That could be exactly how he wrote The Monkey.
00:17:36
Speaker
Maybe.
00:17:36
Speaker
I think a lot of the brilliance of this book lies in its brevity.
00:17:40
Speaker
And he kind of says something similar that we'll get to later.
00:17:44
Speaker
The writing in this novella, short story, whatever, is so rich and descriptive that I think were it a full-length novel, it would be exhausting.
00:17:58
Speaker
Okay, interesting.
00:18:00
Speaker
So I wrote this one quote down because I read it and you kind of get to the end of the sentence and just go, oof, like you need to reread a few times.
00:18:09
Speaker
And this was a fairly tame example.
00:18:11
Speaker
Outside, a cold gust of wind rose, and for a moment, lips with no flesh blew a long note through the old, rusty gutter outside.
00:18:22
Speaker
Goodness.
00:18:23
Speaker
The word flesh is like, I don't like that.
00:18:26
Speaker
There's a lot going on there.
00:18:28
Speaker
I mean, anything having to do with lips and a big, rusty piece of metal in the same sentence, it's just...
00:18:36
Speaker
Yeah, and I know what you mean.
00:18:38
Speaker
I need to hear that again because I got so distracted by some of the imagery that I don't know what he said.
00:18:45
Speaker
Exactly, exactly.
00:18:46
Speaker
Imagine reading 300 pages of that.
00:18:48
Speaker
It's untenable.
00:18:50
Speaker
This was very, very interesting to me.
00:18:52
Speaker
So he had a preface.
00:18:54
Speaker
These were written over time and then put together into the collection that was later published as Skeleton Crew, right?
00:19:01
Speaker
So in 84, he wrote a preface to this collection being published.
00:19:06
Speaker
That was very interesting.
00:19:07
Speaker
I really had to clip out a lot of parts that he said that I thought were humorous.
00:19:12
Speaker
But at the very end, the last page of this preface says, okay, commercial's over.
00:19:18
Speaker
Grab onto my arm now.
00:19:19
Speaker
Hold tight.
00:19:20
Speaker
We're going into a number of dark places, but I think I know the way.
00:19:25
Speaker
Just don't let go of my arm.
00:19:27
Speaker
And if I should kiss you in the dark, it's no big deal.
00:19:30
Speaker
It's only because you are my love.
00:19:35
Speaker
Now, I do want to be clear because I think that removes some context.
00:19:40
Speaker
Earlier in this same preface, he discusses some complaints he receives from...
00:19:47
Speaker
who he calls the constant reader.
00:19:49
Speaker
Had you heard this before?
00:19:51
Speaker
No.
00:19:52
Speaker
They're like Stephen King super fans.
00:19:54
Speaker
They have their own proper noun, constant reader.
00:19:57
Speaker
Capital C, capital R. Yes, correct.
00:20:00
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:20:01
Speaker
So I think this is, I had never heard of it before.
00:20:03
Speaker
I think this is like the people who would read anything he put out.
00:20:06
Speaker
Sure.
00:20:07
Speaker
But he's receiving complaints at this point that he's putting out these short stories rather than more novels.
00:20:14
Speaker
The people want more novels, basically.
00:20:16
Speaker
And to that complaint earlier in the preface, he said, a short story is a different thing altogether, obviously.
00:20:25
Speaker
A short story is like a quick kiss in the dark from a stranger.
00:20:28
Speaker
That is not, of course, the same thing as an affair or a marriage, which he compares novels to in an equally strange way.
00:20:37
Speaker
But this is where the other reference came from.
00:20:41
Speaker
He said, but kisses can be sweet.
00:20:43
Speaker
and their very brevity forms their own attraction.
00:20:46
Speaker
Okay.
00:20:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:49
Speaker
So it was very interesting as a story in its own right, but also as this glimpse into how he views the place of the short story within the literary world.
00:21:02
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:02
Speaker
It's also quite clear you can almost see a dark, twisted,
00:21:08
Speaker
playfulness on his part with these type of stories.
00:21:12
Speaker
Indeed, I think there are interviews where he describes this as more or less his process.
00:21:16
Speaker
There's distinctly within the monkey one idea.
00:21:20
Speaker
Sure.
00:21:21
Speaker
And it's a newer movie, so I don't necessarily want to spoil it in case people are still going to go see it, even though it was written four and a half decades ago.
00:21:31
Speaker
But you can see quite clearly just this tick of a thought that I think the rest of us would just dismiss.
00:21:39
Speaker
And he clearly sat down and thought, what could this be?
00:21:42
Speaker
And kind of tugged at that string in a delightful way.
00:21:46
Speaker
I think that's all I want to say about the plot.
00:21:48
Speaker
It is a dark, dark book.
00:21:50
Speaker
I'm very curious how they rendered this into film.
00:21:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:55
Speaker
But certainly an enjoyable read.
00:21:58
Speaker
Okay, great.
00:21:59
Speaker
Yeah, this movie's had sort of an interesting long road to being made.
00:22:05
Speaker
Originally, the rights were optioned by Frank Darabont, a name that you might recognize because he wrote the 1994 film adaptation, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.
00:22:17
Speaker
Yes.
00:22:18
Speaker
Okay.
00:22:18
Speaker
So it's just kind of interesting that we've got him popping up, and he'll pop up even later in this episode again.
00:22:24
Speaker
But the movie fell through after years of being stuck in development hell.
00:22:27
Speaker
It's just really...
00:22:28
Speaker
It's really tough to get a movie off the ground.
00:22:30
Speaker
It's kind of a miracle that any of them do.
00:22:32
Speaker
So it's pretty common for stories to sort of fall off after they hit too many obstacles.
00:22:39
Speaker
Eventually, a new adaptation is put into development in 2023.
00:22:44
Speaker
produced by James Wan, who's a really big name in the horror space right now, and directed by Osgood Perkins, who is a somewhat divisive director, but a mainstay in horror.
00:22:56
Speaker
He's actually got another movie in theaters right now called Keeper or The Keeper, something along those lines.
00:23:02
Speaker
Obviously, didn't see it, not that interested.
00:23:05
Speaker
But I think it was, I bring this up to just display that it was sort of a strong showing
00:23:12
Speaker
for this story that they got two fairly heavy hitters to bring the story to life here.
00:23:17
Speaker
Okay.
00:23:18
Speaker
Okay.
00:23:18
Speaker
I see.
00:23:19
Speaker
Eventually the movie comes out in 2025, starring Theo James, Tatiana Maslany and Elijah Wood.
00:23:24
Speaker
It's distributed by Neon, which is an independent film company.
00:23:29
Speaker
Why are you making that face?
00:23:31
Speaker
Like Frodo Elijah Wood?
00:23:33
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:34
Speaker
What?
00:23:34
Speaker
He's got a really small role.
00:23:36
Speaker
Oh,
00:23:37
Speaker
Okay, sorry, sorry.
00:23:38
Speaker
Continue.
00:23:40
Speaker
I thought I heard you wrong.
00:23:41
Speaker
I was like... No, his role is really small.
00:23:44
Speaker
He's kind of just comedic relief in the movie.
00:23:47
Speaker
Okay.
00:23:48
Speaker
But anyway, it was distributed by Neon, which is one of the bigger independent film studios.
00:23:53
Speaker
And they claim that this trailer is the most watched indie horror trailer of all time.
00:23:59
Speaker
I don't really know.
00:23:59
Speaker
That's so many sort of like qualifiers and asterisks.
00:24:03
Speaker
I don't really know how you... Pure conjecture.
00:24:05
Speaker
Yeah, but I wanted to bring it up because anticipation for this movie was really high, regardless of whether that's...
00:24:13
Speaker
a 100% true fact.
00:24:14
Speaker
I don't think that they could generate it without some modicum of accuracy.
00:24:19
Speaker
Yes, yes.
00:24:20
Speaker
You know, they made a handful of changes to the story, I think, in part to expand it into a full movie.
00:24:26
Speaker
It's a short story rather than a book, right?
00:24:28
Speaker
So they needed to make some changes.
00:24:30
Speaker
And also, they sort of shifted the tone of the
00:24:34
Speaker
movie as well.
00:24:35
Speaker
I still think it's very much in line with that stayed awake for days on coffee and cigarettes.
00:24:41
Speaker
But I wanted to share a little bit about this quote actually from Osgood Perkins to sort of contextualize how they framed this movie.
00:24:50
Speaker
He said, they had a very serious script, very serious.
00:24:53
Speaker
I felt it was too serious and I told them this doesn't work for me.
00:24:56
Speaker
The thing with this toy monkey is that people around it all die in insane ways.
00:25:01
Speaker
So I thought, well, I'm an expert on that.
00:25:04
Speaker
Both my parents died in insane headline making ways.
00:25:07
Speaker
I spent a lot of my life recovering from tragedy, feeling quite bad, and it all seemed inherently unfair.
00:25:12
Speaker
You personalize the grief.
00:25:14
Speaker
Why is this happening to me?
00:25:15
Speaker
But I'm older now and you realize that this shit happens to everyone.
00:25:18
Speaker
Everybody dies, sometimes in their sleep, sometimes in truly insane ways like I experienced.
00:25:23
Speaker
But everyone dies.
00:25:24
Speaker
And I thought maybe the best way to approach that insane notion is with a smile.
00:25:29
Speaker
Now, Perkins, I saw this quote and was like, what is he talking about?
00:25:34
Speaker
Insane deaths.
00:25:35
Speaker
His father died of AIDS and then his mother died in 9-11.
00:25:40
Speaker
So he is gracious, these two sort of wrecking ball experiences.
00:25:46
Speaker
So it is really interesting to me that he he was called to the story, which brief overview of the plot, I guess, would you call it a haunted toy?
00:25:55
Speaker
I don't know, a toy monkey.
00:25:58
Speaker
Oh, yeah, I don't know what else you would call it.
00:26:00
Speaker
I don't even know how to how to put it very succinctly.
00:26:03
Speaker
This toy chooses people to end up dying.
00:26:06
Speaker
It starts clapping its little symbols, and each time it does, something horrible happens to someone related to or important to whoever is there watching it do this.
00:26:21
Speaker
Right.
00:26:22
Speaker
Essentially, this one family has ended up in possession of this basically haunted demonic
00:26:28
Speaker
toys that selects people in the periphery to to die and in this movie the violence i don't want to call it gratuitous because obviously that was perkins goal but it is an insanely gory violent movie oh and he he wanted to make all of those changes and make it sort of comedic in order to make it stand out from other haunted toy movies like chucky and annabelle and and those things which are which are just pure
00:26:58
Speaker
horror, like slasher horror movies.
00:27:02
Speaker
I thought it was also interesting too that they did actually replace the symbols, like the musical instrument symbols with a drum because they thought, and I didn't really bother looking into whether this line of thinking was correct or not because it seems confusing and stupid to me, but they thought Disney owned the rights to the monkey with the symbols because a similar toy appeared in Toy Story 3.
