The Stand - CBS All Access - (**Spoilers**)

Dial Hard

I've only watched four episodes but I think I'm done. The Stand is pretty much my favourite book ever and I'm just too wedded to the source material, the changes they've made (some purely for the sake of it, by the looks of the things) keep taking me out of the story.

This is what happens when you love a book a bit too much.

pc7

Oh sweet tiny baby Jesus, the dodgy rave dad dancing! What on earth where they thinking! I’m actually embarrassed watching it.

pc7

Is the older mini series worth a watch?

Thargor

pc7 wrote: »

Is the older mini series worth a watch?

I remember being shocked at how well it matched how Id pictured the book in my head but from the odd clip Youtube recommends to me every now and then it seems to have aged very badly, and just like this series theres nothing really new to it at all leaving the whole thing feeling a bit pointless.

pc7

Thanks will skip it so.

youcancallmeal

pc7 wrote: »

Is the older mini series worth a watch?

I'm re-watching it myself at the moment. It's clearly pretty low budget even for the time and acting is dodgy in places but I think it's worth a watch just to see how it's faithful to the book

Glebee

Just caught upto date. So far its fine, nothing brilliant, just fine. The whole thing just felt so rushed. Is true whats posted before if they had got rid of flashbacks it could have been done over a few seasons and got into the characters more. In the end I did not care what happened to anybody.

Slydice

You know what that dance scene did for me.. it had me blurring the episode to one from True Blood.. I don't know if that's what they were going for. Felt very.. True Blood baddie style.

Nigel Fairservice

youcancallmeal wrote: »

I'm re-watching it myself at the moment. It's clearly pretty low budget even for the time and acting is dodgy in places but I think it's worth a watch just to see how it's faithful to the book

I liked the original, more so than the new one. The new series is certainly more flashy but the original series tells the story much better and did a lot better on character development. I loved Matt Frewer as Trashcan Man in the original too!

Mr E

Not sure that worked 100% but was pretty good. The start was good (up to the road trip - you could see King's words in the narration). The road trip and well incident was only OK (the well dream was a bit contrived). And the ending? WTF?

Agent Coulson

They had a better cast and a lot better budget and still somehow didn't do half as good a job as the 90's mini series in telling the story and and giving the characters life I just didn't care for any of them where as I was invested in the 90's characters.


Again King proves he can't do endings even when he had 40 years to add to this one.

RobbingBandit

Mad ending absolutely bizarre really

upupup

It's set up now for The Stand season2.I hope they make it ,Randall deserves another try.M o o n spells season2

Slydice

9: Lost... I dunno.. maybe

it's a setup for a 2nd season.. I was thinkin more that it was something to do with setting up a wider Stephen King tv verse thing and I just wasn't getting some references. After that.. I'm not sure I saw much point to the episode.

Anyway.. Finished! Overall: It was a good reminder that 90s show existed. Some bits and pieces were done well. It looked modernised. Maybe it's setting up for something else.

pc7

On the last episode now,

Stu is back, did the skip over completely how Tom helped him in the book? All the things they came up against? Or did my dodgy box cut some of episode 9?

fritzelly

pc7 wrote: »

On the last episode now,

Stu is back, did the skip over completely how Tom helped him in the book? All the things they came up against? Or did my dodgy box cut some of episode 9?

You didn't miss anything

pc7

fritzelly wrote: »

You didn't miss anything

Bloody hell was such a good section of the book, they really butchered the whole thing.

stronglikebull

All in, this wasn't too bad, but maybe not different enough to warrant the remake. Not really any different from the story in the '94 version, most main points were the same though they did seem to knock out major bits of it.
Not once was there a mention of Colar-ay-doh, which I was waiting all through it for. Also no frey-ends from Mother Ab either, really wanted Whoppie Goldberg to do that.
Very little from Tom's story, and I don't think they even explained the M O O N thing, and didn't do much with it when it was quite a major part of the original. Also, didn't Nick appear to Tom in a dream when he was returning from Vegas to tell him to go back for Stu?

The epilogue episode didn't do much for me. Kind of stupid, obvious and forced with the well thing, and the ending was bizarre. I guess maybe they're setting up for a possible next series, or not ruling it out anyway.

gmisk

Finished the last episode....that was disappointing...it had a low bar with the 90s miniseries....but it barely cleared that. Disappointing given the budget and cast.
The changes didn't really work, I doubt I would bother with another season.

youcancallmeal

Last episode was fairly meh once they got past where the book ends. Didnt really add anything to the overall story unless they have some notions of attempting a season 2 with new material. Those 30 minutes of "new" story would've been better used developing the main characters properly in earlier episodes. Nick Andros was one of the main(and best imo) characters in the book and he got about 5 mins screen time in this show.

