Chukzombi
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Stephen King's The Dark Tower
- Thread starter Chukzombi
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I read the books, but never thought of them as anything more than schlock to begin with. Fun, worth a read (the early ones at least) but hardly more than a quick throwaway by King in mass-production-mode after watching an Eastwood film.
I am surprised how religious people get over it them.
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Xarpolis
Life's a Dream
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Chukzombi
Millie's Staff Member
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its all about the world that he built and how it interacts with all his other worlds. its like saying the original star wars was shit because the story was weak, so why not add a cartoon fucking rabbit in it as an important character because why the fuck not?
Arbitrary
Tranny Chaser
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I can't speak for new readers but back in the day the series was sorta like the Game of Thrones or Harry Potter of its day. Each book only came out every 4 or five years. At the end of the third book it just ends in the middle of a scene with an apology from the author. It would take another six years to see what the fuck was happening on that goddamn train. For a lot of people this was the first book series they had read where they had to deal with something like that. There were connections being made in his other works to the Dark Tower and the whole thing just seemed really big.
Then he cranked out the last few, shit all over his own meta-narrative, gave the series a herp-a-derp non-ending ending, and then tweeted a photo of the Horn of Arthur Eld with the tagline "Last Time Around."
I'm going to be permanently salty about the series. It got to me at too young an age. As much as I like Game of Thrones if fatty keels over and we don't get anymore books that's just whatever. I like them, I want to see what happens next, but I'm ready to get served a bowl of cocks.
Those Wheel of Time people are lucky. They were getting yanked around before it was cool.
Then he cranked out the last few, shit all over his own meta-narrative, gave the series a herp-a-derp non-ending ending, and then tweeted a photo of the Horn of Arthur Eld with the tagline "Last Time Around."
I'm going to be permanently salty about the series. It got to me at too young an age. As much as I like Game of Thrones if fatty keels over and we don't get anymore books that's just whatever. I like them, I want to see what happens next, but I'm ready to get served a bowl of cocks.
Those Wheel of Time people are lucky. They were getting yanked around before it was cool.
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Frenzied Wombat
Potato del Grande
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The first three were honestly masterpieces, but it went full retard once he introduced himself as a book character. Unlike most, I didn't mind the last book nor the ending, but it would have been impossible to live up to expectations for the ending, and I was prepared because King was never known for being able to deliver on quality conclusions.
Chukzombi
Millie's Staff Member
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i dunno how old you were when you got into it, but i was there from Drawing of The Three's release and was hooked. i got Waste Lands for my birthday and its honestly one of the best SK books i ever read. so many possibilities and then the Dark Tower centric books started coming out afterward building up even more hype, i was disappointed with Wizard and Glass because it was a prequel. but i strived to keep hoping. i was please with Wolves of the Calla'h, but not so much like i was with Waste Lands. it was a rolleroaster of feels when the last two were shit out and was stuck with the shit on top of shit kinda sorta ending. it wouldnt have been so fucking hard to end that book. he was able to end The Talisman with a satisfying conclusion and that had a similar all worlds collide scenario. maybe because Peter Straub was there to help him with it. maybe he wasnt there to help him with book 7. well now that Dark Tower is ruined, i can pin my hopes on a Talisman adaption or Eyes of The Dragon adaption that wont fucking suck on film.
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Arbitrary
Tranny Chaser
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You might as well be me.
The more I think about these the more I remember all the other shit that angered up my blood. Randall Flagg does the mother-fucking J.O.B for a new villain that then dies fifty pages later. Flagg was a villain in a couple different books, was the nemesis of our hero, and gets eaten by a brand new villain that does nothing but kill a main character and immediately die. We get no showdown between Flagg and Roland, the final confrontation and confrontation with the Crimson King was anti-climactic to the point of being parody.
The more I think about these the more I remember all the other shit that angered up my blood. Randall Flagg does the mother-fucking J.O.B for a new villain that then dies fifty pages later. Flagg was a villain in a couple different books, was the nemesis of our hero, and gets eaten by a brand new villain that does nothing but kill a main character and immediately die. We get no showdown between Flagg and Roland, the final confrontation and confrontation with the Crimson King was anti-climactic to the point of being parody.
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BrutulTM
Good, bad, I'm the guy with the gun.