00:27:26
Speaker
So they switched it to a monkey with a drum.
00:27:28
Speaker
Now, to your credit, the one from Toy Story 3, without me knowing, is absolutely what I was picturing the whole time I read this.
00:27:35
Speaker
Yeah, I'm sure it is.
00:27:37
Speaker
I just wonder, that's such a famous toy, and I don't really know if that comes from this...
00:27:44
Speaker
story, but I feel like that's a very famous image when you conjure images of old toys.
00:27:50
Speaker
So I just don't know that it would be possible to trademark that.
00:27:53
Speaker
The monkey is, uppercase letters, a musical jolly chimp.
00:27:59
Speaker
Okay, so somebody along the lines had trademarked that.
00:28:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:05
Speaker
Interesting.
00:28:06
Speaker
Anyway, I just thought, again, kind of an interesting change to the movie.
00:28:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:11
Speaker
To be able to tell it in the way they wanted to, because Disney absolutely would have not allowed, if they do own the rights, they would not have allowed...
00:28:20
Speaker
gory horror movie to be made out of one of their toys.
00:28:24
Speaker
Yep.
00:28:25
Speaker
Mixed positive reactions.
00:28:27
Speaker
Some reviews I scrolled through Rotten Tomatoes really make me think that some of the viewers missed the point of the humor and excessive violence, which I think is easy to do.
00:28:35
Speaker
Like I said, I'm hesitant to use the word gratuitous, but when you talk about something like violence, I mean, there's some scenes that are just unbelievable that like you almost lose the thread a little bit.
00:28:45
Speaker
So I totally understand people missing it.
00:28:48
Speaker
And other detractors have called it sort of boring or without message or meaning.
00:28:52
Speaker
It doesn't have a lot to say.
00:28:53
Speaker
Like you said, it's sort of one note in the fact that it has this one idea that's driving it the entire time.
00:29:00
Speaker
It's a short story.
00:29:01
Speaker
It was a short story.
00:29:02
Speaker
Right.
00:29:02
Speaker
Exactly.
00:29:02
Speaker
The fans of the movie, however, call it fun and funny.
00:29:06
Speaker
And it is sort of just like a good romp.
00:29:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:29:10
Speaker
You know, does it feel like what we talked about when they somehow
00:29:17
Speaker
air pumped the hobbit a fairly small book into three feature-length films that's what i'm picturing here from short story to a full-length film like can you tell they were kind of goose in it i guess not not so severe as something else we'll talk about later i think okay and certainly not as severe as the hobbit because that just did not need to be three movies yes okay
00:29:42
Speaker
But I did finish this movie and, and like, you know, when you like eat a meal and you still feel a little bit hungry afterwards.
00:29:53
Speaker
Yep.
00:29:53
Speaker
I guess I would compare it to that.
00:29:55
Speaker
Air pump inflation is a good metaphor for how they turn this into feature length movie.
00:30:01
Speaker
Okay.
00:30:01
Speaker
Okay.
00:30:02
Speaker
But not, not terrible.
00:30:03
Speaker
It's not entirely the case.
00:30:05
Speaker
Stephen King is known for sharing pretty honest opinions about his adaptations.
00:30:10
Speaker
So I included some of the little nuggets that he's given for each of the movies that we'll talk about today.
00:30:17
Speaker
Of course, each of these are still sort of on the newer side and he has a vested interest in them performing well.
00:30:22
Speaker
So they might be a little bit sanitized or doctored or whatever, but I still thought it was kind of interesting.
00:30:27
Speaker
He said about the monkey, he said,
00:30:30
Speaker
I don't do tweet on threads.
00:30:32
Speaker
I don't know what the hell that's called.
00:30:33
Speaker
He threaded.
00:30:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:37
Speaker
You've never seen anything like the monkey.
00:30:39
Speaker
It's batshit insane.
00:30:40
Speaker
As someone who has indulged in batshittery from time to time, I say that with admiration.
00:30:45
Speaker
So he seems to be pretty, pretty happy with the final product.
00:30:48
Speaker
That's phenomenal.
00:30:50
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:50
Speaker
Funny guy.
00:30:51
Speaker
I have to imagine, because I saw, I saw no direct quotes one way or the other.
00:30:57
Speaker
just for the sheer quantity of his work that has been adapted, I have to imagine he has historically maintained a pretty open and liberal party line in terms of, you know, if he had been intensely...
00:31:13
Speaker
over observant or critical i have to imagine people would have stopped adapting his stuff at some point right yeah he's mostly interested in how faithful are they right he very famously does not like the movie adaptation of the shining and then ended up producing a mini series adaptation that is much more faithful so i don't think it's like super common for him to come out and trash something and my understanding is that when he does he sort of backs it up like but
00:31:42
Speaker
by producing the miniseries himself, you know?
00:31:45
Speaker
Okay.
00:31:46
Speaker
Okay.
00:31:47
Speaker
He doesn't kind of just sit around and whine.
00:31:49
Speaker
No, that makes sense.
00:31:50
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:51
Speaker
And, and he's very involved in all of these movies as well.
00:31:53
Speaker
So, you know, I think it would be tough to like really go off the Stephen King rails.
00:31:59
Speaker
Right.
00:31:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:00
Speaker
I like that.
00:32:01
Speaker
I like that.
00:32:01
Speaker
He's, he's, you know, part of it, but still clearly letting others develop this idea that they had.
00:32:09
Speaker
Right.
00:32:09
Speaker
Well, and he's sort of, he's a really good example of,
00:32:13
Speaker
Like we said, people studios mine and mine and mine, his archive of work.
00:32:18
Speaker
I mean, there's just few better examples of somebody that is like really connected with the culture.
00:32:23
Speaker
So like you might as well fricking listen to him.
00:32:26
Speaker
You know?
00:32:27
Speaker
Yep.
00:32:28
Speaker
Yep.
00:32:28
Speaker
I agree.
00:32:29
Speaker
I think that's why he could be such a prolific fiction writer and still have, I mean, lots and lots of people turn to his blogs and lectures and interviews on
00:32:42
Speaker
what it means to be a successful modern writer yeah oh yeah he's kind of he's kind of one most famously and often pointed to for no this is a job like i sit myself down at my desk nine to five monday to friday like everybody else just minds at home and i'm writing about people getting murdered sounds cheery yeah that's the monkey what's what's next
00:33:09
Speaker
Yeah, so chronologically in publication order, next up is The Running Man from 1982.
Discussion on 'The Running Man' and Media's Influence
00:33:15
Speaker
Okay.
00:33:17
Speaker
Let's get sad.
00:33:21
Speaker
So of the three today, of the three that I read for today, this is the only full-length novel.
00:33:28
Speaker
And it's actually incredibly hilarious in, I believe this would be an ironic way.
00:33:36
Speaker
I don't feel super confident I'm using that correctly here.
00:33:40
Speaker
It's this future setting from when he published it.
00:33:45
Speaker
And I think all readers will share an agreement that it's not incredibly hilarious in, I believe this would be an ironic way.
00:33:56
Speaker
I don't feel super confident I'm using that correctly here.
00:33:59
Speaker
It's this future setting from when he published it.
00:34:05
Speaker
And I think all readers will share an agreement that it's not too far from where society has come in his fictional comical viewing of instead of TV, they call it the freebie.
00:34:22
Speaker
And that's because everyone gets it for free because it's like the fully accepted, deliberate opioid of the masses.
00:34:30
Speaker
Yeah.
00:34:31
Speaker
It made me think immediately a good buddy, the guitar player in a band I was in years ago, had a giant sticker on top of his TV that said, this machine kills hippies in imitation.
00:34:45
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:34:47
Speaker
Who's that folk guitar player?
00:34:48
Speaker
It's an imitation of them.
00:34:50
Speaker
Pete Seeger.
00:34:51
Speaker
Yes, this machine kills fascist sticker on his guitar, right?
00:34:56
Speaker
Yep.
00:34:57
Speaker
Yeah, so I thought it was just the first thing I thought of immediately.
00:35:00
Speaker
Yeah, freebie, everybody's just sucked in.
00:35:04
Speaker
They don't want to live their own lives.
00:35:06
Speaker
They just want to watch what's on.
00:35:08
Speaker
Oh, wait.
00:35:09
Speaker
Oh, wait, what's that?
00:35:11
Speaker
There's a ninth iteration of wealthy housewives in some city I don't go to, all probably committing insurance fraud and tax evasion.
00:35:21
Speaker
but I can watch an episode of how their new cat shits on their carpet.
00:35:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:27
Speaker
Sign me up.
00:35:28
Speaker
Sign me up 200 episodes a month.
00:35:30
Speaker
Can't wait.
00:35:32
Speaker
Sorry if that's crazy.
00:35:34
Speaker
Blair's Blair's going to listen to that and be very upset at me.
00:35:37
Speaker
I have no idea, but that, and that's not a fair example, but you know what I mean?
00:35:40
Speaker
The things that he posits in this as a, this horrific dystopian future are eerily accurate for here and now.
00:35:48
Speaker
Yep.
00:35:50
Speaker
Um, throughout the entire thing, um, yeah, you kind of keep thinking that that doesn't sound that inaccurate.
00:35:58
Speaker
Uh, this guy's daughter is sick, the protagonist of the story.
00:36:02
Speaker
Um, and he wants his wife to not have to keep being a, um, sex worker to earn money, to buy meds for this kid.
00:36:14
Speaker
And this is what really, really the, the,
00:36:17
Speaker
rising action to this is disturbingly realistic.
00:36:22
Speaker
Right.
00:36:22
Speaker
Because everyone goes, oh, your daughter has like, you know, this weird cancer or something.
00:36:26
Speaker
And he's like, no, it's just pneumonia.
00:36:28
Speaker
It's very treatable.
00:36:29
Speaker
But we have no money for the medications.
00:36:32
Speaker
And I'm like, this is happening in this country today.
00:36:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:36
Speaker
So he goes on this game show.
00:36:39
Speaker
And there he even references it himself in the book.
00:36:42
Speaker
It's essentially modern gladiatorial games.
00:36:46
Speaker
Mm hmm.
00:36:47
Speaker
And not like American Gladiator, the phenomenal series that was out at the time this book was published.
00:36:54
Speaker
This is truly gladiatorial games.
00:36:57
Speaker
I think the first one he describes is...
00:37:02
Speaker
Everyone who wants to go on the game show goes through this rigorous set of physicals and health tests.
00:37:12
Speaker
And basically all of the people with weak hearts or respiratory problems are assigned to this show where they're running on a treadmill.
00:37:20
Speaker
And they're asked a question.
00:37:21
Speaker
They get it right.
00:37:22
Speaker
Cash bonus.
