I’m not going to lie to you. I have been dreading writing about this film since the very first film blog that I wrote back in 2012. I always knew that this day would come. I knew that we would someday be in the midst of some huge horrible thing, like a pandemic, and that I would finally force myself to write about this fantastic mini-series. Allow me to be clear, I am very biased towards this series. The Stand happens to be my favorite book and prompted me to get back into reading after years of avoiding books. I have probably seen this mini-series 15-20 times in totality. I may at times refer to it as a film because mini-series is a pain in the ass to type frequently.
When I see Gary Sinise, I don’t see Lt. Dan, I see Stu Redman because this came out 2 months prior to Forrest Gump. This wasn’t my first exposure to many of the actors, for some it was. I knew Molly from The Breakfast Club and Bill from Coach. I knew Ozzie Davis from Grumpy Old Men and I knew Corbin Nemec as Parker Lewis. I knew Rob Lowe from Wayne’s World and Max Wright from ALF as Willie Tanner. I knew the name Kareem Abdul-Jabbar but this was my first real-time seeing him. I knew the incredible Kathy Bates from Misery, Jeff Goldblum from The Fly, and Ed Harris from Needful Things and Creepshow.
Looking back now, it is so wonderful to know that this was also my first taste of so many different actors. Take Shawnee Smith, for example. As a teen, I just thought that she was hot. Then I watched Saw for the first time and I got so excited. Ray Walston was in Picket Fences. Matt Frewer, I have seen numerous times, most recently on Fear The Walking Dead, and he is always so damn good. Ruby Dee in Do The Right Thing (along with Ozzie Davis) and Jungle Fever, and she was so talented. I was surprised to see Laura San Giacomo one day on my screen as I saw Just Shoot Me for the first time. Miguel Ferrer was as talented as just about any actor out there, and I saw him numerous times, but I think the time that I got very excited about was seeing him on Tales From The Crypt with Teri Hatcher in one episode, Adam West in another, and the third one with Slash and Wendi Malick who also starred on Just Shoot Me. Tales From the Crypt also had episodes with Peter Van Norden and Adam Storke. Last but not least being Ray McKinnon who has been in Sons of Anarchy and Mayans as Lincoln Potter as well as Fear The Walking Dead. That guy is a legit lead guy that needs a big film someday, I hope.
I say all of that to say that this film has had such long term effects on actors and actresses that I like. I recorded this from the TV on my VCR and it was easily one of my 5 most worn-out tapes, along with my Nightmare on Elm Street part 3, 4, and 5, the Monster Squad, and any porn that I could make copies of. Hell, about 10 years ago, a local convenience type store, Stewarts, started selling their own brand of energy drinks, and it’s in a red can. You mix that with some vodka, preferably cherry vodka, and you have a little drink that my buddy Ron and I like to call the Stu Redman. It is fucking delicious. It’s like the normal energy drink, think the green basic Monster can, but this is cheaper and tastier. The music was so good, it is actually also used in Fallout 2 called “Gold Slouch”. Apparently, the guy who did the music for Fallout 2 also helped the lead composer for The Stand.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fjM9pKeEGw
Okay, I have practically written a blog without starting the film. I think it is safe for you to assume that I am excited. Without further adieu, let’s start this long-ass mini-series. I will be breaking the blog up into 4 pieces because otherwise, this would be too much to read.
For your reading pleasure, here are the links to the blogs for all 4 parts of this mini-series.
Part 1 “The Plague”
Part 2: “The Dreams”
Part 3 “The Betrayal”
Part 4 “The Stand”
Start Film/Mini-Series
“This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang but a whimper.” – T. S. Eliot
That is the quote that we start off with. We are at a military base, and there’s the crow. Randall Flagg takes the form of a crow at times and can use them to see what is happening at other locations. The alarm goes off and Charlie Campion (Ray McKinnon) gets a Code Red message, long before it was a flavor of Mountain Dew. Anyway, there’s been a containment breach and the gates aren’t working, so he needs to manually override them, which basically means certain death for everyone on base, including his wife and child. This wouldn’t be much of a story if he did what he was supposed to do and followed protocol. Nope, he gets his family and makes an escape. The gates are closing but he guns it and his wife Sally is in a pure panic telling him to slow down. Bitch please, do you want to live or not? Ohhhhh, wait. Time to crank up some Blue Oyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper” which was cool to me before Will Ferrell and Christopher Walken made it iconic. We see all of the dead bodies on base. It moved fast enough that it appears to be fairly instantaneous. Back then, I didn’t even know that I needed more cowbell. Ahhh, to be young and foolish again. I love seeing arcade machines in Stephen King flicks. My favorite example being Maximum Overdrive. The crow inspects the doll that Campion’s daughter dropped. The crow is pleased, or so I assume.
