(Warner Bros. Home Entertainment provided me with a free copy of the Blu-ray TM I reviewed in this blog post. The opinions I share are my own.)
Originally posted on 7/18/20
I used to pick up a Stephen King novel and just get swallowed up in it. At its best, his work would draw me in, wring me out, and leave me stunned. I would binge-read one of those big, deeply involving books and loathe to put down until I'd rushed headlong through the whole thing.
It's been a while since I got that feeling, but it came rushing back when I started watching the 3-disc, 10-episode Blu-ray collection of THE OUTSIDER:THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), HBO's adaptation of the King novel in which a smalltown boy is horribly murdered in the woods by a man whose DNA and fingerprints are all over the crime scene and there are eyewitnesses who can positively identify him.
The trouble is--and this is where you can picture King gleefully setting his literary trap for us--that the man, Terry Maitland (Jason Bateman), the boy's little league baseball coach, who has a devoted wife and two daughters and has never shown any indication towards violence or untoward behavior, can also be positively identified both by eyewitnesses and video footage as being in a town 70 miles away at the exact moment the murder occurred.
Thus, the story starts out like a really puzzling murder mystery of the "locked room" variety--that is, one in which there seems to be no possible explanation even though the investigators know that, logically, there must be one. It takes a while to dawn on us and them that, in this case, the strict rules of logic aren't being followed by whoever or whatever is responsible.
I was shocked to find that the series' star, Ben Mendelsohn, played the sniveling Daggett in THE DARK KNIGHT RISES. As Ralph Anderson, lead investigator on the case, he's a solid guy we can pull for to get to the bottom of things despite his own self-doubts, even when we find him maddeningly skeptical of anything resembling the supernatural.
Ralph's wife Jeannie, played by the great Mare Winningham (an Oscar® nominee for GEORGIA), shares with him a lingering grief over the death of their own young son, making their relationship a turbulent one that is exacerbated by their current circumstances.
Of the rest of the rather large cast playing interesting and diverse smalltown personalities, the standout for me is Cynthia Erivo as the incredibly eccentric private investigator Holly Gibney.
Holly is one of those characters--like Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot--whose every move and utterance holds the viewer in keen anticipation. (Clearly, Stephen King had a ball creating her, as did Erivo in bringing her to life.)
Though something of a societal misfit, maybe even an oddball, Holly has a mind like a search engine and is perceptive to the point of being psychic. These qualities tend to intimidate others and set her apart from normal society, making social interactions difficult. It also makes her a clear threat to the elusive and darkly malevolent subject of their desperate search.
When the case takes its inevitable turn toward the supernatural thanks to her dogged investigation, Holly is the one who must suffer the withering scorn of both her peers as well as the family members involved in the case who are still wracked with unrelenting grief.
King explores every detail of the emotional distress which all of the characters must bear during what will be the most grueling and ultimately horrific ordeal of their entire lives, all the while keeping us on edge waiting with bated breath for the worst to happen at every turn.
The production itself is a visual page-turner whose first couple of episodes move at a fast clip, hooking the viewer with its sensational premise. Then the whole thing slows down and settles into a maddeningly deliberate pace which makes us wait in constant suspense for each story point to unfold.
The direction is considerably well-done, often rather disorienting in that much is shown in wide, informal camera shots with few closeups, distancing us from the action and forcing us to seek out what's going on, especially in the many scenes that take place in creepy dark rooms or other murky locations.
This may, in fact, be the most darkly-lit movie I've ever seen. Often characters wander slowly through a scene in almost total darkness, making us want to scream for them to turn on a light before something jumps out at them. It gets even worse when something indeed appears in the form of a hooded figure whom Ralph keeps insisting is merely a dream although we know he isn't.
Jason Bateman sets the standard high with his sharp and imaginative direction of the first two episodes--he's better at it than whoever directed him in the last couple of things I've seen him in--while his portrayal of accused child-murder Terry Maitland is just as expertly done.
The ten episodes are easily one of the most watchable television productions I've ever seen, climaxing with King's usual catastrophic clash between good and evil in which characters we've grown close to must die while others are irrevocably changed by the horrific experience.
I found the story's resolution more satisfying than I expected after all the build-up, and an extended denoument takes its time in decompressing us after all that tension. (Don't miss the final scene which occurs after the end credits have already begun.)
Like some of King's best older work such as "The Stand" and "It", THE OUTSIDER:THE COMPLETE FIRST SEASON gives us a disparate collection of characters who eventually must come together against all odds to oppose a terrifying and seemingly invincible unknown enemy that they can barely begin to understand. As a superbly wrought work of horror-suspense cinema, this is one of the best Stephen King novels that I never read.
BONUS FEATURES
EL CUCO. THE BABA YAGA. THE OUTSIDER – All New Featurette
Invitation to Set
Stephen King and The Outsider
Jason Bateman and The Outsider
Adapting The Outsider
Analyzing Holly Gibney
The Outsider: Inside Episodes 1-10
10 ONE-HOUR EPISODES
Fish in a Barrel
Roanoke
Dark Uncle
Que Viene el Coco
Tear-Drinker
The One About The Yiddish Vampire
In the Pines, In the Pines
Foxhead
Tigers and Bears
Must/Can't
DIGITAL
The Outsider is now available to own on Digital. Digital purchase allows consumers to instantly stream and download to watch anywhere and anytime on their favorite devices. Digital movies and TV shows are available from various digital retailers including Amazon Video, iTunes, Google Play, Vudu and others. A Digital Copy is also included with the purchase of specially marked Blu-ray discs for redemption and cloud storage.
BASICS
Street Date: June 9, 2020
Order Due Date: May 5, 2020
BD and DVD Presented in 16x9 widescreen format
Running Time: Feature: Approx. 600 min
Enhanced Content: Approx. 40 min
DVD
Price: $29.99 SRP ($34.99 in Canada)
3 DVD-9s
Audio – English (5.1), French
Subtitles – English, French
BLU-RAY
Price: $39.99 SRP ($44.99 in Canada)
3 BD-50s
Audio – DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 – English
BD Subtitles – English, French
Read our original coverage HERE
