Stephen King's The Monkey: A Fresh Start After Salem's Lot's Remake
Stephen King's The Monkey: A Fresh Take After a Divisive Remake
Get ready for another Stephen King adaptation; but before we discuss this new story, we need to discuss the elephant in the room. There are tons of King adaptations that have had a varying range of success over the decades; but let's address this: 2024's Salem's Lot remake is coming to an end, and it received somewhat mixed reactions among viewers and critics; the divisive reviews aren't something audiences want to deal with often when watching this particular writer's novels get adapted to film, it greatly affects a future project; however, the latest project adapting King's work will try to achieve its own, original and much better approach! That's great news for fans. And this new adaptation provides immense possibilities.
There is a new adaptation on the horizon: The Monkey! It has some serious advantages going for it after that problematic Salem’s Lot remake, including some key points which demonstrate some interesting possibilities that greatly elevate its overall production!
The Monkey: A New Adventure, No Pre-Existing Expectations to Manage
Salem’s Lot has been adapted before; multiple times. Those older TV miniseries adaptations are considered highly successful, building immense anticipation around the 2024 remake–which underperformed. Yet, what happened?
The 2024 version, featuring Lewis Pullman as Ben Mears, currently has that very mediocre score from Rotten Tomatoes. People found issues; they used existing expectations and comparisons against those older iterations to assess what they wanted, causing criticism against a film that clearly didn't capture those exact qualities previously provided.
But this isn’t something that The Monkey has to worry about! It's never been adapted to either a film or a TV show. Yes, a short film came out earlier. But 2025 marks a totally brand new attempt. That means the film’s potential remains completely unaffected and unbound from the potentially very negative and troublesome baggage; which could become huge risks for any adaptation that had a troubled, less than impressive previous adaptation already associated to its overall storytelling. Those viewers don't bring their negativity when assessing and understanding the overall storytelling – an immense upside and one thing that every creative individual in filmmaking always looks for! And no previous success has to be copied.
A Renowned Director at the Helm
There is even greater good news: The Monkey is being directed (and written) by Osgood Perkins. This is truly huge! He's behind Longlegs a recent and well-received horror movie starring Nicolas Cage. It received great critical acclaim with its Rotten Tomatoes score; which exceeded 85%. It became a massive box office hit too— making $108.9 million on a $10 million budget; exceeding all expectations. It’s important to show the importance of getting these creative decisions completely right – using some of these names alone to bring critical acclaim, this clearly demonstrates some very powerful implications toward that existing fandom.
And those successes create more confidence toward any new Stephen King adaptations–creating positive anticipation!
The Monkey: An Original Stephen King Story For An Exciting New Movie
The source material – the 1980 short story "The Monkey" is classic Stephen King! It focuses on twin brothers discovering a cursed monkey toy. Whenever this thing clangs its cymbals, someone close dies! This becomes the basis of a creepy thriller that explores family and destiny!
Conclusion: High Hopes for The Monkey’s Debut!
The Monkey has many advantages going for it; far different from that Salem’s Lot remake! A fresh story; no comparison to previous works to generate problematic issues, coupled with a highly renowned director – those are just a few ingredients for creating something utterly memorable, especially if these plot elements come into a singular conclusion for this new Stephen King movie and its possible spinoffs. The box office might end up mirroring that highly successful earlier work Longlegs.
The fact that The Monkey comes after that recent and largely unsuccessful adaptation, creates interesting circumstances where those existing narratives can create great contrast; however, despite this specific advantage; a truly great and popular work must create its own momentum which creates positive and significant outcomes and is never reliant on purely the work of its peers!
