The Stephen King property The Stand had to endure more than a decade in development hell before the 1994 mini-series adaptation was finally produced - and when it was announced that we were going to get another adaptation of The Stand, the project spent the better part of another decade in development hell. Just like the first time around, the initial idea was to turn The Stand into a single feature film. But there's so much to this story, it would be impossible to pack it all into one movie. So one movie became two. Then there was hesitation, and it was cut back down to one movie. When Josh Boone came on board to write and direct, his plan was to turn the story in four feature films. Then there was talk of doing a mini-series that would lead into Boone's feature. And finally, the adaptation ended up right where the previous one did: it became a mini-series. But instead of airing on network television, the new mini-series was made for the CBS All Access streaming service, which meant there were no restrictions on the content. It could be gory, the language could be vulgar. The new mini-series is also longer than the 1994 version, running roughly nine hours while the '94 mini-series was six hours.
I was cautiously optimistic when I heard there was going to be another version of The Stand. I love King's story, so I was interested in seeing it brought to the screen again. But at the same time, I felt there was no way a new adaptation could live up to the '94 adaptation. King and director Mick Garris had done something really special with that one; it has an amazing cast and the perfect tone. The new mini-series might be good, and I liked that it was going to be longer so they could get even more story and character work in there, but it wouldn't be as impactful as the previous one. And, having sat through the 2020 version of The Stand (it actually aired from December 2020 through February 2021) twice now, I can say that I definitely don't find the update to be nearly as impactful as its predecessor... but I do like it. Even if Boone and his collaborators made choices that I don't agree with.
The most baffling choice that went into this take on The Stand is the fact that it starts after the plague has wiped out more than 99% of the population of the world. It even starts after some of the characters have made their journeys to join Mother Abagail (Whoopi Goldberg), a 100+ year old woman who has a direct connection to God, in Boulder, Colorado. (The location of Hemingford Home, Nebraska, where Mother Abagail's house was located in the novel and the first mini-series, has been changed to a Colorado retirement home called Hemingford Home.) The plague and the cross-country journey parts of the story are presented as back story, shown in flashbacks. So several episodes of this mini-series are fragmented and non-linear, and I find that this style of storytelling makes it much more difficult to connect with the characters.
The makers of this adaptation also seemed to have a strange fascination with Harold Lauder, an aspiring writer with an unrequited crush on his sister's friend Frannie Goldsmith. Harold and Frannie are the only two people to survive the plague in their hometown of Ogunquit, Maine. They travel across the country together. Frannie turns her attention to another man. Driven by jealousy and spurred on by a servant of the evil Randall Flagg (played here by Alexander Skarsgard), Harold ends up betraying the good people of Boulder. And it feels like this mini-series spends a lot of its extra time focusing on Harold and building up to his eventual betrayal.
I could have spent a bit less time with Harold, but at least Owen Teague turned in a terrific performance as the character. This version of The Stand was quite well cast overall. Odessa Young does well in the role of Frannie. James Marsden is a great Stu Redman, the man Frannie falls in love with. Ruby Dee was already the perfect Mother Abagail in the other mini-series, so Goldberg couldn't win at this one, and the writers seemed to have less interest in Mother Abagail this time anyway. Goldberg does a fine job with what she was given to work with. Jovan Adepo is good in the role of Larry Underwood. Greg Kinnear makes for a substantially younger Glen Bateman than Ray Walston did in the first mini-series, but he makes the character almost equally likeable. Henry Zaga wasn't given the chance to make his Nick Andros shine in the way that Rob Lowe's did, but Brad William Henke is an endearing Tom Cullen. Even if I don't like him as much as Bill Fagerbakke's Tom Cullen. Irene Bedard's Ray Brentner is about on the same level as Peter Van Norden's Ralph Brentner. Whether male or female, Brentner is always the least interesting character of the four who are sent to "stand" against Flagg in the end (the other three being Stu, Larry, and Glen).
Skarsgard was an excellent choice to play Randall Flagg. His portrayal of this charming hellspawn is near perfect - and he comes off even better considering how over-the-top the villain characters around him are. This is another area where this mini-series made odd choices. As Flagg's lackeys - like Lloyd Henreid (Nat Wolff), Julie Lawry (Katherine McNamara), and the Rat Woman (Fiona Dourif) - make their ways around Flagg-controlled Las Vegas, they conduct themselves as if they're living cartoons. The actors appear to be having a lot of fun, but the characters are ridiculous. Most ridiculous of all is the version of pyromaniac Trashcan Man played by Ezra Miller.
Much more grounded is Amber Heard's tragic character Nadine Cross, who first contacted Flagg through a Ouija board when she was a child and has been destined to be his ever since. She goes back and forth over how much she wants to live up to her destiny. She asks Larry to take her virginity so Flagg won't want her, and yet she's dedicated enough to Flagg that she takes Harold over the edge with her. In the first mini-series, the character of Nadine was combined with another woman Larry encounters in the book, Rita Blakemoor. Here, Rita and Nadine are separate characters again. Rita is played by Heather Graham, and she is the character Larry leaves New York with. In another of their questionable decisions, the makers of this mini-series chose not to do one of most popular set pieces from the book – Larry and Rita's walk through the dark, corpse-filled Lincoln Tunnel. Instead, they have Larry and Rita leave New York through the sewer.
Rita isn't around very long, but Graham is good in the role. A book character who has an expanded role in this mini-series and comes off very well is Teddy Weizak, part of the burial committee in Boulder, which is assigned the task of clearing out the bodies of all the plague victims. Teddy was barely in the first mini-series, where he was played by Stephen King himself. Here he is played by Eion Bailey, who makes him a standout character through his interactions with Harold and his desire to bring movie-going back to the world.
This adaptation of The Stand did a lot of things that I wasn't into, and given the non-linear structure of the episodes it probably helps to be familiar with the source material before you watch it. If this was someone's first exposure to the story, they might have trouble getting to know the characters and grasping exactly what's going on. I really don't like the non-linear approach or that the residents of Las Vegas / New Vegas are such clowns, but it has its bright spots and strong performances.
It also has a brand new coda. The ninth and final episode was written by Stephen King… and overall it feels rather unnecessary, but it shows you what Frannie and Stu decide to do after the Vegas issue is dealt with. Then it wraps up with the goofball ending King added to the extended edition of the novel – an ending that does give a small glimpse of the world beyond the United States. And sets up a sequel that we'll surely never get. Even if we did, there's no way it could come anywhere close to the quality of the first story, so it's for the best if we just leave it alone.
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