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RandolphCarter posted:The ending of Revival has stuck with me more clearly than any other King ending. Same, it came completely out of the left field. Very strong book from start to finish.
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May 7, 2023 22:05
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I really liked Revival too, esp the ending, though it did drag for me a bit whenever we were with the main character in the modern day as a lame rear end boomer music guy with like...a young lady (i forget their relationship) who King just writes terribly in a typical way
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May 8, 2023 20:08
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Punkin Spunkin posted:I really liked Revival too, esp the ending, though it did drag for me a bit whenever we were with the main character in the modern day as a lame rear end boomer music guy with like...a young lady (i forget their relationship) who King just writes terribly in a typical way Yeah I think the main character was a little bit of a drag, and didn't quite work for me as a protagonist. The other thing that felt out of place were the time skips layered into the structure of the narrative. Felt more like an editorial decision rather than something that strengthened the story overall but ymmv. That said Revival was pretty good, probably above average as far as late era King joints and could fit comfortably into the peak era King ouerve on vibes and nihilism alone.
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May 8, 2023 22:30
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nate fisher posted:If you want to see a mother of 2 kids who has no idea what Pet Sematary is about, react to the movie this is the video for you. Honestly this a great reaction. ruddiger posted:I look forward to the day that guy is watching movies by himself because he's completely destroyed any trust his wife had in him. TBH, the more interesting bit is watching Mr. sit there wide-eyed instantly realizing that they have hosed up and not knowing how to pull the filming back on course to something people would want to watch, trying to prod her now and then into "thoughts?" to be met with hurt "gently caress off" vibes. One of the most uncomfortable reactions I've seen on both sides, it's amazing.
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May 16, 2023 17:48
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I thought at one point that there was text on the screen explaining that he tried several times to remove the movie from the rotation but it got selected on patreon or whatever. Like if i was getting paid 7000 / month to watch movies and they wanted me to watch Antichrist i'd probably just watch it and deal with being uncomfortable.
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May 25, 2023 01:16
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Oh God I've been enjoying Nightmares and Dreamscapes and finally got to the infamous "Dedication". So bad. Why would you ever. Oh my god dude. How much coke?!?! Was he clean in 1988? Was he just high as gently caress thinking about getting cumjacked by a black cleaning lady? Lock him up lock him up
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May 28, 2023 19:05
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Do not actually lock Stephen King up
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May 28, 2023 19:56
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lmao
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May 28, 2023 19:59
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I read through N&D a bunch between middle school and college, and I have no memory at all of that one.
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May 28, 2023 20:57
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Punkin Spunkin posted:Oh God I've been enjoying Nightmares and Dreamscapes and finally got to the infamous "Dedication". So bad. Why would you ever. Oh my god dude. How much coke?!?! Was he clean in 1988? Was he just high as gently caress thinking about getting cumjacked by a black cleaning lady? Seriously? Oh. Em. Gee. I am super-duper discombobulated that the dude who wrote the child orgy in IT also wrote that. Shocked am I at this discovery.
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May 29, 2023 00:57
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"Man, this Stephen King story has one of those super cringey moments that Stephen King is extremely known for writing, and he also wrote a black character with an extremely cringey way of speaking which is also something he is extremely known for."
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May 29, 2023 02:17
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I never said any of this was obscure or unexpected? Just didn't know I'd be reading it in this collection.  I was talking about how I'd already heard the horror stories about it. Talk about knee-jerk reactions. It's just a funnily goofy bad gross story.
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May 29, 2023 02:27
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I finally watched the newer Firestarter. Bleah, what a soggy muddled mess. Totally butchered the story from one of the best plotted thrillers ever IMO. As mediocre as the Drew Barrymore/George C. Scott version was, this managed to be a billion times worse, and the ending makes zero sense. The whole way the story plays out once Charlie and Andy are captured at the Shop compound is the heart of what makes the book so great, and this film has none of that. So disappointed because now that the technology exists to do real justice with special effects to some of my favorite old stories like Firestarter, or Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light, I would love to see a decent film version of these, but instead we get garbage like this. I was so excited to see there was a modern version being done, and so let down.