00:37:23
Speaker
They get it wrong.
00:37:25
Speaker
Cash deducted.
00:37:26
Speaker
Treadmill speed goes up.
00:37:28
Speaker
Double whammy.
00:37:29
Speaker
Damn.
00:37:29
Speaker
And they just run until they have heart failure or angina.
00:37:34
Speaker
And then the next one's brought in, right?
00:37:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:37:37
Speaker
You look at it and you go, wow, that's heinous.
00:37:39
Speaker
And then you look at the things people are doing.
00:37:42
Speaker
I don't know if this is a one-to-one modern analogy, but I immediately think of the people doing astinine things on TikTok and Instagram reels to get views.
00:37:53
Speaker
And then suddenly, oh, that dumb current trend
00:37:57
Speaker
It immediately makes me think of things like this, where, no, perhaps this isn't their only option.
00:38:03
Speaker
You know, these are very dire straits.
00:38:05
Speaker
This guy has been blacklisted from work for dissenting, a tale as old as time.
00:38:14
Speaker
And has determined that going on this show and literally risking his life is the only way to make any money.
00:38:21
Speaker
Right.
00:38:22
Speaker
He ends up on a show where he's being chased by bounty hunters, basically.
00:38:26
Speaker
Yes, that's exactly it.
00:38:27
Speaker
Well, chased by all of society.
00:38:29
Speaker
Oh, yeah, right.
00:38:31
Speaker
Arbitrarily declared public enemy number one, let loose from the station, given a 12-hour head start, and then after that time, there are
00:38:41
Speaker
essentially the fbi bounty hunters professionals chasing him the police chasing him and the public is given a cash bonus if they send a tip leading to his arrest right not not an arrest for anything he did an arrest for signing up for the show and saying i will do this yep it's like taking out a life insurance policy on yourself
00:39:02
Speaker
Right.
00:39:03
Speaker
This money is to benefit his wife and daughter because his total goes up for every hour he eludes escape until they kill him.
00:39:13
Speaker
And then the check for whatever his total was that he earned is sent to his family that he leaves behind.
00:39:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:39:19
Speaker
Just insane.
00:39:20
Speaker
Right.
00:39:21
Speaker
I wasn't super excited about this book.
00:39:25
Speaker
It took me to that 50, 60 percent and then I could not put it down.
00:39:31
Speaker
I had to just read to the end.
00:39:33
Speaker
Okay.
00:39:35
Speaker
I had a very similar experience when I read The Shining.
00:39:38
Speaker
Yeah.
00:39:39
Speaker
Really got pulled in.
00:39:41
Speaker
Really, King is famous for creating just this depth of worlds that you are... You can't look away.
00:39:50
Speaker
You are glued to.
00:39:53
Speaker
In a good way, obviously.
00:39:54
Speaker
Right.
00:39:55
Speaker
The ending is crazy.
00:39:56
Speaker
I do not want to give it away.
00:39:58
Speaker
I believe...
00:39:59
Speaker
You said they changed it drastically for the movie, something to that effect?
00:40:04
Speaker
Yes, they did.
00:40:05
Speaker
Okay.
00:40:06
Speaker
That's all I want to give of the plot.
00:40:11
Speaker
It's fascinating.
00:40:12
Speaker
It really makes you sit down and look at the world around you in a very good way.
00:40:19
Speaker
I think made all the more poignant decisions.
00:40:23
Speaker
that it is not a recent publication that he wrote it 45 years ago.
00:40:27
Speaker
And it has gotten only more true and accurate.
00:40:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:32
Speaker
No kidding.
00:40:33
Speaker
It is.
00:40:33
Speaker
It's harrowing to watch because like you said, you're like, yeah, this isn't,
00:40:39
Speaker
so far off, you know, there's like the major political players in the movie are, they call it the network and they have so much power that they, they basically run the military and the police and the, you know, societal norms and everything like that.
00:40:55
Speaker
And, you know, we're, we're very much seeing something sort of not, not quite as drastic, but Warner brothers is about to be purchased right now.
00:41:03
Speaker
And,
00:41:04
Speaker
which is one of the biggest studios out there with obviously television assets.
00:41:08
Speaker
And one of the major players in this potential purchase is Paramount, which is a company that's growing more and more in line with our current presidential administration.
00:41:17
Speaker
So it's really interesting to see how politics is playing into what should just be
00:41:25
Speaker
know non-partisan entertainment but of course it's it's got this growing influence so really harrowing and kind of kind of a tough watch i can understand why you said let's get sad uh to open this up this is actually uh the second time running man has been adapted to film the first was in 1987 starring arnold schwarzenegger
00:41:46
Speaker
That's right.
00:41:47
Speaker
That's right.
00:41:47
Speaker
That's right.
00:41:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:41:48
Speaker
A lot of people kind of laugh at the movie and laugh it off as like a crappy Schwarzenegger 80s action flick.
00:41:54
Speaker
We're not here to discuss that version, but I do want to mention it because I think I think it's not that bad.
00:42:00
Speaker
It's it's really ripe for sort of a re-adaptation because the concept is strong and just becomes more poignant as time goes on.
00:42:08
Speaker
It's just sort of the execution of that movie was was not great.
00:42:12
Speaker
So 2025 version was directed and co-written by Edgar Wright, who is mostly known for sort of high energy dramedies.
00:42:20
Speaker
You and I tend to like a lot of his movies like Hot Fuzz is a favorite of yours.
00:42:24
Speaker
Yes, yes.
00:42:25
Speaker
Okay.
00:42:25
Speaker
You're right.
00:42:26
Speaker
Did Shaun of the Dead?
00:42:27
Speaker
I don't know if you've seen that one.
00:42:29
Speaker
Love fantastic.
00:42:30
Speaker
Baby Driver, Scott Pilgrim versus the world.
00:42:33
Speaker
It's he's very much a Nate and Chris coded writer director.
00:42:38
Speaker
Yeah.
00:42:39
Speaker
The movie stars Glenn Powell, who's really trying to assert himself as like a movie star right now.
00:42:44
Speaker
Sort of wants to be the next Tom Cruise, I think.
00:42:47
Speaker
Supporting cast is Josh Brolin, Coleman Domingo, William H. Macy.
00:42:51
Speaker
Michael Cera shows up for a little bit.
00:42:53
Speaker
And then several more.
00:42:55
Speaker
It's a real true ensemble movie because the nature of the story is that he's constantly moving and constantly coming across new people and places.
00:43:04
Speaker
So there's a lot of opportunity for people to sort of pop up for
00:43:09
Speaker
10 or 15 minutes and do something crazy and probably die.
00:43:14
Speaker
This specific movie, like I said, it was always meant to be a much more faithful adaptation of the novel itself.
00:43:20
Speaker
And Wright insists that it's not a remake, but is a standalone production adaptation of King's story.
00:43:30
Speaker
Doesn't want any comparison with the previous adaptation.
00:43:34
Speaker
Right.
00:43:35
Speaker
Fairly divisive, whether you like it or not.
00:43:37
Speaker
It gets bogged down by some of the movie's flaws.
00:43:39
Speaker
It's really devoid of the Edgar Wright isms that we like from his other movies.
00:43:44
Speaker
So you'll see a lot of people call this movie like sauiceless or flavorless because it just it seemed like he was going to be the perfect director for this because it is such a zany, weird, wacky tale.
00:43:56
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:43:57
Speaker
The movie's just not, unfortunately.
00:44:00
Speaker
Other detractors pointed out that there's some real tonal confusion.
00:44:05
Speaker
The action is really poorly staged, which is kind of like unforgivable for an action movie.
00:44:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:11
Speaker
But it's still one that you can kind of have a good time watching.
00:44:15
Speaker
I'm growing to hate the term turn your brain off, but it is sort of a good turn your brain off action movie.
00:44:20
Speaker
And I think the themes are sort of ham fisted.
00:44:23
Speaker
They're not subtle at all about fighting the powers that be.
00:44:26
Speaker
The network.
00:44:28
Speaker
The network, yeah.
00:44:30
Speaker
Zero subtlety there.
00:44:31
Speaker
Right.
00:44:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:32
Speaker
Oh, is that the same in the book?
00:44:33
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:44:34
Speaker
It's not subtle at all.
00:44:35
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:44:36
Speaker
Well, you have no question who represents what in society.
00:44:41
Speaker
And I guess, I mean, subtlety, I don't know, maybe subtlety isn't the right word because this is one of two titles we'll talk about today that gets compared to The Hunger Games a lot because it is this
00:44:53
Speaker
competition to the death.
00:44:54
Speaker
I wouldn't necessarily call that a subtle text either because she literally goes to war against the president of her nation.
00:45:01
Speaker
But it's a socioeconomic caste system.
00:45:04
Speaker
Right.
00:45:04
Speaker
But because it's sort of set in this like sci fi world that like may or may not be America, it's a little bit takes a little more work to like map it onto your life.
00:45:13
Speaker
Whereas The Running Man, like you said, basically doesn't.
00:45:16
Speaker
We're in a world where television networks are starting to run things too much.
00:45:19
Speaker
Like it's it's just
00:45:21
Speaker
There is no real nuance, maybe nuances.
00:45:23
Speaker
Yes.
00:45:23
Speaker
The way to put it to the comparison between our world and the quote unquote fictional world of this story.
00:45:30
Speaker
Like you said, the ending was changed from the book, presumably to set up a sequel.
00:45:36
Speaker
Oh, I don't want to say too much.
00:45:38
Speaker
I feel like that's kind of spoils the ending of the movie to a degree.
00:45:43
Speaker
I really hope we don't get a sequel because it just, I think it was really well packaged as a solo story.
00:45:49
Speaker
And then on top of that, this movie was less than stellar.
00:45:52
Speaker
So I'm not really looking forward to second Running Man.
00:45:55
Speaker
But just wanted to mention that because I think it's interesting that the studio
00:46:00
Speaker
again, studio that owns a network, right, is sort of milking this.
00:46:04
Speaker
And I don't know, interesting.
00:46:07
Speaker
As far as King's reaction to this, what I was able to find is that he gave his permission to change the ending and that he said that he liked it, quote unquote, very much.
00:46:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:19
Speaker
I mean, like I said,
00:46:21
Speaker
This movie, he wants it
Financial Success of King Adaptations
00:46:23
Speaker
to do well in theaters.
00:46:23
Speaker
So who knows if that's true, what he'll think in five, 10 years.
00:46:28
Speaker
I mean, not that the man needs any more money at this point, but think about it.
00:46:33
Speaker
That's the ultimate ROI.
00:46:35
Speaker
I put all the effort in to write a book and 45 years later, I'm going to get royalties on a sequel that I didn't write.
00:46:43
Speaker
Right.
00:46:44
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:46:45
Speaker
That's...
00:46:46
Speaker
It'd be tough to shake a finger at the guy.
