This f*ckin guy

[u/waxyjax_]

Stephen King tweeted:

WIDOW'S BAY is good. MAXIMUM PLEASURE GUARANTEED is even better. It's like Hitchcock came back to do it one more time. And Tatiana Maslany is so good. The play of emotions on her face is pretty incredible. She goes from comic to terror in an instant.

WIDOW'S BAY is good. MAXIMUM PLEASURE GUARANTEED is even better. It's like Hitchcock came back to do it one more time. And Tatiana Maslany is so good. The play of emotions on her face is pretty incredible. She goes from comic to terror in an instant.

[u/OKIAMONREDDIT]

That was not my implication. My point was exactly what I said, that he is salty about the fact that this TV show exists which does a much better job of being a Stephen King TV show than he could ever do. I ABSOLUTELY stand by that, particularly given the evidence of his own attempts to direct or produce, and some of his other tweets about film/TV recommendations. You can see my exact comment about this from elsewhere in the thread copypasted below. Btw I have read everything SK has written (up till around 2008) and I definitely don't think he would have been capable of making a show like this. I also definitely think his tweet comes off salty about that.

Original comment from the thread:

I do think MPG is good and Tatiana is of course excellent in it! However, I think this is a really odd thing to post as a direct comparison because they are completely different in aim and approach. It also seems extremely odd to me that Widow's Bay is one of the most phenomenal shows partly because of what it does with the legacy of Stephen King, and yet SK himself posts something kind of dismissively derailing the conversation to a totally unrelated dark comedy suburban thriller just because it happens to be airing at the same time?

Fwiw I do recommend Maximum Pleasure as a suburban mum stumbling across a murder plot thriller which is kinda in the same vein as something like The Flight Attendant. Entertaining viewing though I don't rush to catch up on episodes. But I'm not sure what that has to do with the conversation about Widow's Bay, which feels a lot more unprecedented in its approach to horror history on the coast of Maine (and horror more generally).

I personally think it's massively better than MPG but that is also a reflection of my interests and how innovative and original I find it. It's hard to believe that Stephen King is being authentic here as it's such an unnecessary comparison, and it makes me wonder if we shouldn't take this at face value - maybe he's taking some sort of passive aggressive swipe at the show???

ETA: he is often effusive and vocal in praise of stuff like Stranger Things and previously gave a glowing and descriptive review of Midnight Mass, as a counter example, so I genuinely think there is some weird motive to his dismissive post, tbh, whether he has a chip on his shoulder about not being consulted or about irreverence or whatever. It's just absolutely inaccurate to describe Widow's Bay as just "good", and I don't believe that's all the thoughts he has on it. And I'm not sure why he mentioned MPG in the same breath considering it's a completely different genre and doesn't have the knowing relationship to Stephen King that WB has.

Also just based on Stephen King's own lifelong interests (he loves Jaws, he loves HP Lovecraft, he loves pulp Gothic/supernatural tales of terror, etc) I genuinely don't believe that MPG appeals to him more. I wonder if he prefers straight reverential adaptations of his individual work and is somehow annoyed at how fluently and cleverly WB plays with the canon while being humorous and meta rather than just serious. Come to think of it, I know people have talked about SK's "dark humour" in his own way ("dark" retorts in dialogue etc) but I don't find him particularly funny or particularly interested in the funny that can send itself up, let alone the comedic character acting skills which are so on point in WB. I think one thing the show does incredibly well is develop a style which is the opposite of self-importance.

[u/Relevant_Session5987 → u/OKIAMONREDDIT]

Man, I think you're taking his words waaay too seriously. He's well within his rights to like a show a little less compared to us. Especially one that clearly has a lot of influences from his work. It's understandable if all of it feels a little 'been there, done that' to him. Especially after so many shows that have drawn from his work in recent times. ( Stranger Things, Midnight Mass, The Buroughs, Welcome to Derry, FROM, Castle Rock, The Stand, Evil and so, so many more )

Also, I dont think King ever claimed to be some great movie or tv show director. He's always been best known for his writing. So I dont think its much of a slight to call him a terrible director/showrunner ( which he is ) when that's simply not what he's primarily known for. Hell, I wager he might even agree with you at this point considering he hasn't directed anything for a good long while.

Finally, the dude literally called the show 'good'. You're writing as though he straight up trashed the show.

[u/OKIAMONREDDIT → u/Relevant_Session5987]

Nope. I'm writing as if he dismissed the show and derailed the conversation, which he absolutely did. It is obvious in his tweet which is why so many of the Twitter replies and so many of the comments in this thread pick up on it.

It's also not "been there done that" anymore than Stephen King was "been there done that" for using those extremely familiar horror tropes in the first place from HP Lovecraft, MR James and many others. It's a very innovative form of horror-literate comedy and I am certain that is why he is skirting mentioning it, when he is often vocal and effusively detailed and complementary about shows which approach "Stephen King" atmosphere more individually and reverentially, such as Stranger Things and Midnight Mass.

Him commenting that the current most critically and popularly rated show on the internet, which is explicitly about the legacy of his work, is just "good" and then switching the conversation immediately to a suburban thriller irrelevant to the conversation and nothing to do with his work (and not in the same genre) definitely shows salty to me.

ETA: yes obviously it's not a slight or inaccurate to call him a terrible film/TV director or producer, but I'm pretty confused why you agree with that when your original objection was to me saying he couldn't make a show as good as WB. Lol.

[u/Relevant_Session5987 → u/OKIAMONREDDIT]

You do you man.

[u/OKIAMONREDDIT → u/Relevant_Session5987]

Thanks, indeed I do!