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May 30, 2023 02:26
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https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/watch-the-new-trailer-for-documentary-stephen-king-on-screen/ Watch the new trailer for documentary ‘Stephen King on Screen’ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-A3Q5dXRBtM quote:Helmed by Daphné Baiwir, the new documentary will chart King’s rise from being an influential novelist to the mind behind some of the greatest movies of the 20th century, including 1986’s Stand By Me, 1980’s The Shining and 1994’s The Shawshank Redemption. The most recent adaptation of his work came in the form of Rob Savage’s The Boogeyman, starring Sophie Thatcher and Vivien Lyra Blair. Speaking of The Boogeyman, anyone here seen it? Haven't heard too much about it
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Jun 9, 2023 12:19
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If they don't cover Maximum Overdrive this documentary is dead to me.
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Jun 9, 2023 13:17
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I saw The Boogeyman in theaters cuz I liked Rob Savage's other film Host. It's not very good. Not terrible either, just a pretty bland installation in the whole genre of babadook types, there was maybe one compelling scary scene (just gonna say: mouth hands) I actually didn't even realize it was based on the short story, even though I read it. Looking it up afterwards I almost wish they'd just directly adapted the therapist's visit and father's recollection as the main meat of the film. It does have the medium from Host making a cameo though which I thought was funny.
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Jun 9, 2023 15:24
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PurpleXVI posted:If they don't cover Maximum Overdrive this documentary is dead to me. They also need to point out that Maximum Overdrive is the prequel to Cars.
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Jun 9, 2023 16:40
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Punkin Spunkin posted:I saw The Boogeyman in theaters cuz I liked Rob Savage's other film Host. It's not very good. Not terrible either, just a pretty bland installation in the whole genre of babadook types, there was maybe one compelling scary scene (just gonna say: mouth hands) Shame, because I really liked Host.
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Jun 12, 2023 21:45
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I’m about 200 pages in on “The Outsider” and liking it so far. Good setup and a good mystery to figure out. I’ve read around 40 King books and nothing has led me to believe this book will end with an unsatisfying conclusion after an enjoyable opening.
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Jun 27, 2023 19:26
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goddamn the last kingcast ep is awful
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Jun 27, 2023 19:42
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I haven't listened to that one in a long time, those guys are the most name-droppingest people on earth
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Jun 28, 2023 00:53
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The Stephen Graham Jones eps are the worst because the one guy keeps calling out all of his stories and saying they're bullshit. Who loving cares? I might feel a little protective because he reminds me of an uncle I've lost, but there's really no need. I don't mind the name dropping, they just seem insecure in their place in everything. That's an understandable feeling to have, but don't treat a charismatic, prolific horror writer like that. So many of them are terrible at being interviewed. I don't care if his story about grabbing a snake from his truck window isn't real, I like hearing him say it. Was the one being referenced the newer Laura Lux one?
