For the most part, I have been keeping the posts on this blog positive, and my intention with reviews was to do the same. But then I watched the Dark Tower movie, and witnessed what it did to my favorite book series. It left me with the need to stand up and say something.

The Dark Tower movie was easily the worst thing I saw in 2017. It was painful to try to get through that disjointed abomination.

It was obvious from the beginning that the writer/director did not bother to read the source material. Quite frankly, I’m not even sure he read the titles of the books. It was more than just trying to condense the content of an epic series into a 90 minute movie, he eliminated all but three of the characters, and changed almost the entire setting to earth, when only a small portion of the books are set there. Two of the greatest attributes of the series are character development and world building, and in a series of misguided key strokes the director eliminated both.

The number of inconsistencies with the series aside, the plot was so incoherent that if I hadn’t read the series I wouldn’t have been able to follow along. Seriously, this script may have been developed entirely by filling out a Mad Libs tablet with words he heard people who have read Dark Tower use. I’ve seen better stories written in crayon.

I feel bad for Idris Elba an Matthew McConaughey, who are both richly talented actors who did the best they could with the material they had. My guess is they signed the contract without reading the script, and once they read it they had no choice but to close their eyes and think of England.

I didn’t go into this movie with high expectations, the reviews (from professionals, not my drivel) were horrible and the internet was not kind. Rotten Tomatoes gave it a score of 16%, which is one of the lowest scores I have ever seen. Having now watched the film, I’d say the 16% of people who liked it need to be pistol-whipped using one of Roland’s guns.

I know that, with a few notable exceptions, Stephen King’s work has a history of not translating well to the screen.  But this sets the bar at a brand new low.

The director of this film forgot the face of his father, and we all suffered the consequences.