I will tell you what...I partially agree with the previous comment on the length of the shows. However, in the first show "Battleground" I felt that the utter lack of dialog added immensely to the tension, and although I was skeptical about how to animate the army men, I was incredibly impressed.
I didn't like "Crouch End" when I read it, so I wasn't anticipating liking the show, and I didn't. It was very long and unnecessarily melodramatic. I felt that they could have picked a comatose actress to play the lead and she would have been better. Not a big fan of the overly expressive actors. Play it down folks.
As for "Umney's Last Case", the show was a lot different than the story, but it was still a good piece. I don't know that I would've chosen William H. Macy as Umney (although he is a great actor, don't get me wrong).
"The End of the Whole Mess" was the most faithful adaptation of book to movie, but it also felt the longest of the four that I've seen. I was curious as to how they were going to show the depletion of the narrator, because in the book he was writing, and you could tell that he was slipping by the way that he spelled some words or had to break off in the middle of a sentence. I thought the video-camera was a nice touch.
I'm looking most forward to "You Know They Got A Hell of A Band" and I'm also very curious about "The Fifth Quarter", but if I had to guess, I think the best of the eight episodes will be "The Road Virus Heads North" only because from a literary standpoint, the visuals in that story are the most compelling.
I'm a huge fan of Stephen King's, and I will always watch any film or T.V. adaptation that he gets behind, but I am often of the persuasion that a movie takes away from some of the individuality and imagination of actually reading the book. Ever after, the re-reading of those stories will be tainted by certain actors that played certain roles, or changes in the movies will effect the way you read the books, and I find that to be kind of a shame.
I didn't like "Crouch End" when I read it, so I wasn't anticipating liking the show, and I didn't. It was very long and unnecessarily melodramatic. I felt that they could have picked a comatose actress to play the lead and she would have been better. Not a big fan of the overly expressive actors. Play it down folks.
As for "Umney's Last Case", the show was a lot different than the story, but it was still a good piece. I don't know that I would've chosen William H. Macy as Umney (although he is a great actor, don't get me wrong).
"The End of the Whole Mess" was the most faithful adaptation of book to movie, but it also felt the longest of the four that I've seen. I was curious as to how they were going to show the depletion of the narrator, because in the book he was writing, and you could tell that he was slipping by the way that he spelled some words or had to break off in the middle of a sentence. I thought the video-camera was a nice touch.
I'm looking most forward to "You Know They Got A Hell of A Band" and I'm also very curious about "The Fifth Quarter", but if I had to guess, I think the best of the eight episodes will be "The Road Virus Heads North" only because from a literary standpoint, the visuals in that story are the most compelling.
I'm a huge fan of Stephen King's, and I will always watch any film or T.V. adaptation that he gets behind, but I am often of the persuasion that a movie takes away from some of the individuality and imagination of actually reading the book. Ever after, the re-reading of those stories will be tainted by certain actors that played certain roles, or changes in the movies will effect the way you read the books, and I find that to be kind of a shame.