00:46:49
Speaker
You know what I mean?
00:46:50
Speaker
Right.
00:46:50
Speaker
I mean, he's got kids probably, doesn't he?
00:46:52
Speaker
And like grandkids, maybe they'll never have to work if they keep making running mans for the rest of time.
00:46:58
Speaker
Gotta imagine they don't already.
00:46:59
Speaker
Goodness gracious.
00:47:00
Speaker
That's yeah.
00:47:01
Speaker
What?
00:47:02
Speaker
Oh, to be a member of the King lineage.
00:47:05
Speaker
That was it on, uh, on the running man.
00:47:08
Speaker
And, and let's take a quick break.
00:47:14
Speaker
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Speaker
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00:47:47
Speaker
Welcome back to adaptation.
00:47:48
Speaker
We are discussing Stephen King's adaptation or adaptations of Stephen King's works in the year 2025.
00:47:55
Speaker
I believe next on the list that we're going to go over is the life of Chuck.
00:47:59
Speaker
Chris, is that, is that correct?
00:48:02
Speaker
Yes.
00:48:03
Speaker
Again, because I think, I know you have one more to discuss than I do.
00:48:06
Speaker
I could only get to three of the titles for this one, which is crazy that he's adapted more than three titles in one calendar year, but I know.
00:48:15
Speaker
Obviously books take a little bit more time to get through usually.
00:48:19
Speaker
This one was by far the shortest of the three.
00:48:21
Speaker
I think this audio book was a cover to cover for me.
00:48:25
Speaker
I think it was maybe two hours long.
00:48:28
Speaker
Okay.
00:48:29
Speaker
Which I suppose is just what you do with every movie.
00:48:31
Speaker
I hadn't considered that comparison.
00:48:34
Speaker
I am curious how well it maps onto the script of the movie in that case.
00:48:38
Speaker
Very curious.
00:48:39
Speaker
Very curious.
00:48:41
Speaker
I'm so glad this was the third of the three I get to discuss.
00:48:45
Speaker
And it's not just dismal, dreary horror.
00:48:48
Speaker
This had an immediately, shockingly fresh, modern feel.
00:48:55
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:48:56
Speaker
Published in 2020, so it's still not, wasn't immediately adapted.
00:49:01
Speaker
This did come out five years ago.
00:49:04
Speaker
Another short story in the collection, If It Bleeds, I believe.
00:49:09
Speaker
I think so, yeah.
00:49:11
Speaker
That sounds right.
00:49:12
Speaker
Very expressive and really kind of heartfelt, almost like moral driven ending to me.
00:49:21
Speaker
TLDR on this is a story about a dude who really digs dancing.
00:49:27
Speaker
That's it?
00:49:28
Speaker
I felt pretty good about that as a synopsis.
00:49:31
Speaker
I mean, I think you're missing some major, major plot points there.
00:49:35
Speaker
Yeah, we're going to talk a bit.
00:49:37
Speaker
I guess.
00:49:38
Speaker
No, it is surprising that this one is both the shortest of the three that I read and one of the more intricate plots.
00:49:48
Speaker
There was a very interesting quote for you and I from this one where he says,
00:49:54
Speaker
You know, it's like a daydream where you play pro baseball or climb Mount Everest or duet with Bruce Springsteen.
00:50:03
Speaker
I love the comparison.
00:50:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:50:05
Speaker
And I was like, yeah, that is exactly the daydream Nate and I would both have.
00:50:08
Speaker
Yes, it is.
00:50:09
Speaker
He also, this was, this is, I mean, one of, once again, every page had something that would be a quote worth discussing with a wider audience.
00:50:18
Speaker
Hmm.
00:50:19
Speaker
Chuck, the protagonist, if anyone was wondering what the protagonist's name in the life of Chuck is, it's Chuck.
00:50:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:50:28
Speaker
He quips, they're talking about this sort of need for answers, and he says, would answers make a good thing better?
00:50:38
Speaker
And all I could think about was...
00:50:41
Speaker
Perhaps this is only my feeling and I'm projecting at which point, screw off, I have the microphone, you don't.
00:50:49
Speaker
To me, this spoke very intimately to this powerful human experience to find comfort.
00:51:01
Speaker
Some people I know certainly nearly demand answers and explanations for everything.
00:51:08
Speaker
Do you know what I mean?
00:51:09
Speaker
Yeah, I do.
00:51:11
Speaker
and I don't want this to be some soapbox, our society has lost its way sort of statement, but just the simplicity with which this character says, would this good thing be made better with further explanation?
00:51:28
Speaker
Right.
00:51:30
Speaker
Which again, to me, and this is not what King said, but what I read from that is exactly the inverse.
00:51:35
Speaker
Can you not find joy in it if you lack...
00:51:40
Speaker
a certain level of control of the situation.
00:51:43
Speaker
Sure.
00:51:43
Speaker
Which is exactly what, um, a significant chunk of the plot is built around that.
00:51:48
Speaker
I, I don't know how much we can discuss it without saying it explicitly, but if we can avoid it, I think it'd be cool.
00:51:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:57
Speaker
Cause there's really, uh, to, to, to some extent, that's the crux of Chuck's experience.
00:52:05
Speaker
This, I have no control over this one thing.
00:52:08
Speaker
And I can find considerable and profound joy exactly in that act by, by relinquishing that control entirely, letting go of the situation and saying, all right, that's done and dusted.
00:52:24
Speaker
Nothing I can do about it.
00:52:26
Speaker
So, so what's next?
00:52:28
Speaker
Right.
00:52:29
Speaker
And that is such an intimately familiar thing.
00:52:33
Speaker
I'm going to argue for everybody.
00:52:35
Speaker
Oh yeah, totally.
00:52:36
Speaker
Totally.
00:52:37
Speaker
Because there's every realm in which he could sit and mope and feel sorry, and it wouldn't get him anywhere, right?
00:52:47
Speaker
Yep.
00:52:48
Speaker
The second fun reference for us in this book that I just sprinted to write down immediately to show you, because I presume even some of the most profound lines in these books don't make it verbatim into the films.
00:53:02
Speaker
Sure.
00:53:02
Speaker
Sure.
00:53:03
Speaker
Chuck as the character when he's younger is introduced to mystery novels and he loves them.
00:53:07
Speaker
And it says he devoured 11 Agatha Christie's in a row.
00:53:13
Speaker
Oh, but very specifically, not a big fan of Miss Marple, but loved her.
00:53:20
Speaker
Wow.
00:53:21
Speaker
Okay.
00:53:21
Speaker
I just thought that was so funny because I was like very fourth wall meta.
00:53:27
Speaker
I'm immediately not in a bad way, but I, as the reader was immediately pulled out of the story.
00:53:32
Speaker
and thinking about Stephen King as an author.
00:53:36
Speaker
What was the purpose of this reference that I think for a large part is going to go over audiences' heads?
00:53:43
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think that there's a direct correlation between the success of Agatha Christie and her somewhat formulaic and somewhat routine writing as an author and Stephen King years and years later doing the same thing in a different shirt, you know?
00:53:58
Speaker
I mean, at this point, being a renowned and published author for nearly the exact same amount of time that Agatha Christie herself was, I just sat back and smirked and thought, what are we doing here, Stephen?
00:54:13
Speaker
What are we doing?
00:54:14
Speaker
What are you saying about yourself?
00:54:16
Speaker
Like it's, it's kind of an introspective idea.
00:54:19
Speaker
Yes.
00:54:19
Speaker
You know?
00:54:19
Speaker
Yes.
00:54:20
Speaker
Cause I mean, in no way besides the authors themselves, would I, have I ever, or would I ever compare the writing that they produce besides a bunch of death, I suppose.
00:54:34
Speaker
Oh yeah.
00:54:35
Speaker
I guess a lot of people die.
00:54:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:37
Speaker
So Chuck itself is,
00:54:40
Speaker
Again, it's such a short story.
00:54:43
Speaker
It feels like there are a few key, key moments that are difficult to include without spoiling the whole thing.
00:54:52
Speaker
But also, it's difficult to talk about much else due to its inherent brevity.
00:54:59
Speaker
But truly, so fast, so easy.
00:55:02
Speaker
I got through the audiobook just in a walk up to the supermarket and the laundromat, just doing some chores on a Saturday.
Impactful Reading Experiences
00:55:09
Speaker
Wow.
00:55:10
Speaker
Cool.
00:55:11
Speaker
I know we'll do recommendations later, but I don't want to talk too much about the plot.
00:55:15
Speaker
Well worth your time.
00:55:17
Speaker
Especially for me, having not seen the movie, I had no idea.
00:55:21
Speaker
Went into it completely blind.
00:55:23
Speaker
Hadn't seen a trailer, had not heard of the book till you told me it was an adaptation.
00:55:28
Speaker
And cause this, no, was this one of the ones that he wrote under that pen name?
00:55:36
Speaker
I don't know if he even uses it anymore because like the,
00:55:39
Speaker
Gig is up.
00:55:41
Speaker
I don't think so.
00:55:42
Speaker
I don't remember.
00:55:43
Speaker
I think he wrote it, published it under Stephen King.
00:55:47
Speaker
Absolutely fantastic.
00:55:48
Speaker
And to me, what was most shocking was quite outside of what I would consider King's wheelhouse.
00:55:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:55:54
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:55:55
Speaker
It's a super big departure from what people think of when they think of Stephen King.
00:56:01
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:01
Speaker
For the most part.
00:56:03
Speaker
Right, right, right, right, right.
00:56:04
Speaker
I'm not saying that his writing is devoid of moral value otherwise, but it almost felt like, you know, Lord Byron's challenge to Mary Shelley to write a ghost story.
00:56:15
Speaker
It was like Stephen King was at some buddy's 80th birthday in the Hollywood Hills and someone said, hey, have you considered writing a super positive, uplifting one with a fun, encouraging message?
00:56:29
Speaker
And he goes, hold my beer and pumps this out, you know?
00:56:33
Speaker
Yep.
00:56:34
Speaker
Very cool.
00:56:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:35
Speaker
Follows the life of Chuck in a, in a very whimsical and humorous way.
00:56:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:42
Speaker
Oh yeah.
00:56:42
Speaker
Totally.
00:56:43
Speaker
Um, truly involving like kind of just a dude that digs dancing.
00:56:48
Speaker
Yep.
00:56:48
Speaker
He does like to dance.
00:56:50
Speaker
Um, yeah.
00:56:51
Speaker
How, how on earth did they manage to wrestle this into a feature length film?
00:56:56
Speaker
Yeah, well, like I said, I'm really curious that the audio book was about two hours.
00:57:02
Speaker
That's somewhat close to the movie's runtime.
00:57:04
Speaker
So I'm really interested how much was just kind of lifted, like copied and pasted.