We go to Arnette, Texas on June 17. There’s Stu and 4 other guys at Hap’s Auto. The guys are ripping on each other. Stu sees the car coming in crazy and he tells Hap to turn off the pumps, and they appear to just in time. The car skids to a crash. Campion is crawling on the ground and he looks like death. Hap calls for help. Campion asks about his wife and daughter and we see that they are quite dead. Campion tells Stu that he didn’t get out in time. He mentions Project Blue and the malfunctioning gate. He came all the way from California to Texas. Sally and his baby have been sick since Salt Lake City, and some dark man kept following him, but you can’t outrun the dark man. Then Campion dies. Man, Ray McKinnon was also in A Perfect World which is ridiculously underrated with Costner, Clint Eastwood, Bradley Whitford, and Laura Dern.
Now at the Blue Base in California, some high ranking guy goes to visit General Starkey, played by Ed Harris. He’s smoking, pouring a glass of booze, looks great. Apparently the ones who got respirators died in 12 minutes, the ones who didn’t, died in 5. That is some shit right there. Eat your heart out COVID-19. It’s just a souped-up version of the flu. Hmmmm, that sounds familiar. They are trying to track down Campion to shut this shit down, quintessentially. The best thing for them is that most people will simply assume they have the normal flu until right at the end. Annnd they have located Campion. How fortuitous. Starkey is pissed that he made it all the way to Texas. This has a 99% communicability rate. Starkey knows that they are fucked. They are blaming it on a new strain of Anthrax rather than revealing the truth as they head to quarantine Arnette. Remember when Anthrax was on an episode of Married With Children?
Oh man, a great cold medicine commercial for “Flu Buddy” with a dude in a trench coat dancing with the medicine. It was great. A police officer shows up named Joe Bob…….wait for it…Brentwood. Horror fans know him as Joe Bob Briggs, who used to host Monstervision late nights on TNT, I think. Yeah, he’s kind of a big deal. He tells them that there is a lot of military closing in. He wants to give them all a head’s up in case of quarantine. Now the old guy and Hap are both sick. Joe Bob passes by a ton of military vehicles heading in the opposite direction. Joe Bob calls into the base to inquire and Cynthia tells him to mind his own business as she is surrounded by 3 military guys. Hey, there’s our friend, the crow.
We see some boys playing basketball as the military roll by and pop their ball. In real life, this would be fucking terrifying. The military start pulling people around. There’s Willie Tanner!! Max Wright plays Dr. Herbert Denninger and they are looking for Stu. Stu refers to the doctor as Hoss. And just like that, I loved Stu. We see the military getting too physical with his neighbors as they hit the male and the female is crying and screaming. Stu ain’t afraid of getting shot as he assumes they all have what Campion had.
They arrive in Braintree, Texas. The old guy asks if it is Cholera and Denninger assures them that it isn’t and puts on his happy face. They are going for a flight.
Oh yeah, now we are in NYC, Brooklyn, I think and we get to hear another classic song called “Baby, Can You Dig Your Man?” by Larry Underwood. In all fairness, it gets sung much better later on. This is some easy listening lovey song. It’s actually terrible, well the recorded version. My bad, we’re in Queens. Larry has a California license plate that read “DIGYOMAN”. Fantastic. He’s come home to his mother’s home. Her name is Alice. He puts on an act but she knows exactly why he’s there and while she is happy to see him to some extent. Alice says that Larry sounds black when he sings. He gloats about how successful he is, and how he’s here to hang low. She knows that he’s in trouble. He overspent his advance a bit and then he borrowed money from the wrong people. She says that he’s just like his father. She is giving him the business. He owes 40 grand. That’s early 90’s money nonetheless. That’s like 42 grand now. He reassures his mom that he’ll be rich and famous, and she is just like, yeah, I gotta go to work. Larry was modeled after Bruce Springsteen, I believe I read that somewhere back when I read up on such things.
At the medical center, Denninger is monitoring the patients. We see the old guy in his dying moments rip out the ventilator and then die. There’s only Bruette and Redman, and Bruette is near death. Stu is healthy though and just reading, looking anxious and curious.