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I hated this as well. Vonnegut did it too in "Breakfast of Champions" and I have never forgiven him for it either.
Arbitrary
Tranny Chaser
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In the last pages of the book a mute kid comes in through a magic door, says I think nothing, and literally erases the mega-villain of King's narrative universe.
The only other place this character has shown up was at the end of Insomnia where he gets two lines of dialogue seven-hundred pages into a book that is later declared "thin" (non-canon even in the already fictional story) by Roland.
The choices King made at the end of this series are just so fucking weird.
Frenzied Wombat
Potato del Grande
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Despite the ending being anti-climactic, it definitely still had a touching pathos to it. I'm still not sure whether I teared up in the final pages because it was touching, or because of the realization that it was finally over. Oy's death certainly fucking made me weep like a little girl.
Arbitrary
Tranny Chaser
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Finally over in that King went on to write another book in the series set in between 4 and 5 (or whatever) and then declare the film franchise is a sequel to the books that represents Roland's final journey.
THE RIDE NEVER ENDS
Amzin
Lord Nagafen Raider
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I've read all of Doyle's Holmes and some of the random 3rd party stuff and I still enjoyed the RDJ Sherlock Holmes. That's what I like about popular, copyright-free things though... tons of room for interpretation and takes. Granted the RDJ aren't my favorite but they're a lot more loyal to the books than they might appear, aside from Watson being useful (Watson being unlike the books is the best thing about the modern versions though)
I only ever read like book 1 and half of book 2 of Dark Tower, for some reason even though I loved a lot of the lore and world building and concepts, the writing itself just didn't keep me in it and I gave up for some other stuff at the time. All this talk in the thread tells me there was still a lot of cool ideas to come but a ton of bullshit with it so kind of glad I stopped
I'm going to Wiki it at some point.Now, as someone who has no investment in the books besides "the ideas were cool" and loves Idris Elba, the trailer was still super meh to me. Just very generic.
Gilgamel
A Man Chooses....
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I love the books, but he ended it shittily and this movie looks to have none of the depth and charm that made the books so captivating. It just looks like a shitty fantasy movie that took this huge conceptual work of fiction and is going to try and distill it down to 2 hours. It's going to suck.
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Only King could have turned a fucking masterpiece of a series into utter dog-shit after book 4. Between what he did with writing himself into the book, what he did to Flagg, what he did about Crimson King, basically the entire plot in the last few books with the Tet corporation and shit was so nonsensical and half assed. I can forgive the ending because I knew King couldn't write a good ending to a normal book, no less a epic like Dark Tower....but man, if only younger King could have finished this series off.
Chukzombi
Millie's Staff Member
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SK has a Golden Age which more or less coincided with his addiction to drugs and alcohol, thats how you got fucked up imaginative shit like It and Pet Sematary. his 1990s work is on the decline because he was off the good stuff, but he still had some knockout books, just nothing consistent, then he had his accident and that threw an even bigger monkey wrench into his life. his writing became more of a stephen king formula than actual stephen king thinking up something new and terrifying. the last 3 DT books were on that stephen king formula, even though i really liked wolves of the callah, it felt like it was going through the paces and the pop culture references were tacked on as bad as a family guy episode.
chaos
Buzzfeed Editor
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I just reread Breakfast of Champions, it might be my favorite Vonnegut book. I think being older made the story a lot more meaningful to me.
spronk
FPS noob
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‘The Dark Tower’: Clashing Visions, Brutal Test Screenings Plagued Journey to Big Screen
shouldn't really be a surprise to anyone but it looks like this movie is gonna be a dumpster fire. They redid it as a young adult movie (wtf). Apparently in the test screenings they told the audience that they shouldn't write anything about recasting one of the leads, its too late for that (most people are guessing its Matthew Mc who plays the bad guy)
movie is also only 88 mins long, releases in 3 days, no preview screenings afaik and not sure if critics are allowed to review before. sub 20% RT?
shouldn't really be a surprise to anyone but it looks like this movie is gonna be a dumpster fire. They redid it as a young adult movie (wtf). Apparently in the test screenings they told the audience that they shouldn't write anything about recasting one of the leads, its too late for that (most people are guessing its Matthew Mc who plays the bad guy)
movie is also only 88 mins long, releases in 3 days, no preview screenings afaik and not sure if critics are allowed to review before. sub 20% RT?
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