I first read Stephen King’s The Mist in the horror anthology book Dark Forces (and still have a copy of it) way back when I was a teenager. It was a terrifying tale of a group of people who find themselves trapped in a supermarket when a strange mist descends upon their town. It’s not so much the mist itself that’s was horrifying, but the impossibly frightening things that resided within it; blood-thirsty monsters that hunt and kill humans without a second thought--from large, terrier-sized flying insects to enormous behemoths that would have warmed the cockles of Lovecraft’s cold dead heart. But equally scary was the reaction of some of the trapped people in the store, who devolved into a pack of frightened savages that proved to be just as much of a danger as the monsters in the mist.
The Spike TV series isn’t the first time that King’s novella had been adapted. Back in 2007, Frank Darabont directed an underrated and marvelous film version of The Mist, and watching the limp, boring pilot of The Mist sent me running back to re-watch the film, just so I could cleanse myself of the crapfest that was the TV show.
The 2007 movie still holds up superbly ten years after its original release. Frank Darabont builds up a steady tension in even the quiet scenes, doing this without the use of music, giving the movie a real-life documentary feel, which just adds to the creepiness factor. Thomas Jane, who’s now starring in the superb SF series The Expanse, stars in the film as David Drayton, a professional artist who works at home on movie posters for the studios. After a violent thunderstorm sends a tree crashing through his house, David decides to make a run to the store for supplies with his young son (Nathan Gamble) and neighbor (Andre Braugher) in tow.
The mist is never really noticeable by the characters at first until it’s too late. Once it shrouds the store and surrounding area in a thick gray blanket, that’s when the “fun” begins, and Darabont effectively ratchets up the suspense until it’s unbearable at times. No soap opera histrionics here, just well-written characters played by a fantastic cast of actors, expertly directed by a master storyteller--all of which serve to pull you into the story and keep you invested until the shocking ending. Several of the cast members from this film would reteam with Darabont for the first season of The Walking Dead (before Darabont would unceremoniously be ousted from his show-runner position).
In contrast, we have the Spike TV series, which is a drab, lifeless hour that uses every soap opera trope it can get its hands on in setting up its cardboard characters--none of whom are very memorable. And I don’t mind if half the cast of a show is made up of teenagers (or at least twenty-something actors pretending to be teens), as long as their story is captivating. But everybody in this opening hour is either so bland or annoying they are almost interchangeable. There’s so much angst and whining going on, even before the mist arrived, that I was tempted to give up halfway through. I can’t imagine how they'll be able to stretch King’s story to cover a full season, especially with such uninspired writing like this. For the best adaptation of this story, stick with the movie. For the novella itself, The Mist is now available as a Kindle e-book. --SF
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