We go to Ogunquit, Maine on June 20. Now, as you may know, June is my least favorite month of the year. It’s when everything bad happens. This film starts in June. The stuff in Maximum Overdrive is on June 19th. Stephen King gets it. June is awful. And speaking of awful, let’s meet the worst character and worst actress. Let’s meet Fran Goldsmith, her father, and Harold shows up. Now, if my memory is accurate, in the book, Harold is a chubby like 14-year-old, but due to content, they made him a late teen so that he was “legal” and that brings us to Corbin Nemec and Fran is played by Molly Ringwald. It is my assertion that she is the absolute worst aspect of this film. I know that she can act, but she is terrible here. Absolutely awful. I much preferred the novel’s version of her. Fran doesn’t like visits from Harold because he’s a bit obnoxious and has a crush on her. I do like Fran’s father, Peter, who is played by Ken Jenkins who was Dr. Kelso in Scrubs.
Harold asks Fran out, but she blows him off to go to a R.E.M. concert. She is kind of a dismissive bitch and Harold storms off, completely heartbroken. Fran and Peter have a look at the poem that Harold wrote for Fran. I feel like Fran had a bigger backstory, in the book, with her boyfriend and that helped. There is some talk of Jess, so I assume that is him. Aww, Peter misses his old lady. Oh, and he has a bad cough.
Back at the medical center, the doctors observe and test Stu, but he doesn’t want to talk to this lady and says no more tests. He wants to talk to a doctor. In comes Denninger in the full hazard suit. He will not shake Stu’s hand. Stu is all kinds of pissy and says that he will rip a hole in Denninger’s suit. Stu tells him to get out. He looks very uncomfortable.
In Shoyo, Arkansas on June 20th, we meet Nick Andros (Rob Lowe) who is walking alone at night and is deaf. 3 good ole boys jump Nick and beat him up because he’s deaf. Ray is the leader of this crew. A car is approaching so Ray leaves Nick unconscious in the middle of the road. The car stops just in time.
Nick wakes up in a cornfield, well let’s face it, he’s dreaming. Stephen King sure does like cornfields. Nick can hear and talk in his dreams and he is stoked. He meets a very old black lady on her front porch playing a guitar and singing. She knows Nick’s name. “Mayhap it is, mayhap it ain’t.” Her name is Abigail Freemantle, but they call her Mother Abigail. She is 106 years old and still makes her own bread in Hemingford Home, Nebraska. She is a nice godly woman, and she tells him to come to visit her with all of his friends. There’s a storm coming, “his” storm and we see a scarecrow with red eyes. That my friends was Randall Flagg. We’ll meet him later.
Nick wakes up in jail. There is the officer and the doctor who almost ran over Nick. They’re playing Gin Rummy, and the officer has a bad cough. The officer’s name is Johnny. Nick comes out of the cell and approaches them. “When I was a boy, we killed ourselves a mountain lion up in the hills, gutted it, and dragged it back to town. What was left of that critter was the sorriest sight I ever seen. You the second sorriest, boy.” That is what Johnny says to Nick. It’s one of the best lines in this series. The doctor is also pretty funny. “You got a name Babalugah?” Nick explains that he’s deaf and dumb. Johnny wants to know what happened to him. Nick says that his assailant had a ring like the sheriff, and Ray is the only other person in town with that ring.
At the Vermont Center for Disease Control on June 21st, Starkey is having a press conference denying the existence of a superflu. Also, this is where Stu is. Dr. Dietz is now visiting Stu and he brought a friend, Geraldo, a guinea pig. Geraldo has been breathing Stu’s room air for the past 3 days and is fine and frisky. Dietz tells Stu that the testing on him shall resume, with or without his cooperation. All the people from Arnette are dead. Stu grabs Dietz and two guys come in, but Stu has a hold of Dietz’s suit. Dietz tries to reason with Stu. Stu fucks with him with a fake cough. Aww, Stu wants them to take Geraldo with them. He should have kept him.
We’re on June 22nd and we’re back in Queens with Larry calling some strumpet in California. Her name is Arlene and sadly, she didn’t have much of a career but she is quite attractive. She tells him that he’s moved up to 9 on the charts and she tells him to delay his trip due to Captain Trips, the name of the flu. “Suddenly L.A. is a creepy place to stay.” No shit, Arlene. More arcade games. Larry accidentally bumps into this stellar guy named “The Rat Man”. Hey, Kareem is outside ringing a bell and screaming “Bring out your dead’ and then gets in Larry’s face and warns him about the man with no face. As a kid, that actually creeped me out.
