Tag: stephen king

IT’s better than you remember

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The last few months I’ve been reading about how the new movie based on the Stephen King novel IT is finally going to do the story justice on the big screen. It’ll be the film that sets right what was done wrong in the 1990 made-for-tv movie IT. These articles talk about how bad that TV version was and how it was unwatchable in its day.

The kids of IT
The kids of IT

Either the people writing about how the 1990 IT stinks weren’t around back then or don’t have good memories, but as someone who remembers I’m here to tell you that good sci-fi and horror series were the exception rather than the rule back then and the TV version of IT was one of the good things on TV.

Back then there were a few sci-fi/horror series on like Twin Peaks, Quantum Leap and The Flash with other syndicated shows like Star Trek: The Next Generation and Swamp Thing as well. But non-sci-fi/horror TV series then ruled the day with shows like Murder, She Wrote, Matlock and In the Heat of the Night which were all top-rated series in the early 1990s.

But really there wasn’t too much good stuff on TV in 1990. Shows like The X-Files, Babylon 5 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer were all still in the future in 1990 so, when the IT TV movie was announced I was beyond excited.

The adults of IT
The adults of IT

In 1990, Stephen King was the one author who’s books kids at my school actually chose to read without having to. He was, and still is, a prolific writer who had a huge body of work that seemingly all of which was slowly being turned into movies. Some were good like Stand by Me and Carrie and some of which was not so good. But since there was a lot less to choose from then, genera fans like myself would devour the good stuff right alongside the not-so-good stuff. I think that’s why I was so excited about IT. To a certain extent, it didn’t matter if IT was any good or not. Fans like myself were going to watch it no matter what. I think what mattered was the “king of horror” was going to have one of his stories turned into something that was going to be shown on TV — in prime time — and on a major network.

Back then if you weren’t going to record something like IT to VHS then you had to watch each episode when it aired. And because IT aired over two nights meant you had to come back the next night to finish the story. Which a lot of people did — IT was a success for ABC when it aired with nearly 30 million people tuning in to watch.

Why do people dislike the 1990 IT today? My guess would be that by today’s standards the movie looks pretty crude. It stars a group of actors mostly known for TV work and has some special effects that are more “man in a rubber suit” funny than terrifying. Which is all true, if you look at the movie with 2017 eyes.

Tim Curry as Pennywise
Tim Curry as Pennywise

With my 1990 eyes I saw the movie in a whole other light. There was nothing like it on TV — it felt a bit like the kids from Stand by Me who were fighting a kid-killing alien from space which was not something that ever showed up on Murder She Wrote. And it had some truly scary moments, abet the end of the miniseries when you get to see the creature in all its glory probably isn’t one of them.

But still, there’s Tim Curry as the title character in its human form that was so good in the miniseries I think he turned a generation of kids off clowns for all time. Curry in his Pennywise guise is the most effective villains in any Stephen King adapted work, and that’s saying a lot.

Now comes a 2017 IT for a new generation, this one out September 8. This new IT might be the bestest, scariest, goodest Stephen King movie ever made, but I can only imagine sometime in 2044 there’ll be a whole new generation of fans talking about how bad it was.

Stephen King’s World of Horror

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The author Stephen King has had an amazing career. Over the last 40+ years he’s published more than 50 novels and has just as many films adapted from his works. Which, to me at least, would make King the most influential living writer of our time. And, recently too, a few of King’s work has been turned into TV series with the likes of Mr. Mercedes and The Mist this year and shows like Castle Rock due out in the future.

The Dark Tower
The Dark Tower

So, if King’s writing output has remained essentially steady the last few decades — he produces around a book a year, sometimes more — and movies based on his works come out every few years why does 2017 feel different? Why does 2017 feel like it’s the year of Stephen King?

I think it’s because while King’s had a lot of his works turned into movies since the late 1970s, 2017 seems like it’s the first time those movies are top of the line, big-budget films meant for everyday filmgoers rather than those who’d go see a Stephen King horror movie no matter what. It kind’a feels like when comic book movies made the jump from movies only fans of comic books would see to movies anyone would see that appealed to a wide range of people.

The kids of It
The kids of It

Out in theaters this summer is the first film of The Dark Tower saga August 4. This movie that’s based on a series of eight books takes place in a weird realm where old-west style gunslingers do battle with wizards more at home in something like The Lord of the Rings than The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Starring Matthew McConaughey and Idris Elba, if this first film is successful The Dark Tower will be to Sony what Harry Potter was to Warner Brothers — a long-running film series that will be the basis for all sorts of ancillary moneymaking things from Halloween costumes to theme park rides.

Then, a little more than a month after the release of The Dark Tower on September 8 comes It that’s the first movie of two based on the 1986 novel of the same name. Already made as a movie-of-the-week back in 1990, this new It is based on the first part of the book where a group of kids, the film takes place in the mid–1980s, must do battle with an evil presence living under their town that kills children. The It sequel due at some point in the future would deal with the kids as adults present day who must go back to their town and finish the job when the killings start again.

That clown
That clown

If The Dark Tower and It are successful I can only imagine that there’ll be a rush to turn all sorts of King works into movies since he’s got such a back-catalog of classics. And I’d also assume that much like with Marvel and DC other authors in the same vein as King will start getting their works turned into big-budget films as well. But there’s always a chance these two King movies could flop meaning that his movies would one again be relegated to low-budget flicks at best, direct to streaming at worst.

What I find most interesting here is that the The Dark Tower and It movies couldn’t be more different to one and other. One’s a fantasy flick with six-shooters and the other a horror movie with a monster so scary I think there’s an argument to be made that the titular “It” which in its human form looks like a clown scared a generation of kids so badly that they now have a phobia of them. The idea that these two separate works are both being released into theaters around the same time and both movies have a great chance at starting multi-billion dollar film franchises, means that the works of Stephen King might just about to be elevated from simple genera movies that a generation ago were more at home on VHS than movie theaters, to something more. Something more along the lines of serious films — scary clowns and all.