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Jun 28, 2023 02:01
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Ariza posted:The Stephen Graham Jones eps are the worst because the one guy keeps calling out all of his stories and saying they're bullshit. Who loving cares? sorry, what, are they dissing Stephen Graham Jones he’s one of the best writers in the genre today
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Jun 30, 2023 15:04
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So I read Steven king pretty religiously as a teenager and into my 20s and dropped off after finishing dark towers series, kind of didn’t touch him again for a long while until somebody told me the kennedy time travel novel was really good, so I read it and was pretty underwhelmed for reasons I’ll get to in a second. I don’t regret reading it but it consistently pulled me out of the narrative. On the recommendation of a friend I just read/finished fairy tale and came away with fundamentally the same reaction. I can’t stand the protagonist in either one. They both feel hollow to me, for lack of a better word. they’re much younger people and king just doesn’t seem to land the aesthetics or values or motivations of someone from the time and place these characters are ostensibly from. Instead, it just seems like an aging boomer trying to write contemporary protagonists as if they had time traveled from his youth, if that makes sense. I don’t know if I’m really saying this the right way. But both just felt horribly inauthentic and unbelievable to me, which going back to my memories of reading king when I was younger a big part of the horror was that the characters felt real to me and so when they suffered horrible fates it resonated Neither was bad, per se, and I finished both, and I’m not somebody who hesitates to drop a book I’m not enjoying pretty quickly, learned long ago that completionism is pointless, but idk they just both felt oddly off to me Curious if there’s other of his more recent output that I should try instead? Or are these standouts? They both seem well received so it’s pretty clear that other people don’t have the same problem I do, just curious Edit: also, and granted it’s a sample size of two, both novels struck me as very lacking in texture for any but a handful of main characters. Fairy tale was worse than 11/22/63 for this, but really for both of them it felt like there were two or three characters that got any real substance and everyone else was cardboard And while I’m here, the massive plot hole in 11/22/63 really bothered me and afaict never got resolved so burger dude is dying of lung cancer that he picked up in the past but he has already been set up with home hospice care despite the fact that supposedly no time has passed while he was in the past HashtagGirlboss fucked around with this message at 02:16 on Jul 1, 2023 |
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Jul 1, 2023 01:59
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HashtagGirlboss posted:Curious if there’s other of his more recent output that I should try instead? Or are these standouts? Revival. It avoids most of those problems by making the main character a guy who was born in the 1950's, and King, unsurprisingly, does "aging boomer with a history of addiction" pretty loving well.
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Jul 1, 2023 02:25
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You could also try Duma Key (from 2008) and, if you liked the Dark Tower books, The Wind Through The Keyhole (2012).
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Jul 1, 2023 03:54
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I bounced off Fairy Tale hard precisely because of the protagonist’s narrative voice, so I totally get your criticisms. Will also recommend Revival, it was really compelling and actually had a good ending IMO (which is weird to say in reference to a King book lol). I also enjoyed The Institute well enough and thought the first third of The Outsider was outstanding before leading to an okay 2/3rds.
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Jul 1, 2023 13:52
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Khizan posted:Revival. Ragle Gumm posted:You could also try Duma Key (from 2008) and, if you liked the Dark Tower books, The Wind Through The Keyhole (2012). Cpt. Mahatma Gandhi posted:I bounced off Fairy Tale hard precisely because of the protagonist’s narrative voice, so I totally get your criticisms. Thanks all. I think I’m going to give Revival a try then. Appreciate it!
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Jul 1, 2023 17:25
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Late to chime in but fully agree with the Revival rec. I’m still working my way through Fairy Tale. Things are getting interesting but I’m not picking it up every chance I get (which was the case when reading Revival). Also went to see The Boogeyman in theater yesterday. Definitely felt like a King movie. Really enjoyed, but that might also be because I haven’t seen a horror movie in a cinema in over 2 decades. Sound effects were especially well done.
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Jul 1, 2023 19:43
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oldpainless posted:I’m about 200 pages in on “The Outsider” and liking it so far. Good setup and a good mystery to figure out. I’ve read around 40 King books and nothing has led me to believe this book will end with an unsatisfying conclusion after an enjoyable opening. Oh boy! This one is absolutely maddening for how it spends the first half acting like a detective story, while King constantly references locked room mysteries, his favourite detective writers, and the art of crafting compelling mysteries, and then it turns out the resolution to the mystery is "it was an evil shapeshifter that's a force of Manichean darkness that our protagonists must travel underground to destroy at the source". It's not a twist so much as an absolute default on credit tendered.
