Mike Flanagan’s modern day reimagination of Stephen King’s classic horror novel Carrie boasts cinematographic and atmospheric strengths, akin to those of his Netflix miniseries The Haunting of Hill House. The gloomy, yellow-tinged lighting of Carrie’s home speaks eerily of a lifetime of religious oppression, and the interspersion of supernatural occurrences recall the classic format of gothic horror.
The modern addition of cyberbullying finds a natural home in this story, as do the lockdown drills and metal detectors that emphasise Carrie’s painful vulnerability in a harsh and unforgiving world. For me, these details are almost enough to justify the series as a sixth screen adaptation of Carrie – but not quite.
The addition of Emaline, the astral projector who encourages Carrie’s revenge, and the implication of a community of women with psychic powers will supposedly link Carrie to the broader King universe in the already announced second season. However, I think this change came at the price of a truly climactic final episode, as the one we got felt cluttered, confused and full of loose ends.
While the splicing of interview scenes at the peak of Carrie’s destruction of Chamberlain didn’t help the show’s case, what I really disliked was the sacrifice of Carrie’s agency. She is basically a puppet, corralled into her revenge by Emaline and remorseful until Emaline persuades her not to be.
When Carrie crushes her bullies, Chris and Billy, it is Emaline who convinces her to. In this version, Carrie isn’t even the one to kill her mother — instead, it is the mysterious psychic interviewer who does so.
Was this an attempt by the writers to retain the viewers’ sympathy for Carrie? If so, I think it is misplaced. The prom scene — the iconic point at which Carrie’s psyche snaps and she wreaks a glorious but shocking destruction on everyone who wronged her, falls flat as this destruction is instead delegated to unknown parties, who will supposedly become important in the next season.
All in all, while Flanagan’s Carrie makes several unnecessary changes to the source material, the series still isn’t bold enough in its differences to be considered a fresh perspective in its own right.
Illustration by Agatha Shepherd-Jones for The Student.