Hello, we got some “Sharp Dressed Man” by ZZ Top in Burrack, Arizona on June 23. That’s just like how Paul Heyman says Brock Lesnar’s name. Here we meet Lloyd Henreid and his crazy partner in crime, Poke. I thought the novel was so much better in regard to these guys. I don’t want to get into the whole “the book is always better” thing. But I think it is fair to acknowledge specific things that the book did incredibly well. They are gonna rob the Echo Cafe. Lloyd comes in telling nobody to move and Poke just shoots and kills a lady. An old guy fires back and we have a gunfight on our hands. Yes, Poke is that friend that gets into too much trouble and doesn’t stick to the gameplan. The old guy got got. The last guy in there shoots Poke. Lloyd is out of ammo. He throws his gun. Oh, he was a deputy sheriff and the cops are already there. Lloyd is arrested. He sees Randall sitting on top of an electric pole. But it’s really just a crow.
Where Starkey is, I think California, but maybe Washington, not sure, the people are in a panic. Len reports that there is a large problem in Wyoming now. That’s right, Wyoming….large problem. Has that ever been said before? Video footage of flu victims and body dumps are now out there. Len is ordered to get that footage by any means necessary. I think that goes without saying.
We see a helicopter land and there are military putting up a roadblock. There’s a new coverage van that is asked to evacuate and the lady reporter is an idiot and pushes things too far. Lots of vehicles behind the van. The military wants all of their video footage. Martial Law has been declared, some guns are fired. I think the footage was successfully taken out. That problem is solved. Starkey is now starting to understand Yeats’ poetry.
Back in Shoyo, Arkansas, Ray is being a dick to Nick despite the fact that he is serving him and his crew some food. One of the guys is very sick and he can’t eat. The other one is super hungry. Ray is just pissed at everyone. Nick gives Ray his food, and Ray throws his beverage at Nick once he turns around. The doctor shows up and Johnny and his wife are dead. The doctor and Nick are two of the last people in Arkansas that’s still healthy. Now the hungry guy appears sick. The doc says that he has a cabin up in the woods and offers to let Nick stay there. Nick thinks that he has to be responsible for the prisoners. Ray promises to leave Nick alone as does the hungry man. Nick opens the cell to Rich first, he’s the sickest one. He doesn’t get up. Then he lets out the hungry man. Last up is Ray. Nick opens up his cell. Ray is such a dick and spits in Nick’s face. Nick sticks the gun in Ray’s belly the doc reminds Ray that things have changed. Ray coughs and then runs along. Nick won’t go with the doctor, he stays to keep an eye on Rich. Rich can’t really even drink water.
In Queens on June 24th, there are fires and gunshots as Larry is driving home. The man on the radio is Jeff Goldblum, which is always delightful. A bunch of people were killed and injured trying to leave the city via the Lincoln Tunnel. Larry opens the door to find his mom on the floor. She is dripping with sweat and looks like death. She is delusional, talking to Larry about finding his father at the bar. He gives her some of the medicine, but she just coughs it up. She warns Larry to watch out for the Dark Man. Larry makes a call but the hospital is busy. Mom sits up like the Undertaker screaming for Larry. She reminded me a bit of Zelda in the original Pet Semetary. Kareem is still out screaming and ringing his bell. Some dude is just shooting people while others are looting and getting fans and tipping over cop cars. God, New Yorkers are just the dumbest fucks. Like the city folk. Stupid then, stupid now.
Starkey just shot himself in the head with a note attached to him that says GUILTY. There are a few people still alive, including Len that are horrified. Rich looks to be dead too.
June 25th, Nick finds the doctor, and he’s dead. I can’t tell if those are just nasty growths and decay or if they are bullet holes. I gotta look this up. And I can’t even find a mention. Ray is behind Nick, talking shit. Right before Ray can attack, Nick sees a shadow on the car. He shoots Ray in the stomach. Nick screams, kinda. Kareem still wants to bring out your dead.
In Maine on June 26, Frannie is feeding her dad some food. He is sick and looks like hell. She feels fine, yippy, yay. BOOOOO! Dad wants her to turn on the radio so that he can listen to Rae Flowers, who is played by the great Kathy Bates. Rae is talking about Captain Trips and the military sightings. The first caller is Leonora, her daughter died and she sees soldiers burning bodies. Rae is seemingly anti-government. Well, the military has broken into the radio studio. This is all on-air live. They tell her to turn off her broadcast. She refuses so they gun her down. I love Kathy, but Rae deserved to go down.
NYC on June 27th, it’s night, buildings on fie, Kareem still screaming.
