Welcome back to Books With Cause. Let’s dive into my latest review. Stephen King’s Bachman books have had quite the resurgence this year, especially with two big movie adaptations landing within months of each other. The Running Man is a brutal, relentless dystopian thriller originally released under King’s pseudonym, and it still hits astonishingly hard today.
What a year it has been for Stephen King. To me, he’s the greatest of all time, but you don’t need me to tell you how great I think it is that he’s still going strong after all these years. The fact that he’s published 65 novels with no sign of stopping. And that’s not to mention the collections of short stories and novellas. My stepdad would often say, “He must be running out of ideas soon.” And that was over seven years ago.
Anyway, never mind all that. What a year it’s been for Richard Bachman. Maybe I’m being pedantic. Forgive me if that’s the case. But there aren’t that many Bachman books, and I don’t think there’s ever been two adapted into movies in the same year. From The Long Walk a couple of months ago, and now Edgar Wright’s offering of The Running Man. I haven’t seen it, but I understand the previous version of the film, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, had little in common with the source material. While Wright’s film is much closer to this book.
Originally published in 1983, The Running Man is set in a futuristic and dystopian 2025. Read that last sentence again. When his baby daughter is ill and in desperate need of medicine that they can’t afford, Ben Richards signs up to take part in a reality television programme in the hope of making quick cash. What Richards doesn’t expect is to get selected for The Running Man – which is the network’s most dangerous show, but it’s also the one that offers the largest cash prize.
Richards must survive on the run for thirty days. All along the way, he has hunters on his trail, and if they catch him, they will kill him. Game over. It’s implied that throughout countless seasons of the show, no contestant has lasted very long. Contestants earn $100 for every hour they stay alive, plus there are bonuses for killing officers of the law and/or hunters. Richards doesn’t expect to survive the whole thing. He only hopes that he’ll last long enough that a large sum of money will be left to his wife and daughter after his demise.
But this is an oppressed alternate version of the world we live in. What neither Richards nor the network bears in mind is that there are people out there who have had more than enough and are willing to do whatever it takes to help Richards survive to the end.
Having seen the recent film and read the book, I have to say that both are very good, and the film is rather faithful to the source material. The strange thing is, with the likes of The Hunger Games and Maze Runner films, it feels like we’ve had a lot of dystopian movies in the last decade or so. Wright’s version of The Running Man is good, but it enters a diluted field. It’s also worth noting that his ending is slightly different. But if you read the book, you’ll understand why.
My Goodreads rating: ★★★☆☆ (3 stars)
Buy the Book:
These are affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission if you buy through them, at no extra cost to you.
