Review: The Outsider

On January 12, 2020, HBO will premiere a new series titled The Outsider, which is based on the novel by Stephen King of the same name.

The show opens up with the discovery of an 11 year old boy’s lifeless and nude body in the park named Frankie. 

An arrest is made quickly. It’s not some outsider, but one of the town’s most well-liked citizens-Terry Maitland (Jason Bateman) who is a little league coach, teacher, father and husband.

Detective Ralph Anderson (Paul Mendelsohn) has everything it needs to convict him, but does he have the right person?

There is also a lot of circumstantial evidence and a video that shows Maitland was somewhere else at the time of his murder.

His wife Holly (Julianne Nicholson) continues to maintain his innocence, but Detective Anderson doesn’t really want to hear it.

True to Stephen King’s style, strange things start to happen like supernatural-ish stuff that’s hard to explain such as dark, hooded figures in bedrooms, mutilated deer and words written in blood  appearing suddenly on the skin. All that is accompanied by blood, fire and the dreaded spiders.

In other words, all things that Detective Anderson can’t explain through evidence.

Stephen King has stated that The Outsider (along with Stand By Me) are his two favorite works and is a little concerned that the showrunners may stray a bit from the book, but that doesn’t appear to be the case.

Many of his novels that have been adapted for movies such as The Shining, Misery, Needful Things and Cujo did stray a bit.

Most writers tend to have issues when people take a creative licensing hatchet to their work.

However, it doesn’t seem to be the case with HBO.

Also appearing in this show are: Cynthia Erivo, Bill Camp, Mare Winningham, Paddy Considine, Marc Menchaca, Yul Vazquez, Jeremy Bobb, and Hettienne Park.

The show will have 10 episodes and is surely going to keep King’s legion of fans happy as well as garner him some new followers.