Although 2020’s adaptation of Stephen King’s Stephen King has written many novels, The Stand is one of his most iconic projects. Released in 1978, the post-apocalyptic epic blends elements of fantasy, horror, science fiction, and character drama into a sprawling story that follows over a dozen main characters through the aftermath of a lethal pandemic.
The Stand, alongside IT and The Shining, is often listed among King’s best works. While director Mick Garris’s 1994 miniseries adaptation of The Stand isn’t perfect, it was met with almost universally positive reviews upon its release. However, a lot went wrong with 2020’s The Stand adaptation. The CBS All Access miniseries was badly miscast, inexplicably told in a bizarre and confusing anachronic order, and full of clichés when it came to its depictions of both the villainous Randall Flagg and his new Las Vegas.
A Swan Song Show Can Finally Redeem 2020's The Stand Adaptation
The Robert R. McCammon Adaptation Can Make Up For The Stand’s Failure
Although The Stand had many problems, Variety's report that Robert R. McCammon’s A Swan Song will soon receive a TV adaptation from Greg Nicotero will be exciting for fans of King’s novel. Originally finding fame as a groundbreaking special effects makeup artist, Nicotero also directed 37 episodes of The Walking Dead. This makes him uniquely well suited to a perspective-switching story set after the apocalypse, which makes this adaptation particularly promising. A Swan Song’s plot has a lot in common with the story of The Stand, as proven by the show’s official synopsis.
A Swan Song tells the story of a group of survivors who, after a nuclear war, attempt to eke out an existence in the resulting wasteland. Filled with ”Monstrous creatures and marauding armies,” this wasteland is a hellish, unforgiving setting. However, “One small girl offers a glimmer of hope against a supernatural being hell-bent on the planet’s destruction” in A Swan Song’s story of mismatched survivors banding together to keep hope alive at the end of the world.
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If that plot sounds familiar, it is because A Swan Song and The Stand share many similarities. Both stories are set after the end of the world, both follow numerous good and evil characters in their winding, twisty narratives, and both center on a supernatural villain who can change their identity and manipulate world events to suit their whims. Although 2020’s The Stand was originally planned as a movie, the miniseries treatment is a more fitting approach for McCammon’s novel.
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Since the miniseries format fits the post-apocalyptic storyline better, it is reasonable for readers to wonder what went wrong with 2020’s The Stand. The answer is multi-faceted, and not all the show’s issues could have been avoided by its creators. For one thing, releasing a fantasy series about the world ending due to a killer pandemic in late 2020 was terrible timing. The team behind The Stand could not possibly have predicted the COVID-19 pandemic, but its shadow loomed large over the story of the miniseries.
For another, many characters were badly miscast or poorly handled. While Owen Teague’s Harold was surprisingly effective, The Stand 2020’s Nadine was too obviously villainous and too one-dimensional to feel like a compelling character. Randall Flagg’s Las Vegas was transformed from a fascist prison state into a perpetual party, which missed the point of the character badly and also made his hometown seem a lot less scary. Meanwhile, the out-of-order storytelling felt less like welcome narrative experimentation and more like unnecessary confusion, since The Stand was already a long, complicated story.
Why Fans Of Stephen King's The Stand Should Be Excited For An Adaptation Of Swan Song
A Swan Song Has A Lot in Common With King’s The Stand
Since A Swan Song and The Stand have a lot in common, this miniseries could allow a TV show to do right by the source material. A Swan Song’s TV show could make up for The Stand 2020’s failures, particularly considering Nicotero and McCammon’s shared strong suits. Nicotero’s work on The Walking Dead proves he knows his way around a post-apocalyptic story with plenty of characters, while McCammon’s darker, nastier horror story is a perfect fit for the director’s gore-forward style.
To do justice to a grim, bleak story like A Swan Song or The Stand, creators need the freedom to get truly dark.
Part of the reason that 2020’s Randall Flagg flopped was that the miniseries was never going to get as gruesome as The Walking Dead or even the IT movie adaptations. In contrast, Nicotero’s take on McCammon’s book is likely to be gorier, more brutal, and more effective as a result. To do justice to a grim, bleak story like A Swan Song or The Stand, creators need the freedom to get truly dark. For all The Walking Dead’s flaws, the show certainly didn’t lean into sunny optimism. Thus, The Stand’s adaptation may soon be redeemed.
Source: Variety
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