At last, the day has finally arrived. After months of production and studio-enforced waiting, we get our first glimpse at the The Dark Tower today, and Stephen King fans everywhere greeted it with much rejoicing. Well, until they saw the damn thing and remembered it was written and produced by the writer behind such classics as Batman and Robin and The Da Vinci Code, and directed by a solid filmmaker who may or may not be out of his element.
Look upon this trailer, ye mighty, and despair.
Well, we think we know why they hid this movie from the public eye for so long — it just looks so painfully generic, even though we like the casting of Matthew McConaughey and Idris Elba so much — and it can’t help but be a massive disappointment. Sure, there’s lots of shots of bad shit about to happen in New York and a big ol’ tower collapsing, but, if you can, please tell us what exactly makes this different than the first footage from Josh Trank’s Fantastic Four movie that dropped two years ago.
The focus on Tom Taylor’s character, Eddie, kind of sucks, even though it might be both close to the source material and a stereotypical feature of nearly every single King work and adaptation since the fuckin’ ’70s, and we’re not that excited to watch him navigate an American accent for the first time. Elba’s speed-reloading looks less cool every time he does it. And remember, Akiva Goldsman co-wrote this! Use that knowledge to keep your expectations low, especially since we’re about to praise this thing.
Again, the leads look like they’re going to steal the show — it’s nice to see Elba in a good guy part again, even if Roland looks to be a bit of the Tortured Hero Who Has To Learn To Love Again, and McConaughey looks alright alright alright as The Man in Black, in prime Rust Cohle form here. Director Nikolaj Arcel has made amazing films— his last, the period drama A Royal Affair helped to jumpstart Alicia Vikander’s career prior to Ex Machina, and was acclaimed when it released back in 2012 — and we hope he can bring a steady hand to this once there’s no “marketing department” filter between us and the final product. Hell, we thought the ending clip of him shooting one of the Man in Black’s henchmen was pretty dope too, though not enough to catapult this above It in our “most anticipated King adaptation of 2017” rankings.
Anyways, The Dark Tower hits theaters a measley three months from now, on August 4. If you start reading now, you might be able to read the books before the movie comes out, and you’ll get even more disappointed when this thing finally shows up at the multiplex.