By Josh Hornbeck
The television anthology has gone the way of the dodo, what with the recent proliferation of serialized dramas and the excessive gluttony of reality TV filling our homes night after night. Gone are shows like “The Twilight Zone,” “The Outer Limits,” “Amazing Stories,” and “Tales from the Crypt,” programs designed to bring in new writers, directors, and cast members each week, every episode a short story to entertain and hopefully enlighten its audiences. Not every episode of an anthology is perfect, but the “short film” format allows the producers of a series to tackle darker subjects and create works with a bit of a bleaker, cautionary tone. But there’s not much of a market for anthology shows these days. Television audiences want the same recognizable characters they can see doing the same recognizable things week in and week out. But thankfully, TNT decided to take a risk and invest in “Nightmares & Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King,” an eight-episode miniseries assembling some of the best writers and directors of television and a phenomenal cast of actors from the big and small screen.
“Nightmares & Dreamscapes” is a collection of eight self-contained stories, all based on the short fiction of Stephen King. In “Battleground,” a hit-man is hunted by the toy soldiers of the CEO he murdered. “Crouch End” is a Lovecraft-ian tale of American tourists who get sucked into a hellish alternate world. In “Umney’s Last Case,” a successful mystery-writer trades place with the fiction gumshoe he created. “The End of the Whole Mess” tells the story of the end of the world at the hands of a pair of good-intentioned brothers. A horror writer is pursued by the subject of an evil painting in “The Road Virus Heads North.” In “The Fifth Quarter,” an ex-con is lured back into a life of crime by the promise of easy money. “Autopsy Room Four” gives us an autopsy from the perspective of the body on the table. Finally, in “You Know They Have a H**l of a Band,” a husband and wife on a road trip stumble upon a hellish heaven for dead rock stars.
As with any anthology series, the pieces in “Nightmares & Dreamscapes” are an uneven lot. Some are excellent, some are passable, and some are downright awful. With the fact that Stephen King is acknowledged horror writer, it’s interesting to note that the two worst pieces in the series are the two pure horror stories – “Crouch End” and “The Road Virus Heads North.” The writing is horrible and their attempts at stylized storytelling merely obscure the plot and keep us from fully engaging with anything that happens onscreen. “Umney’s Last Case” is the most satisfying of the pieces, with William H. Macy giving two of the best performances in the series – as both the mystery writer and the fictional character with which he trades places. It’s a fascinating premise, but King and the creators of the series use it to explore loss, grief and our need for escape. Others, like “Battleground” and “The Fifth Quarter” are fun and consistent, but unremarkable. No matter how poor its ending might be, I defy anyone to watch “Autopsy Room Four” and not find themselves glued firmly to the edge of their seat. But however mixed the offerings may be, “Nightmares & Dreamscapes” is certainly a wonderful addition to the history of televised anthologies.
One common theme that rings throughout the pieces is the notion that we all make mistakes, but when we fail to acknowledge them we end up in more trouble than when we started. In “You Know They Have a H**l of a Band,” Clark gets lost and refuses to admit that there is a problem. “We’ll just keep going and hit the freeway eventually,” he tells his wife. But their detour winds up taking them directly to a town they are never able to leave. Howard, in “Autopsy Room Four,” is a reckless man who never acknowledges the possible consequences of his actions until his finds himself paralyzed and near-death on the autopsy room table. “Crouch End” features another couple who are unable to admit that they may have made a mistake – ignoring all of the advice they’ve been given – by trying to go to an area of town they should have stayed far away from.
We all make mistakes in our lives, we all sin and stumble and fall. And yet we are so often unable to admit those mistakes, to confess our sin. We’re afraid of admitting that we were wrong, that we messed up. So we fall and then jump to our feet as quickly as we can, denying that the fall ever took place. We’re worried that others will see us as less than perfect, that they will judge us for our failings. If we want to truly grow in our lives as Christians, if we want to grow and mature as the church of Christ, we must get over this fear of being open and honest and real with one another. We have to have the courage to admit our failings and weaknesses, we have to be able to admit that we have sinned. It’s only when we are honest with one another that we can encourage and carry each another, growing more and more into the image of Christ.
