antidisestablishmentarianism: Also, besides those wonderful boobies the only way you can improve on the TV mini-series is with an R rated film and modern special effects. The ABC mini-series was a very good interpretation of the book.

It was a pretty good adaptation of it. I still think it could be done amazingly well if it was made into an HBO mini-series. I don't have high hopes for a feature length movie, though. Or even a pair of movies.

Ditto with It. As perfect as Tim Curry was, the rest of the cast and production looks incredibly dated and lacking.

antidisestablishmentarianism: The ABC mini-series was a very good interpretation of the book.



The casting decisions were terrible. Randall Flagg was the opposite of a menacingly charismatic leader, even moreso when they glued on the "demon" make-up. The acting performances rivaled "The Room". Who would have thought Rob Lowe could act so poorly without saying a word? The production values were outright laughable. 99% of the US is dead, but the only sense you have of it is the characters saying it.

In other words, it was as good as King's "It" mini-series.

Been done, Ben.

Just let it go.

Mugato: All I remember from that mini-series as a youth is

[intimatecelebs.com image 608x609]

Is that the chick from Just Shoot Me?

Do Swan Song instead, Ben. It's a better book and would make a better movie.

RedPhoenix122: Summoner101: Is that the chick from Just Shoot Me?

IMDB concurs.

If you look at some sweater shots of her from that show, you can see that each breast is actually as large or larger than her head.

probably because the ending farking sucks

//not to mention the rest of the tome

The marvel 30 issue adaptation wrapped up and it got boring after the first two arcs (which i enjoyed)

it would be hard for me to get excited for anything stand related after having read those books over the course of a three year period

I admit I'm mostly a noob about Stephen King's books. I only ever read one, Bag of Bones. My understanding is that he's like the George Lucas of literature, always going back and revising his work after the fact, and that The Stand is no exception.

wasn't there talk of adapting The Gunslinger into a movie? I remember reading that book and totally loving it. But of course I expected so much after reading Misery and yes while Kathy Bates made me cringe I think they could have done it even better had they included the lawnmower death, so even if they adapted it to a screenplay, pretty sure they will screw something up.

The Stand would have been better with zombies.


Best advice for Ben is to flip to the center of the book, tear it in half and throw away the part with the back cover.

I loved The Stand when I read it years ago, but wonder how I'd feel rereading it now. Affleck's on a roll right now; I'd hate for this to be his stumbling block. I can't imagine doing it in only one film though.

B.L.Z. Bub: I admit I'm mostly a noob about Stephen King's books. I only ever read one, Bag of Bones. My understanding is that he's like the George Lucas of literature, always going back and revising his work after the fact, and that The Stand is no exception.

Not really. ASFAIK the only book he's gone back and re-released with changes is The Stand, and the only change he made was to put back in about 300 pages that the publisher cut out. 300 really great pages that really sell the premise of the book: the world has come to an end.

B.L.Z. Bub: I admit I'm mostly a noob about Stephen King's books. I only ever read one, Bag of Bones. My understanding is that he's like the George Lucas of literature, always going back and revising his work after the fact, and that The Stand is no exception.

No. He has recently tried to tie all his works into a single universe using a fantasy series (the Dark Tower) he started and abandoned back in the early 90s, but beyond that he hasn't started changing his work to fit some evolving worldview.

As already pointed out, the Stand as written was considered "too long" to be published and was edited. After it was a huge hit, the publisher went back to the well by releasing the "unedited" edition with King's approval. I've only read the unedited version; it's fine and probably a better read than the shortened version.

I am a little worried about King at the moment as he's working on a project he's threatened for 25 years called "Dr Sleep" which will be a sequel of sorts to The Shining in that an adult Danny is the central character. It could either be very good, or very bad.

An awful actor trying to sell an awful book as an awful movie? I can't see how this would fail.

Dwight_Yeast: B.L.Z. Bub: I admit I'm mostly a noob about Stephen King's books. I only ever read one, Bag of Bones. My understanding is that he's like the George Lucas of literature, always going back and revising his work after the fact, and that The Stand is no exception.

No. He has recently tried to tie all his works into a single universe using a fantasy series (the Dark Tower) he started and abandoned back in the early 90s, but beyond that he hasn't started changing his work to fit some evolving worldview.

As already pointed out, the Stand as written was considered "too long" to be published and was edited. After it was a huge hit, the publisher went back to the well by releasing the "unedited" edition with King's approval. I've only read the unedited version; it's fine and probably a better read than the shortened version.

I am a little worried about King at the moment as he's working on a project he's threatened for 25 years called "Dr Sleep" which will be a sequel of sorts to The Shining in that an adult Danny is the central character. It could either be very good, or very bad.

naysayer says nay. the edited version was better 'cause it throws you right into the start action of running into gas pumps with the peckerwoods without all the really unnecessary back story. years later when the unedited version came out it seemed like an snl skit....one decent joke beat to death for 15 minutes at a time. in short, King needs a good editor to slap him back some. that no longer happens though 'cause of who he is.

