Stephen Kings The Dark Tower

[bewitt]

Also, since we all love hate the Dark Tower so much, has anybody read Wind Through the Keyhole? Is it any good?

[Twinner]

I am just about half way through Wind Through the Keyhole and am enjoying it a great deal. It's good to be back in MidWorld with the gang!
I'm easy though.... I love the way King tells a story. For me reading King (pretty much any of his major works) is all about my enjoyment of the journey... the story... the ride. His endings have always been the weakest part of his work for me, but I got over it and decided I love his story telling so very much that the occasional good ending would just be a bonus.

I agree about the Red King sequence being weak and disappointing (no more so than the finale of IT, less so maybe!), but as far as the actual end of the 7th book and the series 'ending'.... King was right on the mark this time IMO.

[Bob Gray]

Spoilers!!


Alright, the way the ending looped, was awesome, but the showdown with the all-powerful beacon of evil: the red king, some of the dumbest stuff I've ever read. Let's see the demon lord is such a competent villain he managed to get locked out on the balcony of the dark tower, the lynch pin of all existence. Lucky for him, there happened to be a crate of Harry potter licensed explosive snitches to hurl down at Roland like donkey kong. Never fear, somebody pull out the old trite gimmick of magic paper, and simply erase the insane, string puller from the book. What an epic showdown.

(some details might be fuzzy, been over a year since I read it)

I can understand your disappointment but I also have had the pleasure of reading many of King's other novels, which if you do, you find out that the Crimson King has been seriously weakened by the time Roland gets to the Dark Tower. Read Insomnia and Black House.

[bewitt]

... as far as the actual end of the 7th book and the series 'ending'.... King was right on the mark this time IMO.

I'm trying to concede that point

[Loerwyn]

Also, since we all love hate the Dark Tower so much, has anybody read Wind Through the Keyhole? Is it any good?

It's one of the best books of the series.

[chris777]

Spoilers!!


Alright, the way the ending looped, was awesome, but the showdown with the all-powerful beacon of evil: the red king, some of the dumbest stuff I've ever read. Let's see the demon lord is such a competent villain he managed to get locked out on the balcony of the dark tower, the lynch pin of all existence. Lucky for him, there happened to be a crate of Harry potter licensed explosive snitches to hurl down at Roland like donkey kong. Never fear, somebody pull out the old trite gimmick of magic paper, and simply erase the insane, string puller from the book. What an epic showdown.

(some details might be fuzzy, been over a year since I read it)

Yeah, here's a post I made in a previous thread:

I thought the ending was great. No matter what he did people would have complained. My biggest complaint is....

How disappointing the 'baddies' were. Crimson King was a joke. Some gnarled old man who appears to be crazy throwing bombs off a roof? And dies because a kid erases a picture of him? How lame. Then we have the spider boy. Crimson King and Roland's bastard child. What an anti climactic ending for that big baddie. He was able to like control Flagg with his mind from the womb...Which lastly leads me to Flagg. He was killed by this child. FLAGG the guy Roland was chasing through a desert, did all this stuff...was built up. Was killed by this child spider thing. It was all very disappointing. And honestly, it didn't make sense. The "power" structure of the 3, didn't make sense.

Despite that, I still like the books, and think the ending was pretty cool!

FYI use [ spoiler ] [ /spoiler ] to spoiler your text rather than just saying it. =)

[Bob Gray]

I remember that thread Chris, that was one of those things you and I have disagreed on. Here was my comment:

There really wasn't a power structure with any of the three major villains. The Crimson King and Randall Flagg were partners of a sort and both wanted Roland and the ka-tet dead but each had his own desires and plans. The King has Mordred brought to life to help him destroy Roland but I don't believe he is controlled by The King. He actually mentions at one point that he might like to join Roland's ka-tet but couldn't accept Roland as his dinh because he is jealous of Roland.

I also recently found out that:

In the one-shot comic The Dark Tower: The Sorcerer, Randall Flagg and the Pink Grapefruit (one of the thirteen Bends o' the Rainbow) refer to the Crimson King as their cousin. Also, according to the Dark Tower comics, the Crimson King was the bastard offspring of Arthur Eld, a legendary gunslinger, and the Crimson Queen, a demonic creature of the Prim – the chaotic primordial void from which the Dark Tower, and all universes, arose. With the aid of the wizard Maerlyn, the Crimson Queen took on human form and deceived Arther Eld to achieve this union. The main protagonist of the series, Roland Deschain, is himself a distant descendant of Eld; this makes the Crimson King a half-uncle of Roland, albeit through many generations. This is the key through which Roland can defeat the King, as stated in a prophecy laid out during the course of the series.

[bewitt]

FYI use [ spoiler ] [ /spoiler ] to spoiler your text rather than just saying it. =)

Yeah, sorry. I'm on an iPad so those black blocks stay black blocks for me, but I copied and pasted and read em. Chris, those are the same problems I had. Felt like King was running out of paper and wanted to be done with it. IMO some of the problems here stem from not having a plan. Sure writers can do what they want and King is a prince among them, but it's hard to carry on a compelling narrative about such rich and complicated worlds of characters without an idea of where it was going. He even had an assistant that was helping to keep backstory straight and untangle the spaghetti mountain of midworld. I think he had the looping thing down, and BS'd the rest of the series. ESP the last 3 abominations, they made me feel cheated.

[JONK]

I think the ending is perfect.

I suppose you don't get closure from it, but I'm not sure of any other ending that would have made me feel satisfied after such an epic story. I can't imagine Roland just "finishing" his quest in some way and then just riding off into the sunset or something.

Wizard And Glass is my favorite too. I love the flashback!

I wasn't going to read the comics, but after hearing some positive reviews here I will for sure. Thanks!!!