wotsonurmind Same problem as before with Netflix. The story is based on a book by Stephen King which to anyone who has read it is almost made for a single season of TV Series. The story is succint and although not brilliant is serviceable enough. The TV adaptation actually embraces this concept whole heartedly and starts of perfectly with a good pilot episode,followed by good additional ones slowly pushing the characters to the audience. Somewhere after the fifth episode (maybe around the time,someone warned them of extension to a second season), literally very little happens. The characters slowly become a parody of themselves as an attempt is made to film an epsiode where literally nothing happens other than a particular character dying and so on. Then it becomes complete garbage with cliched options given to the actors and everyone trying their best to not do anything and just push the entire plotline to the second season. Netflix producers had the option of starting a new story for the second season instead of having no conclusion at all.Watch 'The Sinner' for example to see how to answer most questions and have good story going on for the entire series.

fallguy_jack The butchery of Stephen King's work was supposed to spare this, at least from what I was told and read. It was sadly not the case. There is no horror, no thrills, it was just uncomfortable for extended periods. If uncomfortableness is what the director was going for, then well done... I guess. That seems more like a low budget script tactic than a King adaptation, or at least it did before recent times. Tactic: Make the characters/scenes gross and uncomfortable to look at and then make the scene way, way too long. The same effect could have been achieved with a really slow slide show. The worst part is that there were plenty of actually terrifying things in the story that could have easily been capitalized on - they were plot points for crying out loud! But no, totally glossed over in favor of overly long shots that had already made their points in seconds. But no, sit there for a while and wait.The cast did a great job, there is no fault in the acting. The director would create multi-car piles on single lane one way streets. I really had to force myself to get through the second half of the episodes, from 4 in two days to the last 6 over two weeks.Caveat Emptor.

leftover I haven't read the books so I cannot attest to the quality of the adaptation, but Mr. Mercedes had to be better than The Mist. This series starts out great, gets terribly tedious in the middle, then picks up nicely flowing into a great finale. It's got a great cast and is well produced. Not too predictable. And provides a nice introduction to the other Bill Hodges stories. It would have had much more punch had a few middle episodes been trimmed, but I wouldn't call that a deal killer. "Hard boiled" detective drama it's not, but it's engaging and entertaining and, like I said, infinitely better than The Mist.

pgooden I am not a SK fan and don't like the movies born out of his novels - I do make an exception here - The villain was ably portrayed so well that were I working with him I would opt for a different shift - The cop , well underplayed but maybe that was the point but as I read the other reviews they all say the adaption was well done and I think Dennis Lehane, my favorite author very well had something to do with that.