00:57:09
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:57:11
Speaker
It was adapted by Mike Flanagan, who is a iconic writer director in the horror space and has worked on King adaptations before Gerald's Game and Dr. Sleep, which is the sequel to The Shining.
00:57:27
Speaker
So very familiar with adapting Stephen King.
00:57:30
Speaker
It was not a surprise that he was the man behind this, except for the fact that much like this is a departure for Stephen King.
00:57:37
Speaker
It's also kind of a departure for, for Flanagan because he does so much horror.
00:57:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:43
Speaker
Like capital H horror stuff.
00:57:45
Speaker
The movie stars, Tom Hiddleston as the titular Chuck.
00:57:48
Speaker
I thought so.
00:57:50
Speaker
That's low key, right?
00:57:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:52
Speaker
Okay.
00:57:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:54
Speaker
Jacob Tremblay as the young version of Chuck.
00:57:58
Speaker
Mark Hamill plays Chuck's grandfather.
00:58:01
Speaker
What?
00:58:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:58:04
Speaker
First of two mentions he'll get in this podcast as well.
00:58:07
Speaker
What?
00:58:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:58:10
Speaker
I don't know why he's so attracted to Stephen King stuff, but I've got plenty to say about Mark Hamill later.
00:58:16
Speaker
Okay.
00:58:17
Speaker
And then Chiwetel Ejiofor and Karen Gillan are kind of the other two
00:58:21
Speaker
names that have like significant roles.
00:58:22
Speaker
But this is another one where people kind of come and go from his life.
00:58:26
Speaker
And he encounters a lot of different people at different moments and for different lengths of time.
00:58:31
Speaker
So there's sort of an ensemble cast quality to this movie as well.
00:58:35
Speaker
So lots of names that I'm kind of skipping here.
00:58:38
Speaker
This one specifically premiered at Toronto International Film Festival, one of the bigger film festivals that's held every year.
00:58:44
Speaker
in 2024 so there's some debate as to whether it's technically a 24 or 25 movie i see in my not so humble opinion i don't really give a what year it comes out in the at the festivals it depends on when people can get to it yes us us regular peasants yeah exactly and it came out in
00:59:05
Speaker
June of 2025 in theaters, so well into the year.
00:59:09
Speaker
Anyway, it's just frustrating to me and it's why we included it here is because I feel so strongly about this.
00:59:16
Speaker
I bring up its TIFF premiere also because it won the People's Choice Award there.
00:59:20
Speaker
These festivals are usually sort of hosted by a jury of filmmakers that will give out a handful of awards to the movies that play at them.
00:59:29
Speaker
And oftentimes there is a People's Choice Award where the attendees, and TIFF is actually open
00:59:34
Speaker
to the public.
00:59:35
Speaker
It's just not in our country where we live.
00:59:38
Speaker
And I have a real job, so I can't go to TIFF.
00:59:43
Speaker
So the attendees get to vote on this People's Choice Award.
00:59:46
Speaker
The Life of Chuck ended up winning that award, which was a big deal because 99% of the time, that's not an exact figure, but pretty close.
00:59:52
Speaker
That's indicative of a Best Picture nomination at the Oscars.
00:59:55
Speaker
Wow.
00:59:56
Speaker
This was also picked up by Neon, who did The Monkey, at TIFF.
01:00:01
Speaker
And they sort of decided to not really...
01:00:03
Speaker
run it for awards, a summer awards or a summer release date.
01:00:07
Speaker
Like I said, it came out in June is not awesome for running an awards campaign.
01:00:12
Speaker
A lot of movies sort of take over the conversation between then an award season.
01:00:17
Speaker
So pretty, pretty effectively killed its awards chances with that release date.
01:00:22
Speaker
And also because it completely bombed at the box office.
01:00:24
Speaker
People were not interested in this movie for whatever reason.
01:00:29
Speaker
Really?
01:00:30
Speaker
Yeah, I think it was pretty poorly advertised and, you know, they leaned into the fact that it was Stephen King, but it's kind of an anti Stephen King.
01:00:38
Speaker
So I can imagine a lot of people felt sort of conflicted about it.
01:00:43
Speaker
But the movie has very strong reviews.
01:00:45
Speaker
You don't win a People's Choice Award without
01:00:47
Speaker
at least moderately strong reviews.
01:00:50
Speaker
And a lot of people have really been drawn to it because it's very life affirming.
01:00:54
Speaker
It has very feel good moments and themes throughout, despite the fact that you do hit some pretty emotional lows watching it.
01:01:00
Speaker
But it's yes, yes.
01:01:02
Speaker
It's more about the upswing afterwards.
01:01:04
Speaker
Right.
01:01:05
Speaker
And the and the need.
01:01:07
Speaker
Right.
01:01:08
Speaker
If you have no lows, then highs are meaningless.
01:01:11
Speaker
Exactly.
01:01:12
Speaker
Right.
01:01:12
Speaker
Right.
01:01:13
Speaker
Some people called it unrealistic.
01:01:15
Speaker
It is ultimately technically like a sci-fi story to some degree.
01:01:19
Speaker
Yes.
01:01:19
Speaker
Yes.
01:01:20
Speaker
There is a supernatural quality.
01:01:23
Speaker
Right.
01:01:24
Speaker
And then the themes are pretty ham-fisted.
01:01:27
Speaker
When I saw, I don't know if you recall this, the episode this summer that we recorded after I saw this movie, I made a joke about the line, I contain multitudes.
01:01:37
Speaker
Yes.
01:01:38
Speaker
That's said like multiple times in...
01:01:40
Speaker
in the movie, which is just like, yep, we get it.
01:01:43
Speaker
We get it.
01:01:44
Speaker
So there's some of that.
01:01:46
Speaker
And then I also mentioned, I think, that there's a lot of exposition via narration in that movie, which is a kind of a lazy writing technique.
01:01:56
Speaker
It doesn't...
01:01:57
Speaker
work super well.
01:01:58
Speaker
It's a lot of telling instead of showing.
01:02:00
Speaker
So that's kind of what people had to say against the movie.
01:02:04
Speaker
Yeah.
01:02:04
Speaker
Yeah.
01:02:05
Speaker
King again, this was especially because of its potential for awards.
01:02:09
Speaker
He was going to be nice to this one.
01:02:11
Speaker
He hasn't shared anything that I have found overtly about this movie.
01:02:16
Speaker
But Mike Flanagan did say that he shared a screener link so that Stephen King could watch it at home.
01:02:22
Speaker
He sent him a link to to watch this movie and he accessed the link seven times.
01:02:27
Speaker
So he's seen the movie.
01:02:30
Speaker
Yeah.
01:02:30
Speaker
Multiple times.
01:02:32
Speaker
Or he doesn't know how to play it on his computer.
01:02:34
Speaker
I was like, he's like 80.
01:02:38
Speaker
He's like 87.
01:02:41
Speaker
Yeah, but that's it.
01:02:42
Speaker
Pretty simple.
01:02:42
Speaker
I don't have a ton to say about that one because it did kind of fall on its face a little bit.
01:02:49
Speaker
That's a shame.
01:02:51
Speaker
It's very interesting because I would actually say everything you described is exactly the same in the book, and it just comes off so differently in written form.
01:03:04
Speaker
Yeah, we'll get to it.
01:03:05
Speaker
a little bit later here, but I will share that I've I hated this movie.
01:03:09
Speaker
I've couldn't stand really.
01:03:12
Speaker
I'll share why later, but okay.
01:03:13
Speaker
Okay.
01:03:15
Speaker
One of my least favorites of the year.
01:03:17
Speaker
Wow.
01:03:18
Speaker
No, that's very interesting.
01:03:19
Speaker
Okay.
01:03:20
Speaker
And I, I believe you've you have a number of them that I did not read.
01:03:23
Speaker
Is that correct?
01:03:24
Speaker
Yeah, I wanted to give a shout out to
01:03:27
Speaker
several actually just because there is so much that was adapted this year so i'm going to run through a handful that i didn't even get to see and then one that i did there were three short films produced this year or released this year that were adaptations of stephen king's stuff lt's theory of pets never heard of it nope mute never heard of it the reach never heard of it but
01:03:50
Speaker
You know, that's three of 200.
01:03:51
Speaker
So of course, you know, a couple of TV shows, one is airing right now.
01:03:57
Speaker
It Welcome to Derry is a prequel to it, which is the clown.
01:04:02
Speaker
Pennywise.
01:04:04
Speaker
Yeah, I have zero desire to watch this.
01:04:06
Speaker
So won't be doing so.
01:04:09
Speaker
But if it's your thing, it's on HBO Max.
01:04:12
Speaker
And then The Institute is a show on MGM+.
01:04:15
Speaker
I don't know who the hell has an MGM plus account, but go for it if you do.
01:04:20
Speaker
A teen genius wakes up in a strange place full of children who got there the same way he did and who all, like him, possess unusual abilities.
01:04:28
Speaker
Sounds pretty cut in print, Stephen King, to me.
01:04:32
Speaker
I very much intended to read this one and just simply did not get to it.
01:04:36
Speaker
Oh, well.
01:04:38
Speaker
Put it on your TBR, I guess.
01:04:39
Speaker
Yeah.
01:04:39
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
01:04:40
Speaker
And then the final feature-length film that I wanted to talk about was The Long Walk, which is based on, I believe, a full-length novel as well from Stephen King that was published in 1979.
01:04:50
Speaker
So actually the oldest, I believe.
01:04:54
Speaker
Yes.
01:04:55
Speaker
The ones that we talked about today.
Adaptation of 'The Long Walk'
01:04:57
Speaker
Much like...
01:04:59
Speaker
The Monkey, it went through several rounds of development and just stalled out, like I said, over and over and over again.
01:05:05
Speaker
Once again, a Frank Darabont shout out in 2007, he tried to adapt it and again, just fell through for various reasons.
01:05:13
Speaker
Wow.
01:05:15
Speaker
I know.
01:05:15
Speaker
It's kind of interesting that that's happened to him.
01:05:18
Speaker
Yeah.
01:05:19
Speaker
I want to give him a hug.
01:05:20
Speaker
He's had a rough run on this podcast.
01:05:22
Speaker
Are you good buddy?
01:05:23
Speaker
Yeah.
01:05:25
Speaker
Eventually they managed to make the movie.
01:05:28
Speaker
JT Molnar wrote the script and Francis Lawrence directed.
01:05:32
Speaker
Francis Lawrence is mostly known for directing most of the Hunger Games movies.
01:05:37
Speaker
Again, that's interesting because this book has some real strong parallels as well, which I'll explain here in a second.
01:05:43
Speaker
I say this is similar to the Hunger Games because the conceit of this is for the plot, I guess, is I guess it's 50 young men, one from each
01:05:52
Speaker
state in the nation in this post-apocalyptic United States embarks on a long walk from coast to coast is the idea.
