A new Running Man movie that takes its beats from the book will make a great new take on an old fav.
I've been meaning to tell a large group of people this since I first read the book The Running Man by Stephen King. Thanks for being a part of that group.
The book's story takes place in the dystopian not-too-distant future just like the movie does. The premise is basically the same; man 'runs for his life', or evades being actively hunted, in defiance of overwhelming odds in a game show designed to literally kill him. The odds are stacked against him. Not only does he plan on winning, but he plans on exposing the show itself to the world as the calloused machine it is, feeding off of a coctail of celebrity worship run amok and a gladiatorial thirst for carnage. This is about all the book and the movie have in common. The movie is not a very accurate adaptation.
The movie's protagonist Ben Richards (aka Arnold) was 'running' for his freedom from a war crime he did not commit. In the book, Richards was running for money for medicine for his dying daughter. The Running Man game show came to Arnold because he was a military bad ass who they could bribe with his freedom in exchange for ratings. The 'running men' so far weren't cutting it as it turns out, and viewers mean money. So they came to Arnold in an attempt at a 'Look, you scratch our backs, we scratch yours' type deal.
In the book though, Richards was an out of work laborer with a child dying from pneumonia. Every raspy breath filled Richards with hate toward the establishment, the system rigged from the start that kept his family in poverty and pollution and his daughter from the medicine she sorely needed just to die comfortably. In the book Ben Richards approached the show; he was a very desperate and shaken man at his wit's end, with no where left to go and nothing to lose.
But here's the big, big difference between the book and the movie that would be the angle for an amazing new movie or mini-series: Instead of The Running Man game show taking place in a huge death studio à la American Gladiators, like it did in the movie, The Running Man game show should take place across the entire continental US, just like it does in the book.
The book idea was simply this: It's 2025. In a twisted game show called "The Running Man", each contestant or Running Man had 30 days to evade both the "Hunters", a studio paid group of villianous clandestine operatives who's only job is to bracket and kill this week's Running Man, and to also evade literally everyone else watching the show. The Running Man game show paid viewers for verified sightings of an active Running Man. Every day that a Running Man could evade detection meant more money for him, and the final prize was one billion dollars. The real-life sighting of a Running Man when submitted to the studio would get you a cash prize! A sighting that led to the kill of a Running Man meant you got a much, much larger cash prize. Naturally everyone was looking for the contestant, and it was the highest rated television show ever. The standing record for a Running Man in the show's history was eight days.
Make a new Running Man but make it beat for beat to the tone of the book (novella? It felt way too short). The 80s movie worked well for the 80s maybe, but after reading the book years ago I was like, what a missed opportunity. The book had action, explosions, heart-wrenching family drama, class warfare, education surpression, more explosions, and lots of revenge. I'm underselling it really; after writing this little rant I've had a moment to reflect on how sickly real and current this science-fiction book feels. I can't imagine with as many eggs as studios have laid over the years that a proper book adaptation of The Running Man wouldn't do well. The 'viewer sightings' angle in the book was included before cell phones were even a thing; how amazing a detail would that be to include, it's so dystopian I can already see it...this week's episode of The Running Man opens with a 'faithful home viewer' livestreaming witnessing a Running Man after several days of running...The cheers and awards going out instantly to the viewer over their cell phone and simultaneously broadcast worldwide live, directly over video proof of the latest Running Man cornered in an alley, the last vestiges of a confident contestant who thought they'd be the one to beat the system only to be this week's gif, crawling away from a barage of bullets from the Hunters, his left arm and the side of his face blown clean off, but he's still firing a gun with his right. One of the Hunters collapses. The alleyway fills with people phones first, hoping to get a verified sighting so they can claim their cash prize. One of the bystanders catches a stray bullet clean through what he's recording on his phone and into his brain pitching him backward into the crowd, the other cell phones keep recording, the crowd closing in... the casino-style sound effects rise with the thumping of gunfire. The Running Man falls, a typically violent end which can be calculated to the second in prize money and TV ratings, and which will all be old news in a few days. We'llberightbackafterthis. Ben Richards turns the TV off, his daughter coughing her lungs out in the next room. He knows he has to do something, now. Richards is running out of time, running out of money, running out of patience. Ben Richards is running...