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Jul 2, 2023 14:54
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Highly related, I just read Desperation and that book is the epitome of this. You can see the first two hundred pages are where King's sketching a cool horror story premise, and then the last three hundred are him backfilling towards a resolution while contradicting parts of the premise because he can't figure out how to make it work within his plot structure.
Android Blues fucked around with this message at 15:25 on Jul 2, 2023 |
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Jul 2, 2023 14:58
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Android Blues posted:Oh boy! This one is absolutely maddening for how it spends the first half acting like a detective story, while King constantly references locked room mysteries, his favourite detective writers, and the art of crafting compelling mysteries, and then it turns out the resolution to the mystery is "it was an evil shapeshifter that's a force of Manichean darkness that our protagonists must travel underground to destroy at the source". It's not a twist so much as an absolute default on credit tendered. Android Blues posted:Highly related, I just read Desperation and that book is the epitome of this. You can see the first two hundred pages are where King's sketching a cool horror story premise, and then the last three hundred are him backfilling towards a resolution while contradicting parts of the premise because he can't figure out how to make it work within his plot structure. God drat, this 100% I don't know why King has to run off the rails in so many of his books and make everything some interdimensional alien time travel ghost demon monster thing but it rarely works. His best stuff, when he goes that direction, starts out that way and continues the theme through the end but, too often, he just spirals and seems to have written himself into a corner. Desperation is, like you said, a perfect example of this and, yes, like you the first half of the book absolutely had me hooked in. You didn't need some subterranean demon totem relic bullshit to tell a perfectly suspenseful story about a totally insane cop in the middle of nowhere sadistically jailing and torturing random, highly vulnerable, unarmed people while the villain increasingly loses his mind and the prisoners try and work out a plan. There's your loving book right there. If you want to include all that weird poo poo, make it so Demon Cop is hallucinating it all or hearing voices in his head. Not an actual abandoned mine with real demons in it or a kid who can magically morph his body. Scary, to me, has to be believable and grounded, first and foremost. Even if it's a ghost or a monster story. If I can't relate to the victims' situation or find it realistic in some sense, I am not frightened, and King's best work (almost) always stays in its lane tonally and thematically. ... Related: I don't like Dean Koontz but Intensity was the first book of his that I read and tricked me into thinking he was a good writer. The whole story is just a girl who gets kidnapped and locked in some dude's basement and is trying to escape. Scary. In King's hands, that book would have had the killer or the girl mutate into a shapeshifter or had weird creatures show up in the basement out of nowhere. HashtagGirlboss was asking for recommendations so check out Intensity BiggerBoat fucked around with this message at 17:17 on Jul 2, 2023 |
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Jul 2, 2023 17:15
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BiggerBoat posted:Related: I mean, read Misery?
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Jul 2, 2023 18:06
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i think in “on writing” king says that he doesnt really write outlines, he just starts with a premise and writes until hes done. also, the best dean koontz book is “phantoms” but i also like the “moonlight bay” and “odd thomas” books.