01:06:03
Speaker
And they're, they can't stop.
01:06:05
Speaker
They can't drop below a certain speed or they're killed by the military that are following them.
01:06:11
Speaker
So it's, again, it's like young people competing and the winner gets in the movie, at least they get like one wish granted.
01:06:19
Speaker
Along those lines, you can see why it's similar to the hunger games, young people competing to the death in a sort of fascist authoritarian state.
01:06:28
Speaker
And the idea is that this long walk is an annual tradition because it inspires workers like they work harder afterwards, which the logic to me doesn't totally line up, but whatever.
01:06:40
Speaker
Yeah.
01:06:41
Speaker
Yeah.
01:06:41
Speaker
Yeah.
01:06:45
Speaker
movie stars cooper hoffman dennis johnson ben wang mark hamill is the authoritarian military leader big stephen king guy i guess i i guess i mean he's talked about how in recent years it's it's been tough for him to find like solid work he's actually a pretty prolific voice actor but it's hard for him to find work in live action i think that it's always been hard for him to shake the luke skywalker of it all yep and you know he's never gotten great reviews as a as an actor either so i
01:07:16
Speaker
He said that it was just sort of an interesting year for him to be offered both of these projects.
01:07:20
Speaker
And he just absolutely couldn't say no because it was against type to sort of play, especially in this movie, the villain.
01:07:28
Speaker
I think there's certainly something operating there where Luke Skywalker, the most famous hero of all time, plays the villain.
01:07:35
Speaker
So interesting that he's involved.
01:07:37
Speaker
Huge change from the ending.
01:07:38
Speaker
I'm trying to figure out how to do this without spoilers, but I don't think that we can have a proper conversation about this book without talking about its ending.
01:07:46
Speaker
So bear with me while I stumble through this explanation here.
01:07:52
Speaker
The ultimate winner of the long walk is changed from the book and what he does afterwards is changed.
01:08:00
Speaker
That's a massive change.
01:08:02
Speaker
One of the major conversations that happens throughout this book is about political violence.
01:08:10
Speaker
And is that an effective way to affect change, to make change happen?
01:08:15
Speaker
The main character of the movie wants to commit an act of political violence.
01:08:19
Speaker
And then there's this sort of
01:08:21
Speaker
secondary character, second lead that basically talks him out of it.
01:08:26
Speaker
He wants to assassinate the general, Mark Hamill's character at the end.
01:08:31
Speaker
His one wish is going to be this movie was released two days after Charlie Kirk was shot and killed.
01:08:38
Speaker
Crazy.
01:08:38
Speaker
And every person in the nation was having conversations about political violence and whether it's
01:08:44
Speaker
effective or appropriate or how that intersects with where we are in terms of language and and all of that.
01:08:52
Speaker
A developed and literate society more broadly.
01:08:56
Speaker
right yeah exactly yeah obviously that was not they didn't know that was going to happen and two days is not enough time to like delay the release of a movie or or anything like that but um i did it was a really bizarre theater going experience it was a fairly full theater people were really interested in this movie and um it's just silent afterwards and i knew that every other person in that theater was like
01:09:20
Speaker
Whoops.
01:09:21
Speaker
Like what weird timing for us to digest this story.
01:09:24
Speaker
And I'm curious how much it affects not just mine, but other people's read on it.
01:09:31
Speaker
Yeah.
01:09:32
Speaker
Yeah.
01:09:33
Speaker
Just because that was such a huge event culturally.
01:09:37
Speaker
whether you were a fan or not of Charlie Kirk, that's one of the defining moments of 2025.
01:09:43
Speaker
So I just think it's really interesting to consider in the context of the story and how it was digested by audiences.
01:09:52
Speaker
Which is to say, strong box office performance.
01:09:56
Speaker
Oh, wow.
01:09:56
Speaker
Strong reviews, particularly for its performances.
01:10:00
Speaker
Detractors criticize the lack of exposition.
01:10:02
Speaker
You're kind of just dropped into this world.
01:10:03
Speaker
We don't really know why it's post-apocalyptic, why the military's in charge.
01:10:08
Speaker
I don't know if any of that's like super important, but it does make for a weird story.
01:10:14
Speaker
The plot's fairly thin.
01:10:15
Speaker
There's not a ton that happens.
01:10:17
Speaker
They kind of just talk while they're walking and people drop dead around them for a couple hours.
01:10:22
Speaker
Yeah.
01:10:24
Speaker
And then that ending, some people felt it was very implausible.
01:10:27
Speaker
Specifically, the character sort of changing his opinion in the moment is it is a little striking.
01:10:34
Speaker
I don't know that I totally buy it.
01:10:35
Speaker
But again, I just can't know if that's how I would feel if I watch this movie at a different time of year.
01:10:42
Speaker
Right.
01:10:42
Speaker
You can never take that context back again.
01:10:45
Speaker
Yeah.
01:10:45
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
01:10:47
Speaker
And then I wanted to tack on Stephen King's
01:10:51
Speaker
reaction.
01:10:51
Speaker
He seemed to really be happy with this movie and compared the script to that of Shawshank Redemption, which is arguably his opus.
01:11:00
Speaker
Yeah.
01:11:01
Speaker
So seems pretty happy with it.
01:11:03
Speaker
Interesting.
01:11:04
Speaker
Yeah.
01:11:04
Speaker
So I'm sorry for spoiling that one, but I just felt like it would not be responsible to have a conversation about that movie and not mention the context in which it came into the world.
01:11:15
Speaker
And it's kind of a cool opportunity for us to talk about how
01:11:18
Speaker
that influences the way we consume these texts.
01:11:22
Speaker
Absolutely, it does.
01:11:23
Speaker
That's nearly, I think that's as close to this nerve as we've gotten just in conversation.
01:11:31
Speaker
Yeah, I just couldn't believe it.
01:11:34
Speaker
Well, why this was a cool idea besides that you and I were just having these discussions anyway about the books and movies we were reading and seeing was this idea that's always haunted me of can only do this activity that we're doing in one order.
01:11:51
Speaker
Yeah, right.
01:11:52
Speaker
Each individual can read the story and then see, presuming you consume both or you can see the movie and read the book.
01:12:02
Speaker
I can never take that back again.
01:12:04
Speaker
No matter how much of Minority Report I forget, whenever I go to read the book, I will have Tom Cruise in my head, right?
01:12:12
Speaker
I'm trying to read Wicked, but I still have... Cynthia Erivo.
01:12:18
Speaker
Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande.
01:12:22
Speaker
Grande.
01:12:24
Speaker
In my head, right?
01:12:25
Speaker
As I'm trying to read these characters with crazy names and I'm frustrated to no ends.
01:12:30
Speaker
Right?
01:12:31
Speaker
Right.
01:12:32
Speaker
And that's kind of the genesis of this idea.
01:12:34
Speaker
And so you've had the exact same experience just with this cultural touch point instead of the book itself.
01:12:39
Speaker
Right.
01:12:40
Speaker
Yeah.
01:12:40
Speaker
Yeah.
01:12:40
Speaker
That's no less valid.
01:12:42
Speaker
Right.
01:12:43
Speaker
Yeah.
01:12:43
Speaker
Oh yeah.
01:12:44
Speaker
Yeah.
01:12:45
Speaker
It'll just be interesting.
01:12:47
Speaker
I don't know, maybe like rewatching it in several years will be interesting to see.
01:12:52
Speaker
Although I don't think this problem is going anywhere.
01:12:54
Speaker
So anyway, let's, should we take another quick break before we dive into the last bit of our discussion here?
01:13:02
Speaker
Yes.
01:13:03
Speaker
Yep.
01:13:03
Speaker
Great idea.
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Speaker
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01:13:38
Speaker
Welcome back to Adaptation, the Book to Movie podcast.
01:13:41
Speaker
We are diving into our discussion questions, even further discussion questions, about Stephen King's titles that have been adapted in the year 2025.
01:13:49
Speaker
Chris, what do you have?
01:13:52
Speaker
Yeah, so I was thinking about just how long it would take me to get through any reasonable quantity of his work.
01:14:01
Speaker
But because there are so many adaptations, I assume you've consumed much more Stephen King than I have.
01:14:07
Speaker
Yeah.
01:14:08
Speaker
Probably, yeah.
01:14:09
Speaker
This is posed for the good of the audience and myself.
01:14:17
Speaker
I'm not a big horror guy.
01:14:19
Speaker
Knowing what you do about his adaptations, is there Stephen King content you would recommend that's not a clown stabbing people and that sort of stuff?
01:14:31
Speaker
Yeah.
01:14:32
Speaker
Okay, yeah.
01:14:32
Speaker
I'm going to...
01:14:33
Speaker
pull up letterbox here so that I can kind of give you a proper look at everything that I've seen of his.
01:14:39
Speaker
Shawshank Redemption and the Green Mile are two stories that he wrote under his pen name, which I'm blanking on, but they're both really, really strong stories.
01:14:50
Speaker
Misery is sort of like horror adjacent.
01:14:52
Speaker
It's more of a thriller.
01:14:54
Speaker
Right.
01:14:54
Speaker
It sounds like you are familiar with that one.
01:14:57
Speaker
You mentioned it.
01:14:58
Speaker
Yes.
01:14:59
Speaker
Yes.
01:15:00
Speaker
Let's see what else.
01:15:02
Speaker
Christine, I think Christine is really fun.
01:15:04
Speaker
It's again, it's sort of horror adjacent because it's about a living car, but it's one that again, it's so silly and stupid that I just had so much fun watching it.
01:15:14
Speaker
I'm really missing the logic there.
01:15:16
Speaker
It's horror adjacent because it's about a living car.
01:15:20
Speaker
So was Herbie.
01:15:24
Speaker
Yeah, that's true.
01:15:25
Speaker
That's a true sentence.
01:15:28
Speaker
I mean, it's, it's horror adjacent in that, like, it's so far out there that you don't take it seriously as horror content.
01:15:35
Speaker
Yes.
01:15:36
Speaker
You know, I'm not, I didn't like leave my house scared that the neighbor's car was going to pin me against a wall.
01:15:43
Speaker
Yes.
01:15:44
Speaker
The way that like you watch it and you like avoid storm drains for the rest of your life, you know?
01:15:49
Speaker
Yeah.
01:15:50
Speaker
Yeah.
01:15:51
Speaker
Is there a different label I would slap on it besides horror?
01:15:54
Speaker
I guess not.
01:15:55
Speaker
I don't know.
01:15:55
Speaker
Maybe science, science fiction.
01:15:56
Speaker
I don't know.
01:15:57
Speaker
But, uh,
01:15:59
Speaker
not so much in a way, not horror in the way, like the kind of thing that you tend to avoid.
01:16:05
Speaker
Yes.
01:16:05
Speaker
Okay.
