First look at Mike Flanagan’s Carrie series

The first-look images of The Haunting of Hill House director Mike Flanagan’s updated version of Carrie, based on Stephen King’s debut novella of the same title, have been released. The miniseries will see Summer H. Howell appear in the titular role of a bullied, isolated girl who discovers she has a telekinetic gift.

Additional cast members include Siena Agudong, Alison Thornton, Thalia Dudek, Amber Midthunder, Josie Totah, Arthur Conti, and Joel Oulette, with Matthew Lillard and Samantha Sloyan also appearing.

Upon the images’ release, the director discussed his approach to retelling King’s hit debut novel, stating, “Typically, when you’re adapting a Stephen King book, the mission is completely different. It’s about, How do you make it smaller?”

“This was the complete inverse,” Flanagan added. “If we’re going to tell the story of Carrie White in longform, how do we make it expand?”

Flanagan acknowledges the Society director Brian De Palma “adapted [the book] faithfully and beautifully 50 years ago” in not only the most famous take on King’s work, but one of the most recognised and loved horror films ever made.

Sissy Spacek took on the titular role in 1976, appearing alongside Piper Laurie, Amy Irving, Nancy Allen, William Katt, P. J. Soles, Betty Buckley, and John Travolta. This film adaptation was followed by a 1999 sequel directed by Katt Shea, a 2002 television film, and a 2013 adaptation starring Chloë Grace Moretz. 

Flanagan also expressed an understanding of the horror author’s messaging about the dangers of bullying and cruelty forced onto those who are different, threading in a modern take with the ongoing rise and significance of social media dominating contemporary teens’ lives and mental states.

“The themes that [King] was talking about half a century ago, of kindness versus cruelty, of empathy and bullying, and of violence at school, have become even more relevant today than he could have contemplated because of our relationship to technology and the degree to which violence encroaches on our high schoolers, especially in the United States,” the director shares. “So that meant we had an opportunity to tell a story about a modern teenage experience that could use the seeds of these characters King created 50 years ago, but express them completely differently.”

Flanagan is also taking on King’s The Mist novella alongside a new adaptation of William Blatty’s supernatural horror book The Exorcist.

Carrie is set for Prime Video this Autumn.

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