Stephen King's 'The Mist' Inspires A New TV Series

Just because a Stephen King story has been adapted in one medium doesn't make it off-limits for another, especially in the peak TV year of 2015. The Shining is the most obvious example of a successful film that was mounted on television, and now there's a development effort to create The Mist as a TV series.

But this doesn't sound like a script re-adaptation of the novella. Rather, The Mist TV series may be something more inspired by the original story than directly based on it, and therefore a story (or set of stories) that can sit alongside Frank Darabont's excellent film.

Deadline says that Dimension Television, part of The Weinstein Company, is developing The Mist TV series, with the blessing of Stephen King and a script from Christian Torpe.

Here's how the site describes the show, with this wording probably coming straight from the producers:

The series will tell an original story about a seemingly innocuous mist that seeps into a small town but contains limitless havoc. From psychological terrors to otherworldly creatures, the mist causes the town residents' darkest demons to appear forcing them to battle the supernatural event and, more importantly, each other.

I think even big fans of the movie would agree that there are other stories hiding in The Mist, waiting to be told. In a television landscape featuring two Walking Dead TV shows and other popular horror, mystery and thriller series, this is almost a no-brainer. That seems to be what Bob Weinstein is promising when he says,

The terror and drama in Stephen King's novella are so vast that we felt serialized television is the best place to explore them in greater depth. With this show, Christian has created a fascinating band of characters and a story with infinite scares.

The great thing is that, the way TV is now, we don't even have to assume that the series will shy away from the divisive (by which I mean excellent) gut-punch ending of Darabont's film. Television stories tend to be even more ruthless than mainstream horror films at this point, so perhaps The Mist will be an appropriately freaky, occasionally troubling series. (Sadly, it probably won't ever be in black and white.)

We don't have any info on when a pilot for The Mist might shoot.

Here's the trailer for Darabont's film, followed by the director talking about that black and white version of the film that was on the special edition DVD.