01:16:06
Speaker
Yep.
01:16:06
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:07
Speaker
Those are, those are my big shout outs though.
01:16:09
Speaker
The not the sort of non horror shout outs.
01:16:11
Speaker
And those, I mean, those two that you mentioned green mile and Shawshank redemption, those are like universally beloved if I'm not mistaken.
01:16:18
Speaker
Yes.
01:16:19
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:19
Speaker
And, and there's movies of them and I assume that we'll get to one, if not both.
01:16:25
Speaker
I don't know how you can have it.
01:16:28
Speaker
podcast about adaptations.
01:16:30
Speaker
Yeah, I'll talk about Shawshank.
01:16:31
Speaker
I mean, some of these we're trying to set it up by year, you know, some some novel approach to cover more of his material.
01:16:38
Speaker
But some of these titles, realistically are going to be their own episodes.
01:16:44
Speaker
Yep.
01:16:44
Speaker
100%.
01:16:44
Speaker
Totally.
01:16:47
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:48
Speaker
I wanted to ask, what are your general feelings on Stephen King?
01:16:51
Speaker
Do you like him as an author?
01:16:52
Speaker
Why or why not?
01:16:54
Speaker
Yeah, you know, it's odd.
01:16:56
Speaker
Like I was talking about a couple of these, I had very, very similar reactions to.
01:17:03
Speaker
I think I told you off mic, The Shining.
01:17:08
Speaker
I had a show in Madison, Wisconsin.
01:17:12
Speaker
Yeah.
01:17:14
Speaker
Like 2017, I think.
01:17:15
Speaker
So I get in the car, I turn on the audio book of the shining and listen to it cover to cover while I drive alone from Minneapolis to Madison.
01:17:24
Speaker
That's crazy.
01:17:26
Speaker
And I got to Madison, Wisconsin, and I was on well, I could not go to the theater to go load in, go get my base and my amp out of the car.
01:17:36
Speaker
I went and found just the first place where there was parking and an open door.
01:17:40
Speaker
and went and sat down in some, I don't know if it was a bar or a coffee shop, but I just stared at the wall and was like, truly, truly separated from society as a corporeal being.
01:17:54
Speaker
Yeah.
01:17:55
Speaker
And I think that's maybe why his quote about the power of Lord of the Flies, the hands that reach out and grab you resonated with me.
01:18:05
Speaker
Mm hmm.
01:18:05
Speaker
None of his writing, you know what?
01:18:07
Speaker
The Dark Tower was probably my favorite book of his that I enjoyed.
01:18:10
Speaker
It's just more in my wheelhouse.
01:18:13
Speaker
I would not say I ever finish a piece of Stephen King's writing and think that was terribly enjoyable.
01:18:23
Speaker
But I also don't think that's what he wants.
01:18:27
Speaker
Oh, sure.
01:18:27
Speaker
As a horror writer.
01:18:29
Speaker
Yeah, there's a power to that that I think...
01:18:34
Speaker
is just so necessary to access.
01:18:37
Speaker
And this sounds kind of crazy, but almost put yourself through.
01:18:45
Speaker
You know what I mean?
01:18:47
Speaker
I think it gives me sort of ballast and context for other things that I'm reading.
01:18:53
Speaker
And it truly is for the sheer quantity that he's written and continues to write
01:19:01
Speaker
I think there's every threat that it would fall into the Agatha Christie.
01:19:04
Speaker
You know, this is a bee tree mold and his doesn't.
01:19:10
Speaker
Yeah.
01:19:11
Speaker
There's similar dark claustrophobic feelings, certainly.
01:19:15
Speaker
And I've no doubt he has some stories.
01:19:16
Speaker
So he's just written too many.
01:19:18
Speaker
He must have some that I would absolutely dislike and not finish.
01:19:21
Speaker
But you ask a fascinating question because he will never be my favorite author.
01:19:29
Speaker
I have no desire to even try to read all of his writing.
Stephen King's Writing Style and Adaptation Challenges
01:19:35
Speaker
Right.
01:19:35
Speaker
But I will, for some reason or another, undoubtedly read something he wrote at least every other year for the rest of my life.
01:19:46
Speaker
Okay, cool.
01:19:47
Speaker
He's just, he's important for a reason.
01:19:50
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, totally.
01:19:52
Speaker
Okay, this actually ties in quite well.
01:19:56
Speaker
A massive strength of his writing for which King is lauded is his tremendous attention to detail, this accuracy of his, even if they're fictional worlds, and the vibrance of these worlds that he builds.
01:20:13
Speaker
How on earth do you bring that out on the screen?
01:20:15
Speaker
You know, is there a consistent, considerable difference from other films that you watch?
01:20:23
Speaker
But maybe as far as would you see a film based on a Stephen King novel and know that that was the writer?
01:20:31
Speaker
Or maybe is some of this just only possible in writing and you lose it as it's turned into a movie?
01:20:37
Speaker
That's sort of my knee-jerk reaction to your question, is that some of it gets sort of lost.
01:20:42
Speaker
I see a lot of his stuff as more character-driven.
01:20:45
Speaker
You know, I think about movies like Carrie or Christine, which of course are named after characters.
01:20:52
Speaker
Misery, those are ones that are very much driven by characters and what happens to them more so than the world that they exist in.
01:21:00
Speaker
Uh-huh.
01:21:01
Speaker
Life of Chuck, you could make the same.
01:21:03
Speaker
Of course, of course.
01:21:04
Speaker
Some of the ones that we mentioned today don't really fit into that description that well.
01:21:10
Speaker
The Running Man is about the world.
01:21:12
Speaker
The Long Walk is about the world that the characters are in.
01:21:15
Speaker
So I don't know that I necessarily feel that there is a sort of immediately recognizable stamp of Stephen King's either, at least once it's translated to film.
01:21:25
Speaker
Uh-huh.
01:21:26
Speaker
I will say I'm not a huge fan of Stephen King stuff.
01:21:31
Speaker
I'm certainly able to appreciate a lot of it.
01:21:32
Speaker
You'll see that reflected in my
01:21:35
Speaker
ratings later too.
01:21:36
Speaker
But I would say that maybe that's one of the reasons that he's so iconic is that he is a good author.
01:21:43
Speaker
Yes.
01:21:43
Speaker
Right?
01:21:44
Speaker
Yes.
01:21:45
Speaker
And that he creates these digestible stories that appeal to the masses, but sort of goes a step beyond and is a good author rather than a film director or something like that.
01:21:59
Speaker
Right?
01:21:59
Speaker
Yep.
01:22:00
Speaker
why do you think he's so appealing to so many people and for so freaking long huh yeah um i do absolutely think the meticulous detailed accuracy of some is going to be a draw um i also think i believe shawshank redemption was one of the examples
01:22:24
Speaker
The Shining was like this.
01:22:26
Speaker
He has this grasp on magical realism.
01:22:33
Speaker
Oh, we just talked about this.
01:22:36
Speaker
Gabriel Marquez Garcia was famous for this.
01:22:41
Speaker
And I guess I would kind of say Stephen King is like the American lit version.
01:22:47
Speaker
It's so subtle.
01:22:48
Speaker
It is by no means the entire book.
01:22:50
Speaker
No one that I have read or...
01:22:52
Speaker
heard has ever accused him of being, you know, a sci-fi or fantasy novelist.
01:22:58
Speaker
Right.
01:22:59
Speaker
It's just enough that I think it touches on those daydreams and those ideas that we all have.
01:23:06
Speaker
And we kind of let them drift off into the atmosphere when we get off our bus for our commute and walk into work and move on with our day.
01:23:15
Speaker
Yeah.
01:23:16
Speaker
Where he captures them, goes home, spends two months making a full story out of them,
01:23:23
Speaker
And we can all, we can identify with, that was a simple idea.
01:23:27
Speaker
It wasn't this grandiose world building.
01:23:31
Speaker
I don't, yeah, it, it kind of, it, it's so fascinating because it's not a question that I had wondered what, what keeps me coming back to them is it's, it's a simplicity that is unattainable for most authors.
01:23:49
Speaker
Yeah.
01:23:50
Speaker
At no point in a Stephen King novel are you like, this is too ridiculous, and you throw the book on the floor, right?
01:23:58
Speaker
Okay, sure.
01:24:00
Speaker
But it is.
01:24:00
Speaker
Obviously, all of them are, for the most part, for some reason throughout the book, absolutely ridiculous, literally impossible.
01:24:09
Speaker
Right.
01:24:10
Speaker
No, there is not a clapping monkey toy somewhere in the world right now that every time it decides to fire up, someone falls through the ice in a lake and dies.
01:24:19
Speaker
Yep.
01:24:20
Speaker
Every other part of the book was so precise, so accurate, so vividly described that for that moment, he epitomizes suspension of disbelief.
01:24:34
Speaker
You don't stop and wonder, is this possible?
01:24:36
Speaker
You go, is this?
01:24:38
Speaker
Is this?
01:24:39
Speaker
Is this real?
01:24:41
Speaker
It's fascinating.
01:24:44
Speaker
Cool.
01:24:44
Speaker
Cool.
01:24:45
Speaker
Yeah, I would say kind of along the same lines.
01:24:47
Speaker
I think these are super accessible and digestible stories that are often rooted in experiences that everybody has.
01:24:56
Speaker
Christine and Carrie are both about kids that were bullied in high school.
01:24:59
Speaker
Yep.
01:25:00
Speaker
The monkey is about a couple orphans, right?
01:25:04
Speaker
Yeah.
01:25:04
Speaker
Most of the parents.
01:25:06
Speaker
Haunted hotel, supernatural encounters, even that kind of stuff is very...
01:25:11
Speaker
It's just accessible.
01:25:12
Speaker
It's not, it's not about, like you said, it's not about trolls and hobbits and whatever dragons or whatever is in those movies.
01:25:19
Speaker
No, it's just close enough.
01:25:23
Speaker
And to the same degree, it's just, it's almost so regular.
01:25:29
Speaker
That's why I've, I've never finished a book by Stephen King and thought, I can't wait to start another one.
01:25:37
Speaker
I mean, the shining was tremendous writing.
01:25:40
Speaker
Yeah.
01:25:41
Speaker
11-22-63 Spectacular
01:25:44
Speaker
I did not finish either of those books and think, man, what Stephen King am I going to read next?
01:25:50
Speaker
I thought, I'm not going to read anything by this guy for 18 months at minimum.
01:25:55
Speaker
You know?
01:25:56
Speaker
Yeah.
01:25:57
Speaker
I know.
01:25:58
Speaker
You did text me and say, the long walk came into my Libby.
01:26:01
Speaker
Should I read it before we record?
01:26:03
Speaker
And I was like, that's up to you.
01:26:05
Speaker
Do you want to read a fourth Stephen King book?
01:26:08
Speaker
I would have been hitting my head against the wall.
