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A review by sa1twaterfish
The Mist by Stephen King
5.0
5.0⭐ Novella/Film Ending Comparison
I love The Mist.
“Film or novella?”
Yep.
Both have their merits. Stephen’s leaves a little more hope obviously, but I completely revere the film ending and personally prefer it. I think the plot's violent human behavior demands a nihilistic ending, or at least, leaves substantial room for it.
In a word where the Mrs. Carmondys of the world can win the day, we’ve already lost.
The film demands consequences for the collective unwillingness for anybody to reach out and help out the woman who had to get home to her kids. Did she take a lazy, potentially dangerous risk as a parent? Sure. Doesn’t have anything to do with those kids, who still need help.
An unwillingness to help is a failure of spirit, but ESPECIALLY children.
Through this cataclysmic event, there's a rich push and pull between Norton and Drayton, there's commentary about military experimentation and classification, there's pull between fanaticism, zealousness, and hysteria, there's trial and error survival, s*ic*de, trauma, and it doesn't even fucking matter because every single person already failed the test of humanity in the first five minutes.
Wont anybody see a lady home?
No?
Then you're already dead.
Texan culture has a savior problem. We love to be the heroes, but never the caretakers. If The Mist happened in Texas, a team of 50 people would’ve gone to help the woman and probably would've somehow made it back with the kids in tow. But if there’d been a known homeless camp near the area, they’d be on their own.
I’d like to believe one of the few core values of universal human spirituality is taking care of humanity as a species, both in the capacity of caregiving and heroic service/sacrifice. Banding together and taking care of everyone, down to the weakest among us.
I’d also like to think that when we fail the weakest among us, when we’re put to the test and choose self-interest, we pay for it in the end.
We might seem like we’re ahead for a time, and there might be some victory, but when we fail others, we fail ourselves. We pay for it, eventually. Always.
By the time the cost catches up to us, we can never afford it.
That’s what the film’s ending exemplifies.
Stephen’s ending isn’t bad though. It’s an ode to survival and the determination of humans to create a pack and run together, work together, fight together. I don’t love the idea of the protagonist writing this glorious manuscript to leave it on a counter...a little contrived there...but hell, when I nail the right way to end a novel, maybe you wont be reading my book reviews anymore.
Easy to bitch about something I can’t offer a solution for.
This story ended up embedding itself into me. After reading, I quickly chased it with the film, and found both so affecting.
Something about our dimensions cracking open and spilling its indifferent, hungry beings into our very easy, very privileged reality fascinates me as much as it terrifies me. God-sized creatures make me sick if I think about them long enough. I love both versions of this story. And short enough to enjoy more than once.
If you loved this and need something else to scratch the itch, I can't recommend his short story "N" enough.
-
I love The Mist.
“Film or novella?”
Yep.
Both have their merits. Stephen’s leaves a little more hope obviously, but I completely revere the film ending and personally prefer it. I think the plot's violent human behavior demands a nihilistic ending, or at least, leaves substantial room for it.
In a word where the Mrs. Carmondys of the world can win the day, we’ve already lost.
The film demands consequences for the collective unwillingness for anybody to reach out and help out the woman who had to get home to her kids. Did she take a lazy, potentially dangerous risk as a parent? Sure. Doesn’t have anything to do with those kids, who still need help.
An unwillingness to help is a failure of spirit, but ESPECIALLY children.
Through this cataclysmic event, there's a rich push and pull between Norton and Drayton, there's commentary about military experimentation and classification, there's pull between fanaticism, zealousness, and hysteria, there's trial and error survival, s*ic*de, trauma, and it doesn't even fucking matter because every single person already failed the test of humanity in the first five minutes.
Wont anybody see a lady home?
No?
Then you're already dead.
Texan culture has a savior problem. We love to be the heroes, but never the caretakers. If The Mist happened in Texas, a team of 50 people would’ve gone to help the woman and probably would've somehow made it back with the kids in tow. But if there’d been a known homeless camp near the area, they’d be on their own.
I’d like to believe one of the few core values of universal human spirituality is taking care of humanity as a species, both in the capacity of caregiving and heroic service/sacrifice. Banding together and taking care of everyone, down to the weakest among us.
I’d also like to think that when we fail the weakest among us, when we’re put to the test and choose self-interest, we pay for it in the end.
We might seem like we’re ahead for a time, and there might be some victory, but when we fail others, we fail ourselves. We pay for it, eventually. Always.
By the time the cost catches up to us, we can never afford it.
That’s what the film’s ending exemplifies.
Stephen’s ending isn’t bad though. It’s an ode to survival and the determination of humans to create a pack and run together, work together, fight together. I don’t love the idea of the protagonist writing this glorious manuscript to leave it on a counter...a little contrived there...but hell, when I nail the right way to end a novel, maybe you wont be reading my book reviews anymore.
Easy to bitch about something I can’t offer a solution for.
This story ended up embedding itself into me. After reading, I quickly chased it with the film, and found both so affecting.
Something about our dimensions cracking open and spilling its indifferent, hungry beings into our very easy, very privileged reality fascinates me as much as it terrifies me. God-sized creatures make me sick if I think about them long enough. I love both versions of this story. And short enough to enjoy more than once.
If you loved this and need something else to scratch the itch, I can't recommend his short story "N" enough.
-