The Dark Tower What Will It Take For Hollywood To Get Stephen King S Series Right

Stephen King has been one of the most prolific authors of our day and age, ever since he hit the scene back in the early 1970s. With all-time classic novels such as Carrie, The Shining, IT, Salem’s Lot; along with short stories such as The Shawshank Redemption, King has managed to create some of the best horror, character-driven, and dramatic stories of a generation, and continues to do, so decades later. With such popular stories of his reaching an audience of millions, Hollywood was quick to knock on his door to begin making film adaptations of his work. Films like IT (both the 1990 and 2017 versions), The Shawshank Redemption, and The Shining became some of the most popular and critically acclaimed movies of their years. But sometimes, those adaptations can fail spectacularly.

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One of the adaptions that has failed recently was The Dark Tower (2017), based on King’s multiple book series of the same name. One of the more fantastical things that King has written, The Dark Tower became one of the most popular fantasy series of the modern era. But the 2017 movie bombed hard, with critics calling it “boring” and “lifeless”, and it only made a mere $113 million USD at the box office. No sequel has been announced or made since then, leaving fans wondering if it will ever continue. So what will it take for Hollywood to do the Dark Tower series right?

A Longer Run Time

     Sony Pictures  

One of the biggest gripes shared by most (if not all) critics, and Stephen King himself, was that the run time of The Dark Tower was way too short, coming in at a measly ninety-five minutes (roughly an hour and a half). Considering the series contains eight books and over three thousand pages, having the first film be that short was a huge detriment. Characters weren’t as fleshed out as they could have been; the plot was immensely rushed, and important themes and messages were merely glossed over in order to get the film over with. Critics stated that the best moments of the film were when Roland and Jake were bonding (and Elba’s performance as well), but because of the run time, they could not be explored more. For a movie that took over ten years to develop and make, a run time like that was a disappointment. In order for Hollywood to get the series right, a film would have to have a longer runtime; at least two hours or longer. And it seems that they were heading in that direction, as a TV series adaptation of Dark Tower was set to be made, but was unfortunately canceled.

More Violence

Another criticism from author Stephen King on the Dark Tower adaptation was the lack of violence, and the story being restrained by its PG-13 rating. He is quoted as saying that the film “lost a lot of toughness” of the book. And with a series as violent as The Dark Tower, that critique makes a lot of sense. In the early part of the first book, Roland Deschain (played by Idris Elba in the film) has to kill an entire town of people after they were turned against him by Randall Flag (played by Matthew McConnaghey). In the second book, Roland loses multiple fingers to a lobster-like monster. And Roland even kills Jake at one point in the story. Having such a brutal series be limited by a PG-13 rating vastly hurt the film, and would have to be improved on for any later adaptation.

Flesh Everything Out More

     Columbia Pictures  

Going directly from the first two points, the biggest criticism against the Dark Tower film is that the story felt rushed, characters were not fleshed out, and that it felt like a generic action movie; rather than one of the better fantasy series of our time. Mike Ryan of Uproxx said it best: “I’ve been told that The Dark Tower books are jam-packed with dense plot, wonderful characters, and a sprawling mythology — which is what made the movie so hard to make for all these years. Well, the solution seems to have been to just scrap all that and release a shockingly short 95-minute movie that just kind of glosses over everything to the point that has any meaning or purpose.” So, it seems in order to do a well-received, acclaimed adaptation of The Dark Tower, much more fleshing out will have to be done. The characters (Roland, Flagg, Jake, etc.), the world and mythology of the series, and the story (an expanded version) will all have to be more coherent and understandable for a film or television series to work. The Dark Tower is available to watch and stream on Netflix.