01:26:10
Speaker
I looked at it.
01:26:11
Speaker
I went to download from Libby and I thought, I'm just...
01:26:15
Speaker
It would have really depressed you too.
01:26:17
Speaker
That one's not.
01:26:18
Speaker
Yep.
01:26:18
Speaker
I don't necessarily think of you when I think of the long walk.
01:26:23
Speaker
Okay.
01:26:23
Speaker
We've got a lot of things to rate.
01:26:25
Speaker
Let's, let's dive in here.
01:26:26
Speaker
Yeah.
01:26:27
Speaker
All right.
01:26:28
Speaker
Kick us off the monkey.
01:26:30
Speaker
Yes.
01:26:30
Speaker
The monkey first up, I give this a three, three out of five.
01:26:34
Speaker
It was solid.
01:26:34
Speaker
Reminds me of those short ghost stories that you would read in class the week before Halloween.
01:26:40
Speaker
Sure.
01:26:41
Speaker
Yeah.
01:26:41
Speaker
Except a lot darker.
01:26:43
Speaker
Right.
01:26:43
Speaker
Yeah.
01:26:44
Speaker
Yeah.
01:26:45
Speaker
would not recommend anyone seek this individually necessarily.
01:26:51
Speaker
It's just kind of a bear to get a hold of.
01:26:54
Speaker
Sure.
01:26:54
Speaker
But if this is the sort of genre that you're into, you like his other writing, get one of these giant compendiums, have Skeleton Crew on your shelf, and once a month pull it down and read one of them.
01:27:06
Speaker
Yeah, that's fun.
01:27:07
Speaker
Yeah.
01:27:08
Speaker
OK.
01:27:09
Speaker
I'm in a fairly similar boat.
01:27:12
Speaker
I gave it 2 and 1 half stars.
01:27:13
Speaker
Like I said, qualifier for all these.
01:27:15
Speaker
I'm not the biggest Stephen King fan in the world, so these are maybe lower than other cinephiles would rate them.
01:27:21
Speaker
I felt like the themes in The Monkey weren't explored deeply enough because they spent so much time on that sort of humor and borderline excessive violence that could come from this being based on a short story rather than a full novel.
01:27:36
Speaker
But if you can't flesh out the ideas well enough, don't make a full length movie.
01:27:39
Speaker
It's sort of a theme that I return
Recommendations and Genre Considerations
01:27:42
Speaker
to often.
01:27:42
Speaker
I think it would have made a more effective short film, which of course means that fewer people would have seen it and it wouldn't have made any money or anything.
01:27:49
Speaker
It would have been more of a risk.
01:27:51
Speaker
But I don't know.
01:27:53
Speaker
For the sake of art, you know, it's not a bad path.
01:27:57
Speaker
No, I can see that entirely.
01:27:59
Speaker
Yeah.
01:28:01
Speaker
Running Man.
01:28:02
Speaker
Yep.
01:28:03
Speaker
I said three, but.
01:28:07
Speaker
I'd be hard pressed to say who I would recommend it to.
01:28:11
Speaker
Not in the sense that it's a bad book in and of itself, but when people ask me for book recommendations, because I have lots of friends that are in book clubs, that we swap books, everything, I think about what genre do they enjoy.
01:28:23
Speaker
And I really had a, I have a tough time saying what genre I think this book is.
01:28:28
Speaker
Yeah.
01:28:29
Speaker
Yeah, I can see that.
01:28:30
Speaker
There are more to the point, it's not bad, but there are other, other
01:28:36
Speaker
books that I would recommend over it.
01:28:38
Speaker
I think if you are into the cynical, kind of glass half empty view of modernity, if you thought 1984 and Fahrenheit 451 were the best books ever, it's certainly an exciting version of that realm.
01:28:57
Speaker
I just personally don't know a lot of people that are sitting around reading those for fun.
01:29:01
Speaker
Again, maybe once a year you want that reality check and this would be a good option.
01:29:06
Speaker
Solid three did not in any way consider higher.
01:29:10
Speaker
Didn't really consider lower.
01:29:12
Speaker
Okay.
01:29:12
Speaker
I gave it three stars as well.
01:29:13
Speaker
Okay.
01:29:14
Speaker
It's definitely fun, but like I said, there's just a lot of self-confliction in this movie.
01:29:19
Speaker
I think it is trying really hard to be a modern blockbuster, which means it wants to appeal to men and women and liberals and conservatives and wealthy people and poor people.
01:29:29
Speaker
And you kind of can't say anything, especially in a story that is so politically charged as this one.
01:29:34
Speaker
You can't say anything if you're trying to please everybody.
01:29:37
Speaker
So this movie...
01:29:39
Speaker
I thought just was pretty flat and shouldn't have been.
01:29:47
Speaker
And there's a lot of, it's still kind of fun, but I don't know, really devoid of what could have made it special.
01:29:54
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's too bad.
01:29:57
Speaker
I fully anticipated of the three that we both consumed this to be the best movie for sure.
01:30:05
Speaker
I was looking forward to it all year, too.
01:30:07
Speaker
So the disappointment factor really weighs on this one.
01:30:09
Speaker
Yep.
01:30:10
Speaker
Yep.
01:30:10
Speaker
That's too bad.
01:30:11
Speaker
Last one.
01:30:11
Speaker
Life of Chuck.
01:30:12
Speaker
I gave this a four out of five.
01:30:14
Speaker
That may not even be correct.
01:30:16
Speaker
I may return and reread this.
01:30:17
Speaker
It could even be higher.
01:30:19
Speaker
Wow.
01:30:19
Speaker
Really like it.
01:30:20
Speaker
Loved the fresh, modern feeling.
01:30:23
Speaker
I think that's another thing that he has pulled off spectacularly.
01:30:28
Speaker
I was going to say good at.
01:30:29
Speaker
I couldn't name another example.
01:30:30
Speaker
So one, oh, a sample size of one is not enough to say that's a consistent trait of his.
01:30:37
Speaker
But it was just refreshing and surprising.
01:30:40
Speaker
There was such a wide open avenue where this could immediately have become corny or...
01:30:49
Speaker
you know, so unrealistic.
01:30:51
Speaker
It's, it's just frivolous.
01:30:53
Speaker
And he pulled it off.
01:30:56
Speaker
You feel good when you finish reading it, but not just a candy feel good beach read because it isn't, um, cause you don't question anything.
01:31:07
Speaker
You feel good while still committing some useful and appropriate reflection.
01:31:15
Speaker
Yeah.
01:31:16
Speaker
Okay.
01:31:17
Speaker
Interesting to hear you say all of that because I have basically the inverse review of the movie.
01:31:24
Speaker
Right now I have it at two stars, could go down.
01:31:26
Speaker
Wow.
01:31:27
Speaker
I think it is sickly sweet.
01:31:29
Speaker
This movie is like too much for me.
01:31:32
Speaker
I think its themes are poorly executed.
01:31:34
Speaker
And I think it's only a feel-good story and a life-affirming story because the beginning makes you feel like such absolute dog shit.
01:31:41
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:31:41
Speaker
And I'm not going to spoil that because if it's effective for some people, then great.
01:31:46
Speaker
And I'm jealous of you.
01:31:47
Speaker
Yeah.
01:31:49
Speaker
I felt so miserable watching the beginning of the movie.
01:31:53
Speaker
And then also, I thought it was just like a poorly made movie.
01:31:55
Speaker
It looks like a streaming movie or a TV movie.
01:31:58
Speaker
And Mark Hamill cannot act.
01:32:00
Speaker
Wow.
01:32:01
Speaker
He's a pretty pivotal character.
01:32:03
Speaker
So I really, really hated this movie.
01:32:06
Speaker
Okay.
01:32:07
Speaker
No, that's good to know.
01:32:09
Speaker
Yeah.
01:32:09
Speaker
And then lastly, I gave a rating to The Long Walk.
01:32:13
Speaker
I gave it three and a half stars.
01:32:14
Speaker
So the highest of the four here.
01:32:16
Speaker
Pretty harrowing story, but very much in the vein of things we've seen.
01:32:19
Speaker
Hunger Games, Squid Game, Maze Runner.
01:32:22
Speaker
And changing the ending doesn't sit well with me.
01:32:25
Speaker
And again, I just don't know.
01:32:27
Speaker
I can't know if that's because of what happened when the movie came out or what.
01:32:33
Speaker
And that's not to say, I don't mean for any of that to indicate how I feel about what happened either, but you just can't
01:32:39
Speaker
read this text without that umbrella hanging over.
01:32:42
Speaker
Yep.
01:32:44
Speaker
Do you have any recommendations?
01:32:46
Speaker
Uh, yes.
01:32:47
Speaker
I didn't write it down because I was hoping some more eloquent and miraculous recommendation would pop into my head.
01:32:56
Speaker
These are just so wildly different.
01:33:01
Speaker
Even amongst the rest of his catalog.
01:33:05
Speaker
Yeah, I really
01:33:08
Speaker
Both short stories, if you enjoy that form.
01:33:10
Speaker
And honestly, based on his preface, I think I personally need to lean into seeking those more than just your standard novels.
01:33:20
Speaker
If you like a, again, I don't know what I'd call it, horror, suspense, dystopian novel, I don't know that Running Man is the one I would point you to.
01:33:30
Speaker
So it's a strange situation, but if I were discussing this with anyone and recommendations were to come up,
01:33:39
Speaker
I don't think any of these would be the first author or book I would point at, which is so confusing because I did enjoy reading all three.
01:33:47
Speaker
Yeah.
01:33:48
Speaker
Interesting.
01:33:49
Speaker
I don't know.
01:33:49
Speaker
Yeah.
01:33:49
Speaker
Tough spot.
01:33:50
Speaker
What are your thoughts on the film side?
01:33:53
Speaker
This is too strange a crop of stories to put any one blanket recommendation over, partly because not only are they all different stories, but each story has its own diversion from traditional Stephen King.
01:34:05
Speaker
Yep.
01:34:06
Speaker
too.
01:34:06
Speaker
So I basically just said, if you like horror, watch The Monkey or try The Monkey.
01:34:11
Speaker
If you like feel good stuff, give Life of Chuck a try.
01:34:14
Speaker
If you like the dystopian thrillers, give The Long Walk and Running Man a try.
01:34:18
Speaker
But the most important thing here, I think, is the Stephen King of it all.
01:34:23
Speaker
He's such a big figure in pop culture that I think
01:34:27
Speaker
you probably know whether you like Stephen King stuff or not.
01:34:30
Speaker
And that's the most important piece when you're trying to decide whether or not to consume these stories.
01:34:35
Speaker
Yes.
01:34:36
Speaker
Yes.
01:34:37
Speaker
What is your relationship with Stephen King stuff?
01:34:39
Speaker
So if you like him, then read this stuff.