"11/22/63" Hulu mini-series

I thought that the novel was highly enjoyable, way better and more fully developed than Under The Dome, and as soon as I finished reading it I was thinking how well this could translate to a miniseries.

As always, opinions vary.

 

I was hoping for a movie, etc...

 

I know nothing about Hulu so I suspect this will be only available to subscribers? sorry for the lack of info on my part.

 

There is no way a two hour movie could do the book justice, you would just be getting the highlights.

 

I thought Under The Dome was garbage...if 11/22/63 really is one of King's best books, surely UTD is one of his worst, down there alongside (IMO) crap like Lisey's Story and Christine. But then, The Tommyknockers is one of my favourites so there's really no accounting for taste...

If that. No way in hell you could do a book like 11/22/63 -at 842 pages- justice with a two, or even three hour movie.

 

agreed, but I'm still interested.

 

Yes, Under The Dome was crap and somehow begat an even crappier TV show.

The Tommyknockers was a decent novel, but not among King's best. I never sat through the TV movie. I really liked Insomnia as well, and thought it would make a pretty good movie, but Hollywood doesn't like movies about senior citizens who aren't Clint Eastwood.

 

I gotta say, Under the Dome was a shaggy dog story that went on for hundreds of pages and then had about a 3-paragraph finale in which very little was explained. (If you think that one was bad, stay far away from Cell.)

Tommyknockers is a weird story, but it's got some moments. But I think 11/22/63 is far better than either of them. I agree with Spaghettiows above that Insomnia is an interesting book as well. Desperation and The Regulators are disturbing books, each kind of the flip-side of the other.

 

Tell me about it, my wife and I watched the whole damn series!

If anything I thought Cell was dumber than Under The Dome!

 

Here's a link to a terrific interview with writer/executive producer Bridget Carpenter on how they shot the movie and how they decided what to keep from the book and what to discard:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/fi...-carpenter-wrangling-863933?facebook_20160210

Biggest surprise for me: they actually were able to use Lee Harvey Oswald's actual apartment building for those scenes in the movie, including the back yard where he was photographed holding the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle.

 

another fine link...thanks!

 

How can you see this w/o Hulu?

 

Watched episode 1. The narrative just glossed over much of what I enjoyed in the novel.

I thought an 8 part miniseries could potentially account for a good deal of the material in the book but it looks like I am mistaken.

I'll keep going with episode 2 but I'm not sold yet.

 

As long as it doesn't totally screw with the novel the way the Under The Dome series did with it's source material, we should be okay.

 

I thought it was okay, but not great. James Franco was good but didn't look like himself without facial hair!

Mild spoilers ahead.

Some of the quibbles I had include: the past looked and sounded too much like Happy Days, especially early on, or Back To The Future with the almanac an' all; okay, the time portal was in a closet, but what is the means of getting back to the present - randomly walking around in a street?; the temporal mechanics seem a bit random (only 2 mins passes regardless of how long you spend in the past - why?) and the central tenant of the story seems to be that history seems to push back with a vengeance when you try to change 'significant' events in the past (as was shown), and yet Franco is supposed to prevent the assassination of JFK, despite this being a very significant event?

Also, there's way too much convenient exposition by the old diner guy with cancer (even though he died 'early') throughout the ep in order to keep the viewers informed as to what is playing out in the past. Sloppy.

Even so, it's enjoyable enough to keep me watching.

 

There's no legit way to see this without a Hulu subscription.

Edit: Loved the book, leery of the mini-series.

 

So is this what Hulu is promoting with a thumbnail of a light fixture and no other hint to what it is? Pass.

 

Your quibbles seem to be more with the book than this interpretation...

 

Biggest surprise to me: they have him go back in time to October 1960, and I'm certain the book was September, 1958. They also have him immediately go to Dallas, where tragedy ensues (details omitted for new viewers); in the book, he goes to Florida where some of those events occur. It seems to me we're getting the "Readers Digest" version of the book, some of which I agree with, some not. (The unnecessary scene with the cockroaches comes out of nowhere and is not in the book, at least from what I remember.) So far, I'd say I give it a B+, but I think the show could be better.

I'm also appalled that Hulu is stringing this out for 8 weeks rather than giving us the entire series at once. I much, much prefer the Netflix/Amazon model where they just drop all the episodes at one time. And I don't like the obvious commercial positions inserted -- I'd much rather they had gone for the Netflix/Amazon approach of just going to the next scene. The show could have easily been re-edited slightly to make it feel like a continuous story rather than an episodic TV show.

 

Certainly they've done this to prevent people like me from signing up for the free trial and immediately cancelling after binge watching the series.

 

I thought the book was very cinematic and would lend itself quite well to a movie/mini-series. I realize the book was long but King has a way of drawing the story out with subplots and sub-subplots, which imho wouldn't be necessary for the movie. Hopefully, this series deals strictly with the book story; if it's successful I could see the next series going somewhere else in time with a completely different story.

 

Watched it. Okay. Definite made for TV movie quality. How does Netflix manage to make such rich looking productions? Maybe it's the inherent phoniness of period movies. Franco is kinda flat. Typical King goofiness. The whole "You shouldn't be here" tease. I'm sure like "Storm of the Century's" "Give me what I want and I'll go away," he's going to play that to the point of annoyance. As Vidiot said, the construction of the movie for commercials is kind of annoying. I guess they planning ahead for a regular broadcast. I guess the time travel element which seemed so easy and cheap in the book works okay for a springboard to get the action rolling. And probably better as a movie. I'll stick with it even though someone here who read the book blurted out the surprise ending. That was a shame.

 

Agree on the cockroach scene. Where in the hell did that come from? Also, these constant reminders of "The past doesn't want to be changed". Yeah, that theme ran through the book but it was a subtle underpinning that Epping recognized when it happened. It wasn't some ghoul continually popping up to shout it out at him.

 

Well, since I've not read the book, I can only comment on what was presented in filmed form. It sounds like you're suggesting that the issues that I had (oh and yeah, I groaned at the cockroach scene too) are also present in the book, but that's why filmed versions of the written word need to be handled with skill, so that the material translates better.

For example, I'm sure that the ongoing exposition by diner guy works a lot better in written form - not so much on film. This could have been handled better, but instead we get cheap shock tactics with crawling cockroaches and creepy dudes and dudettes continually saying 'you shouldn't be here'. It's overdone to the point of silliness.

 

Right. Apparently they can't "do" subtle on TV. The cockroach thing was outrageously stupid and didn't belong in the show.

Did somebody do that? Jesus. The show already emphasized the "Butterfly Effect," where the theory is if you change the past, it may have terrible ramifications for the future.

I agree with your comments -- there are aspects of the show that look expensive, but also way too many signs that it was shot on the cheap in Canada (which it mostly was). They were only in Dallas 3 days on the show.