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Jul 2, 2023 18:28
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scary ghost dog posted:i think in “on writing” king says that he doesnt really write outlines, he just starts with a premise and writes until hes done. also, the best dean koontz book is “phantoms” but i also like the “moonlight bay” and “odd thomas” books. Yeah, sometimes this works great for him and other times you can see the stitchmarks. Desperation starts out as an imaginative sort of pastiche of like, "Dracula as Nevada highway patrol officer" but by the back half the villain has like three different motivations and only one of them sorta makes sense with the way it acts in the front half. What really bugs me most is like - all the tension of the front half is derived from this monstrous authority figure being recognisably halfway between a cop doing his job and a demon from Hell. You get a sense of Entragian's personality influencing how the thing controlling him behaves - part of him needs to stay acting "like a cop" so that he has a pretext to abduct people, which is where the dramatic tension and most of the creepiness of the opening comes from. He's obviously malevolent, but he has a recognisable personality that's based on the person the evil force has hollowed out. There's a push and pull between the things Collie Entragian would have cared about (DARE, gangs of kids stealing license plates, writing people up for speeding) and the things Tak cares about (random violence, goofy grand guignol monstrosity). Then when Tak possesses Ellen Carver it's just blargh argh argh, I'm the boogeyman, I'm gonna chase the heroes around like a Hammer Horror villain - her personality has zero influence on how Tak acts at all, and Tak pretty much does what it wants. Which retroactively makes all the cop stuff in the opening not work at all! There's a little snippet where King seems to realise this and has the protagonists say, "hey, why'd he do that cop stuff when he was an evil demon who could have just abducted us without needing an excuse?" and the answer is kind of a mealy-mouthed, "guess we'll never know". Plus, what Tak even wants is really not clear. It kills people, it possesses people (and is like, I must keep alive these people to possess, even as it's killing people it could have possessed), it "corrupts" people with goofy statues, none of which seems to be driving towards any recognisable end. If the book was better crafted it would come off as a chaotic entity just making completely random plans - there's a line in there about evil being stupid and burning itself out - but it's as often written as a clever schemer being thwarted by God, because of, again, that stitched together feel.
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Jul 2, 2023 18:54
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Android Blues posted:Oh boy! This one is absolutely maddening for how it spends the first half acting like a detective story, while King constantly references locked room mysteries, his favourite detective writers, and the art of crafting compelling mysteries, and then it turns out the resolution to the mystery is "it was an evil shapeshifter that's a force of Manichean darkness that our protagonists must travel underground to destroy at the source". It's not a twist so much as an absolute default on credit tendered. This reminds me a lot of "Needful Things." Faustian bargains are only interesting when the devil needs to honour the wording of the bargain, too, and it's your own inattention or greed that makes you miss the big red warning marks, or it's really what you asked for, but what you asked for turns out to have a horrible downside or other side issue that makes you deeply regret it. Its a lot less interesting when the devil claims to give you what you want, but instead just hands you a chunk of refined uranium covered in peeling paint and then tells someone to go shoot you in the head, while magically bamboozling you into thinking he actually upheld his part of the bargain.
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Jul 2, 2023 20:30
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PurpleXVI posted:This reminds me a lot of "Needful Things." It's such a common beat when King does "evil force corrupts someone" and doesn't quite nail it. It often starts out based on something that's true about the character, or with a temptation narrative that's dramatically interesting, and then becomes "the character does evil and stupid things because the monster put a mind whammy on them". Totally agree that Needful Things is like this - there's no cruel irony or "be careful what you wish for" to it, just Satan mind controlling people into carrying around objects that melt their brains. The pop culture interpretation of what that book's about is so much more interesting than what it's actually about. Then the rest of the time it works really well! Everything Pennywise does in It, just giving already bad people a little push here and there, works as cultural commentary. The Shining is basically just this, done well. Just feels like sometimes he's written this exact beat so much that he starts skipping the stuff that makes it feel resonant.
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Jul 2, 2023 21:28
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Lol I just found a dog eared copy of Duma Key in a little free library box. That was the other one that got multiple recommendations so I’m going to take it as a sign and read that. Thanks for everyone for giving suggestions!
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Jul 2, 2023 23:17
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Android Blues posted:Yeah, sometimes this works great for him and other times you can see the stitchmarks. Desperation starts out as an imaginative sort of pastiche of like, "Dracula as Nevada highway patrol officer" but by the back half the villain has like three different motivations and only one of them sorta makes sense with the way it acts in the front half. he would be a godlike dungeon master
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Jul 2, 2023 23:37
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HashtagGirlboss posted:Lol I just found a dog eared copy of Duma Key in a little free library box. That was the other one that got multiple recommendations so I’m going to take it as a sign and read that. Thanks for everyone for giving suggestions! scary ghost dog posted:he would be a godlike dungeon master
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Jul 2, 2023 23:43
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