The reason you're having a hard time is that the book is too damned long for a movie.

Just go turn another Philip K. Dick short into a movie. You've done it before to meh results.

You can't do C.M. Kornbluth's The Marching Morons because Mike Judge did Idiocracy, but there's plenty of shorts out there to work with.

skepticultist: B.L.Z. Bub: I admit I'm mostly a noob about Stephen King's books. I only ever read one, Bag of Bones. My understanding is that he's like the George Lucas of literature, always going back and revising his work after the fact, and that The Stand is no exception.

Not really. ASFAIK the only book he's gone back and re-released with changes is The Stand, and the only change he made was to put back in about 300 pages that the publisher cut out. 300 really great pages that really sell the premise of the book: the world has come to an end.

I believe he's withdrawn Rage from print, after concerns of copycats. No word on Running Man, perhaps he's negotiating with tv execs to get it on.

Confabulat: He's only now coming out with a sequel to The Shining, and he almost never does sequels except for the Dark Tower and Black House.

All of his (non-Tower) books are kind of sequels, in that they're all set in the same Mythic Maine. But yeah, I can't really think of any that feature the same protagonist.

Confabulat: almost never does sequels

A planned sequel to "Salem's Lot" became a sub-plot in Dark Tower 5. "Salem's Lot" itself formed the center of a trilogy of sorts, book-ended by the short stories "Jerusalem's Lot" and "One For The Road". All the Castle Rock stories kinda bled in to each other. "Dolores Claiborne" & "Gerald's Game" were companion stories, as were "Desperation" and "The Regulators".

I really liked The Stand mini-series. I thought the cast was just fine.

I don't understand the Hollywood producer mentality that keeps them going after King's books. "Let's take an incredibly long book with about 19 subplots and try to distill it down to a 110-minute movie! Yeah! That'll totally work!" They have two options: Take out all the subplots, which means they're telling a pretty standard post-apocalypse story (The Stand is not remarkably different from any other end-of-the-world novel) OR try to shoehorn in every single subplot in under two hours and thereby reduce them all to caricatures (here's the deaf guy, here's the retard, here's the Lord Humungous...I mean, here's the Devil).

Give it up. The Stand cannot be a movie. It cannot be a miniseries on basic cable. You MIGHT pull it off on HBO or Showtime if you had the budget. But it won't ever be a film. Not even a Peter Jackson-style LOTR epic release. Sorry.

Omahawg: naysayer says nay. the edited version was better 'cause it throws you right into the start action of running into gas pumps with the peckerwoods without all the really unnecessary back story. years later when the unedited version came out it seemed like an snl skit....one decent joke beat to death for 15 minutes at a time. in short, King needs a good editor to slap him back some. that no longer happens though 'cause of who he is.

See, I like the long build-up to the inevitable decimation of humanity; I've always liked the early parts of King's books as he's so good at shaping characters who seem not just human but like average people you know.

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

/The Eyes of the Dragon could be cool too.

zobear: The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

They're working on that.

MurphyMurphy: And the Hobbit is going to be 3 movies.

It's also pulling from the LOTR appendices; fleshing out what Gandalf was doing for all those periods when he left Bilbo & the dwarves on their own. (mainly, the forming of the White Council, ousting the Necromancer from Dol Guldur, revealing him to be Sauron)

Summoner101: Mugato: All I remember from that mini-series as a youth is

[intimatecelebs.com image 608x609]

Is that the chick from Just Shoot Me?

Cinder-farkin-rella.

I read my first King book when I was twelve. It was Firestarter. I've since read everything he's written and I'm a fan without a doubt. He definitely had a spell of not-so-great novels, but he seems to have hit his stride again starting with Duma Key.

I'd probably buy Ikea furniture assembly instructions if he penned them.

What's my point? I forget. Tito vodak is really good. You should all try it. It's better than most of the higher-end vodaks.

I had awesome makeup sex today. My dog won't stop licking her ass. Those two statements are TOTALLY unrelated.

Angry Buddha: I read my first King book when I was twelve. It was Firestarter.

Are you me?

Mugato: RedPhoenix122: Rubber Biscuit: RedPhoenix122: Summoner101: Is that the chick from Just Shoot Me?

IMDB concurs.

If you look at some sweater shots of her from that show, you can see that each breast is actually as large or larger than her head.

Hmm...I'm gonna need to see more evidence. Not that I don't believe you or anything.

She's annoyingly modest but

[www.howmuchdotheyweigh.com image 290x367]



"What are those? D-cups?"

/chicken-pot, chicken-pot, chicken-pot pieeeeeee