“Battleground” takes a different variation on this theme. John, a hit-man, is paid very well for the murders he commits and lives a very nice life. He obviously doesn’t have any qualms about his job. He likes the money and likes the things he is able to do with this money. He doesn’t see that anything he is doing is wrong. But his latest killing, the CEO of a toy company, has sparked the vengeance of a battalion of toy soldiers. They entrench themselves in his penthouse condo and riddle him with tiny bullets. At one point, John is cornered in the bathroom and the soldiers pass a note under the door, offering him a chance to surrender, a chance to pay for his crimes and possibly survive the night. But John scribbles out a “Screw You!” back and continues fighting. In the end, he dies, a victim of his own crimes.
So often, we allow ourselves to simply dwell in the midst of our sin and mistakes. We don’t acknowledge our sin, not because we’re afraid of admitting that we were wrong, but because we don’t actually want to give them up. When we’re confronted – by our conscience, by our friends, by God – we feel attacked. We feel cornered. And the offer to surrender doesn’t seem to be much of an offer at all. We want to shout out “Screw You!” to the people we feel are attacking us. But the truth of the matter is, we do need to surrender. It’s what life in Christ is about – surrendering our lives to him and allowing him to work out his will in everything we do. If we don’t, we’ll end up like John, dead in our sin. It may not be a physical death. If you’ve found life in Christ, it may not even mean hell. But it does mean a spiritual deadness that is far removed from the life Christ has for us to live.
But so few of us in our culture want to surrender to Christ or surrender to the reality of life in this world. We want to remove ourselves into a fantasy where nothing is wrong and everything works out the way we want it to. This is Sam’s wish in the finest hour of “Nightmares & Dreamscapes,” the episode “Umney’s Last Case.” Sam and his wife have tragically lost their child and Sam decides that the only way for him to cope with his grief is to escape the reality of his child’s death by entering the world of his fictional private eye, Clyde Umney. So Sam writes himself into the story and Clyde into the real world. But as much as Sam hopes for the simple clarity of a fictional world, he discovers that he really can’t escape the pain of his life – it even intrudes in on the fictional world. And in trying to escape his pain, he causes even more grief for his wife and the people he left behind.
Every one of us has to come face to face with grief and tragedy in this world – it’s part of the brokenness of fallen humanity. But we are constantly trying to escape this pain. Some of us try to escape through more obvious means – drugs or sex or alcohol. For others, this escape takes subtler forms. Some pour themselves into work so that they don’t have to face the reality of life. Others pour their time into possessions or relationships. We can even pour ourselves out into religion. While our work, our things, our friendships and our faith are not necessarily bad, when we use them as a way to escape from the realities of this life they can become idols – unhealthy crutches we cling to. Now, I’m not saying faith is wrong, but as Christians we are called to a genuine and honest faith that confronts the hard realities of this world. That means acknowledging grief. When a loved one dies, we have a hope that comes from the confidence that they are whole and with Christ, but their loss is still painful. To ignore this, to succumb to silly religious platitudes, is to be living with a shallow faith and using this shallow faith to hide from the truth.
With eight separate stories, there are many other themes and ideas to discuss than I have time for in this already long essay. The show may not be perfect – and it will certainly be a little scary and unnerving for some – but it is an interesting series that gives us something to think about and more than a few things to discuss. That’s more than you can say about a lot of television.
There is some profanity scattered throughout the series. There isn’t a lot, and it never feels too gratuitous. There is some discussion of sex in “Autopsy Room Four” and “The Fifth Quarter,” but it’s pretty mild and not explicit.
There is some mild sexual content throughout the series. Sex is implied or mentioned, but nothing is shown.
There is a lot of violence in the series. It is television violence, so it never gets too graphic, but there are some gunshots (with blood) in a few of the stories. Both “Crouch End” and “The Road Virus Heads North” are the most graphic. They are also filled with the most frightening images. They are horror stories, but they are unnerving nonetheless.
(Posted 01/19/2007)
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Discussion Guides:
Episode 1
Episode 2
Episode 3
Episode 4
Episode 5
Episode 6
Episode 7
Episode 8