Maricopa County, Arizona on June 26, and there’s the Dark Man, and he sees a deer. He shoots it with some electricity so he can eat. The Dark Man can hear Kareem, so he makes him like instantly die and then the Dark Man’s eyes glow.
Stu is now in a cornfield. Get used to cornfields and dreams. You can imagine who he is about to meet. Mother Abigail calls him East Texas. He asks who she is. She informs him that the people that are holding him don’t plan on keeping him alive much longer. She talks about rats in the cornfield. He’s suddenly in the middle of the cornfield and can only hear Mother Abigail. He wanders and the Dark Man like startles or scares him. It was a jump scare. I think I may have jumped the first time that I saw this. No shame in being an idiot.
Stu wakes up and Dietz enters the room while holding a gun behind his back. Aww, Geraldo is dead. Stu asks what’s behind Dietz’s back and Dietz grabs the gun with his other hand like a 4-year-old caught stealing candy. It was silly but funny. Now they grapple after Stu distracts him with the TV. This fight is poorly done, almost slapstick. I’m enjoying it, but for all of the wrong reasons. Stu swept the leg and Dietz hit his head on the way down. Stu s the best around, no one’s gonna ever keep him down. He really could use some shoes though.
I admit this would be yet another terrifying thing for me. Being in some medical center, not knowing where I am, no shoes or socks, and everybody is supposedly dead. Hell no. I’ve had dreams like that and usually, I don’t mind nightmares, but that shit ain’t cool. Stu slowly looks around after exiting the room and Dietz gets up and Stu a jump scare. Stu shoots him in the belly because that’s the only place that they shoot people in this story? Now Stu goes down the hall of dead bodies and this is just a fuck no for me. At least the lights are bright. If it was dark, I would be paralyzed with fear. An elevator is stuck trying to closer on a wheelchair and then a dead doctor falls onto Stu. Then Stu runs and panics and falls on a dead guy. They start looking at him. He runs down the stairs but can’t get to the second floor. He runs down more stairs and some guy wants to eat chicken with him. Stu finally gets outside, runs, and then lays on the grass. He hears Mother Abigail tell him to visit real soon and to bring his friends. That whole scene was a big ass nightmare for me. Fuck that. Stu has to be wondering what friends he could possibly have since he gave up on Geraldo. Stu starts walking down a road.
End of Part One
I hate how VUDU has this as just one large file. It makes it a chore. I know, minor complaint. Like most Stephen King material, the beginning is often the best part, gets you hooked, and somewhere around the middle starts to decline. Watching this with fresh eyes, of course, that makes a lot of sense here. The intrigue is in the how and the why of the outbreak. The resolution is rarely gratifying. Consider every zombie or outbreak film. How often is the ending as good as the first half of the film? Night of the Living Dead, Walking Dead, Fear the Walking Dead, Outbreak, I Am Legend, Zombieland, 28 Days and Weeks Later, Dawn of the Dead, etc. There are exceptions to this, but they are few. The same applies to Stephen King’s films and stories. When you think of the films that have very good and memorable endings, you got some that you can make an argument for such as Carrie, The Shining, The Mist, Pet Semetary, and I’m already running out of steam. Horror in general typically fares better in the first half. The same applies to comedy films though. The first half is almost always funnier.
I loved part one of The Stand. So far, you don’t even know about Randall Flagg. You just know of this Dark Man. You get more creepy factors with him as a crow or his appearances in the dreams. Much like Nightmare on Elm Street, this is was Randall is in dark Freddy mode. He will slowly soften as we progress in some ways. To me, this is by far the scariest of the 4 parts. Even stuff that isn’t traditionally scary for a film, if you put yourself in that situation, it’s horrifying. Just imagine listening to a radio show and hearing about the military burning bodies and a radio show host getting executed on air.
I’m not saying that this is or will become our reality. All I’m saying is that I feel people are also unaware of how a few minor things being altered could have made this situation so much better or worse, butterfly effect style. It’s my belief that people are still underestimating the time frames that have been suggested about a potential return to normalcy. That shit is highly unlikely, but the optimists out there are really hoping. (Please note that I wrote this in April of 2020.)
Back to the topic at hand. I’d say that Stu was clearly the MVP of this chapter along with Starkey and Nick. I don’t think Ed Harris gets enough credit for how well he pulled this role off. He didn’t have much screen time, but what little he had, he really painted a vivid picture.
All the pictures used in this blog are for review purposes. They are the property of:
Please go find a copy and support the creators.