Overall not a total disaster of an adaption but massive missed potential. I would argue it's one of the easiest to adapt and widely appealing Stephen King books.

Any chance they are setting up a The Dark Tower series with that ending? M O O N spells they ruined Tom Cullen's story and Nic Andros arc.
Tom's escape from Vegas and saving Stu being left out is so wrong.

nc6000

RobbingBandit wrote: »

Mad ending absolutely bizarre really

That's how it ends in the version of the book I read.

JimmyVik

I stuck it out to the end.
I thought it the whole series wasnt very good at all.
Found myself very bored through long periods.

santana75

Some strange decisions with that last episode. They completely did away with the Stu and Tom journey back to Boulder, which was worth a bit of mileage I reckon. Overall I loved the series I just wish that the final episode had been a bit better.

Notmything

Episode 9 was strange, Tom and Stu just showing up, then the whole reaction of Tom to them leaving, they barely showed him with stu n Fran at all.

The scene with pistols being handed out. Nothing to say why. I thought it was going to be a power grab or something but no.

Then Randall Flagg reappears and the tribe, that was in the book so enjoyed that.

But wtf with Fran, the well & Flagg? I know it sets up a second season but did she not think "I need to warn Boulder?"

Was the black girl real? Or was she a projection or something, she was clearly mother Abigail but after the scene with the well she was gone.

Skyrimaddict

Hi,
Does anyone know where I can stream this?
Says it amazon prime but must be the US?

gmisk

Skyrimaddict wrote: »

Hi,
Does anyone know where I can stream this?
Says it amazon prime but must be the US?

It's available on Amazon prime but you also need to subscribe to starz play.
There is a free 7 day trial.

Spoiler
It isn't very good

Skyrimaddict

gmisk wrote: »

It's available on Amazon prime but you also need to subscribe to starz play.
There is a free 7 day trial.

Spoiler
It isn't very good

So I need to do both?

God I do hate streaming services in Ireland!

DMcL1971

I just finished watching The Stand. I was really enjoying the first half of it and then it fell utterly to pieces.

I never read the book or saw any of the previous versions, so I knew nothing about this going in.

So 99% of the population are dead.

Some survivors have dreams that tell them to go to Mother Abigail. Not clear on whether everyone who ended up in the town also did or only some of them. The same people also dreamt of Flagg but didn’t go to him. When they arrive in the town, 5 of them are told they are the chosen ones (Stu, Frannie, Larry, Glen and Nick). Two characters are secretly working for Flagg (Harold & Nadine). I was fine with it that far. Interesting back stories well fleshed out characters who I liked and was looking forward to seeing how each would play a pivotal role in defeating Flagg.

Then it all fell apart. Flagg tells Harold and Nadine to kill the 5 chosen ones. They mess up and only manage to kill one. Despite all his power Flagg doesn’t seem to know this. Of the remaining 4, Mother Abigail says Frannie has to stay behind while the other 3 go to New Vegas, oh and Ray is to go with them (Who, the chick who guards the house who got no introduction and we don’t care about). They have to walk and bring no supplies (Why?). Mother Abigail then dies which yet again super baddie Flagg knows nothing about. Stu gets injured along the way. Part of the way through what was probably supposed to be some epic journey our remaining 3 characters get picked up by bad guys and driven the rest of the way there. Felt like they had only been on the road for a couple of days.

The three are put in a mock trial in front of a few dozen bad guys. Glen makes a short speech about how a real leader wouldn’t need fear to control their followers and then gets shot. The stunned audience are horrified by this. The same people who actively cheer as people are hacked to death in the hotel lobby, live where the streets a lined with crucified people and everyone is OK with slavery are suddenly moved by this half assed display????

The two survivors are then drowned in a pool and Randal Flagg wins the day and none of the sacrifices of any of our heroes make a bit of difference. If they hadn’t been there it would have all played out the exact same.

But wait, then the God, cloud, storm thing appears, kills all the henchpeople, zaps the hell out of Flagg and then Flagg is finished off by the psychotic arsonist who worked for him.

What was the point of introducing all the good guy characters to us, sending them off on a mission and then killing them all off without them having any affect. As a final nail in the coffin there is an extra useless episode where Frannie falls in a well and is rescued by a kid from nowhere whom we know nothing about and Flagg becomes a leader of a tiny village.

Gimme my 9 hours back..

I like Stephen King and presume the book made a lot more sense.
I liked the performances of all the bad guys Flagg, Lloyd, Julie and Harold but didn’t particularly like those of the good guys.

shawki

You don’t need to type out the entire plot? What’s the point in that?

Could you imagine if you did that in any of the marvel threads. You would be ****ing crucified.