It has recently come to my attention that if you take any given television show and add up its total runtime, accounting for all episodes, you typically get an amount of time that’s much, much longer than that of any given movie, or any given franchise for that matter (well, except maybe The Fast and the Furious franchise). It stands to reason, then, that if you can find a TV show that’s worth all of that time, you stand to gain more in terms of entertainment value, especially if it’s available for free on a streaming service like Netflix or Hulu. On top of that, it seems to me, based at least on the front page of Rotten Tomatoes, which I tend to cite quite a bit around here, that the production standard for TV is in some sense higher than that of American cinema – maybe not the production value, per se, but the production standard. To put it another way, going to Rotten Tomatoes at any given time and comparing the scores of the site’s most popular TV shows (most if not all of them current) with the scores of the movies opening, coming soon, and holding the top spots at the box office typically shows that any TV show that’s worthy of a spot in a cable lineup or on a streaming platform is going to be far more well-reviewed by critics, with only a few exceptions. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.
Me looking confusedly at the dizzying array of watching options offered by the glorious internet.
It’s with all this in mind that my girlfriend and I picked Castle Rock from a worthy lineup of movies and shows alike, arguably with the impending Halloween extravaganza in mind, given the slant of our choices towards the ooky and the spooky. Castle Rock is a Hulu Original Series based on characters and settings from the mind of bestselling author Stephen King, created by Sam Shaw and Dustin Thomason and produced by J.J. Abrams‘ production company Bad Robot. Branding itself immediately and in all of its promotional material as a psychological horror anthology, it has so far fit that bill nicely, and even though I’ve only watched three episodes so far (planning more tonight – it has me hooked!) I thought I’d say a few things about it. Again, it’s either that or review movies I’ve already seen, or the Bills – who actually managed a shocking win this week, but that’s besides the point.
Arguably the creepiest scene in the show so far (coming in Episode 3) – a Halloween children’s courtroom?
Castle Rock, while buoying my interest level and the show’s overall watchability with a preponderance of Stephen King-ness, is anchored by a strong cast. The show’s protagonist, Henry Deaver – a former resident of Castle Rock, a survivor of a childhood trauma, and now a capital punishment lawyer visiting from Texas after receiving a mysterious call – is played by Andre Holland (Moonlight), who has thus far been excellent, if in an appropriately reserved way. Joining him are Melanie Lynskey (Up In The Air, I Don’t Feel at Home in This World Anymore.), playing Deaver’s childhood neighbor who claims to have psychic powers, Sissy Spacek (Carrie, The Help), playing Deaver’s dementia-riddled mother, Scott Glenn (The Hunt for Red October), playing former Castle Rock sheriff Alan Pangborn, and Jane Levy (Don’t Breathe) playing townsperson Jackie Torrance (relation to The Shining protagonist Jack Torrance currently unknown), among others. Bringing all of these characters together is the ultra-mysterious and ultra-nameless antagonist (?), a young, pale, and absurdly skinny prisoner found in the depths of the nearby Shawshank Prison‘s abandoned and shuttered F Block, played by the world’s most creepy-looking actor Bill Skarsgard (It, Deadpool 2).
Having two different colored eyes probably helps when you’re trying to look as ominous as possible.
If I were to compare Castle Rock to another show thus far, it’d be hard for that show to not be Netflix’s hit show Stranger Things. Sure, it’s not quite as good – at least not so far – and that’s likely due to a number of factors: Castle Rock isn’t soaked in a delightful but tasteful amount of 80’s nostalgia like Stranger Things, and while it’s largely carried by a talented ensemble cast the same way Stranger Things is, the set of characters that cast is portraying is not really as likable overall, at least not yet. What I will say, though, is that three episodes in, Castle Rock has given me an equal if not larger number of creepy/scary moments, and its paranormally-inspired plot at least has the potential to be as rich as that of Stranger Things, not to mention the fact that it has the added bonus of allowing the show’s creators to be able to throw a kitchen sink’s worth of Easter Eggs from Stephen King’s literary and cinematic repertoire into the mix pretty much wherever possible.
One of Castle Rock’s as of yet unmentioned major but less fleshed-out characters, a prison guard at Shawshank.
There are also some parallels to be drawn with Lost, which is an older and perhaps more divisive show, but a good one in my book, and an undeniably successful one at that. Castle Rock‘s willingness to talk about the ideas of good versus evil in a big-picture, often bordering on if not fully religious sense, definitely give rise to some echoes of J.J. Abrams’ most highbrow television venture thus far. There’s also the idea that all of the spooky happenings chronicled by the show are surrounding a specific geographic location (admittedly also a hallmark of many great King stories), using inciting events in the present to pick up the threads of various characters’ pasts, assumedly with the plan of weaving those threads together at some point in the future. Sure, no one’s on an island, and no one’s in purgatory – at least as far as I can tell – but there are similarities. Oh, and also, Terry O’Quinn, assumedly a friend of Abrams, plays central roles in both shows, first appearing in Lost as John Locke, the writers room’s champion of faith in the show’s seasons-long “man of science, man of faith” debate, and now appearing in Castle Rock in a recurring role as Shawshank Prison’s former warden.
One of the truly scariest parts of the show so far: Scott Glenn’s haircut (right).
At the end of the day, and given that I’m only three episodes deep into the first ten-episode season, it’s hard to tell yet whether Castle Rock will be as good or better than either of those proven shows, but I’d say it’s off to a solid start, and it’s keeping pace with Stranger Things (and besting the made-for-cable Lost) in the critical area of bingewatchability (a word that maybe I’ve just made up). Assuming it remains good enough, I’ll probably check back in a week or two with some further thoughts and criticisms. In the meantime, check it out on Hulu!
Tuesdays with Cory 