When it comes to Stephen King fans, some have a penchant for Pennywise, while others have a secret love for “The Tommyknockers,” even if Stephen King himself isn’t a fan. However, after Goodreads conducted a poll, one book took the top spot after earning an average rating of 4.35 out of 5. Published in 1978, “The Stand” is King’s epic tale of a virus that wipes out most of the Earth’s population, leaving those who remain to fight on the side of good or evil. Like some of King’s most engrossing work, a wild tapestry unfolds with a host of different characters all walking their own paths. Eventually, all roads lead to a final showdown with the mysterious Randall Flagg, who arrives just in time to tip what’s left of America into even more chaos, ending with the fate of humanity being gambled in Las Vegas.
Within this 1,153-page nightmare, the biggest terror in King’s massive tale chronicling the end of mankind isn’t Flagg, but the virus, dubbed Captain Tripps, that allows him safe passage to the apocalypse. When Captain Tripps is let loose, it’s the spread that creates the most chills for both those infected and the ones left behind to deal with it. It’s what made the 1994 TV movie adaptation such a great watch and one of the best adaptations of Stephen King’s works (the 2020 miniseries, not so much). It also became even more relatable in 2020 when fans noticed that reality was beginning to look like one of King’s most disturbing portions of the book.
The Stand seems even more frightening following our shared horror of COVID-19
When the world went into lockdown following the spread of COVID-19, parts of pop culture eerily started mirroring events in real time. Besides the likes of “Contagion” (which ended up in the iTunes Top 10 at the time) and “28 Days Later,” people looked to King’s “The Stand” to compare the spread of the disease that was bringing the planet to a standstill. The author even referred to a chapter of the book on X (then Twitter) chronicling the spread of the story’s world-ending bug. “Chapter 8 of THE STAND. This is how it works. Heed. (But remember, COVID-19 is not as lethal as the superflu.)”
In a book of nightmarish visions and otherworldly entities, the portion of King’s mammoth page-turner that stands out as the most horrifying is the spread of Captain Tripps. Described at one point as “a chain letter that really worked” spreading between police patrolmen, restaurant workers, and families returning from vacation, it all felt more unsettling than it did before 2020. During a video appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” King confessed that he was still apologizing for the book decades later, when we can only assume there was a spike in his number of ‘sorrys.’ “People will come along and say through their little masks, ‘I feel like I’m living in a Stephen King story.’ My response is, ‘I’m sorry for that.'”