CreatureX

The upcoming "The Road Virus Heads North" is one of my favorite SK short stories. A great scary story filled with impending doom. I hope it translates well to television.

Charlie Goose

Yes lord, that Virus picture should be extra creepy. If this was made 25 years ago, Anthony James would be a natural for it.

Geofferson

I watched The End of the Whole Mess last night and thought it was rather decent. The reviews thus far have lowered my expactions for this show a bit, so that may have been a factor.

Jeraden

Going back to last weeks still, someone said they butched Crouch End and it didn't follow the actually story in the book close enough. I didn't really think it was all that bad, at least not horrible. What happened differently in the original story?

Drop

"The Road Virus Heads North", huh?

I've seen a short film version of it, that my film teacher worked on. It was actually pretty good considering it was basically a student film, it looked professional actually. They did that pay-King-a-dollar-to-adapt-a-story-of his-thing he let's film students do. The picture they used was really creepy, as was the film.

I've never read the orginal story, so it'll be interesting to see what'll be different. My teacher's film was much shorter than an hour.

iggystar

Can someone help with The End of the Whole Mess? Even the Bloody Disgusting site is vague. What's the synopsis?

das Monkey

Quick synopsis: Ron Livingston is a documentary filmmaker, filming his last confession in a secluded cabin before dying. He tells the story in flashback of his genius brother, who discovered some voodoo water that eliminated war but caused people to lose their minds. Before the madness can take them over, he kills his brother and, after telling the story to the camera, he then kills himself. It's a 5-minute tale dragged out for 60 minutes.

I have pretty much the same opinion of both episodes. Macy was awesome, and the first part was really cool and fun, but once the story got completely underway it was boring and too long. Same with Livingston. He was great and carried the episode, but the Bobby character wasn't that great, and the entire story was obvious 5 minutes into it. Great performances, somewhat cool concepts, but meandering and too damn long.

das

Chad

Finally got around to catching some episodes...great stuff so far.


BTW, shouldn't this be in the "DVD Stalk: Horror Talk" forum? Yes, because it's horror-related.

lotsofdvds

It did not.

And Tom Berenger, who I usually like, gave one of the worst acting performances that I've seen in the last 10-20 years.

dadaluholla

I thought I would give this another chance last night, since I hadn't watched after the horrible experience of Crotch End. Honestly I wish I hadn't because Road Virus was possibly worse than that. What a terrible, sad waste of time and money this series is.

MEJHarrison

I need to quit reading this thread. I was looking forward to seeing all the episodes I've got on my Tivo, but this thread is really killing my interest.

Jason Bovberg

Interesting polar-opposite opinion compared with the Bloody-Disgusting review:

"Berenger is tremendous in his role as a famous writer who goes mad watching a painting he purchased change right in front of him."

I haven't watched last night's episodes yet, but I haven't been wowed by any of them yet (although Battleground was pretty good):

Battleground: B (best so far, but the no-dialog gimmick distracts)
End of the Whole Mess: C+ (Fun structure, obvious plot)
Umney's Last Case: D (Starts okay, ends a total botch job, awful casting)
Crouch End: D- (Absolutely terrible, but Forlani is still yummy)

das Monkey

I didn't think Berenger was particularly bad, but he was definitely phoning it in.

I kind of liked "The Fifth Quarter", probably because it was just a simple story with a logical narrative and not another lame horror gimmick we've seen a hundred times. Sisto and Mathis were pretty good. It wasn't great, but it was a good change of pace after all these others.

das

twikoff

Ive only had a chance to watch the first 4 so far.. planning to watch 5 & 6 later today..

but i really liked the author & mickey spillane's mike hammer type story.. i wanted more

Filmmaker

Wrong, though this story deals, obviously, with 'Salem's Lot, as well. The story he was referencing, though, was "One for the Road", also found in NIGHT SHIFT.

Jason Bovberg

So what are everyone's final thoughts on this show? Overall, I think the show was a failure. Most of these were pretty weak, and they continued the long-standing King tradition of the unsatisfying payoff. Here are my own little capsule reviews, in order of preference...

1. Battleground: B+ (best episode, but the no-dialog gimmick distracts)
2. The Fifth Quarter: B- (Nice setup, weird payoff)
3. End of the Whole Mess: C+ (Fun structure, obvious plot)
4. The Road Virus: C (The painting is all wrong, Berenger not at his best, but parts of this are okay)
5. You Know They Got a Hell of a Band: C- (Weak idea, weak execution)
6. Umney's Last Case: D (Starts okay, ends a total botch job, awful casting)
7. Autopsy Room Four: D (Terrible casting makes this idea even sillier than it seems)
8. Crouch End: D- (Absolutely awful, but Forlani is still yummy)

das Monkey

Agreed. And predictable. Most King TV projects suck, and with the exception of The Closer and saving B5, TNT's track record is pretty terrible. They know NBA, they know syndication, they have Kyra Sedgwick's phone number; but drama's just a friend of a friend of a passing acquaintance.

I love their false advertizing, though. Some reviewers write, "the brilliant Stephen King is wasted on this terrible series" or "there is nothing original about this steaming pile of shit", and the ads proclaim: "BRILLIANT!" "ORIGINAL!"

das

mrglass

I thought it was pretty entertaining, so I'd be inclined to give Battleground an A. Everything else was average at best which is probably being too kind. Well, except for Crouch End...that stinker rates a solid Z- in my opinion.

Jay G.

Is TNT going to re-run the series any time soon?

LordofWar

Great little series but the last one was god awful. I thought the autopsy room one was kind of funny.

DeputyDave

Wow, as a huge Stephen King fan (writing NOT movies) I was hopping for something good. But just like 99% of King's horror fiction it fell flat when translated to film.
I think this series may have suffered from the opposite of the usual King movie woes. Usually the screenwriter/director is faced with cutting down huge works of fiction in order to show it on screen. This time they took very short and effectively simple stories and tried to milk them into one hour. I think most of these stories would have worked better if made into half hour shows.

Draven

I haven't plowed through the rest of them yet and my Tivo dropped Crouch End and Umney's, but we've seen Battleground, The End of the Whole Mess and The Road Virus Heads North.

I thought Battleground was outstanding - really great adaptation.
The End of the Whole Mess was done really well too, I thought. I've always liked that story, and it was updated for current times very tastefully. I thought they handled the whole thing very well.
Road Virus played out like a Tales from the Crypt episode. Could have used more killing (and I don't remember that story at ALL. Gotta go back and read the book again.)

We'll see how the rest of them go.

MEJHarrison

I forgot to tell my Tivo to keep them all, so it started deleting them when I got 5 saved up. So I only have the last 5. I almost deleted them yesterday but stopped myself. I'll probably keep them for another month or two and just delete them then.

Jason Bovberg

Wow, that's a pretty smart TiVo you've got there!

Geofferson

Battleground was definitely the strongest. I actually enjoyed Autopsy Room Four in last week's installment. The rest were all unimpressive, IMO.