I had never heard of the Stephen King novel, The Long Walk, until I saw the trailer for the movie earlier this September. It was a very interesting concept and since I saw the trailer before the movie came out, I did some research and discovered that it was first a book. I knew I wanted to watch the movie soon after it came out in theaters, and I also wanted to get back into reading, so what better opportunity than to read the book and then go on a field trip after?

I will admit, I did look up the word count before I committed to reading the novel. I had never read a Stephen King book before, but I knew he had some pretty lengthy ones. The Long Walk is about 320 pages, so it was an easy read for me if I could get into the story. I ended up reading it all in one night, with an hour break in between to drive home from my boyfriend’s.

The novel The Long Walk was published in 1979 under the pseudonym Richard Bachman. After seeing just how many novels Stephen King has written, I kind of understand why he wanted an alias, plus how does one write so many novels?! Even I was skeptical of this but it seems that he really has never had any ghost writers; King is just that dude.

The Long Walk in both the book and movie takes place in the East coast of some dystopian 70’s United States. Every year, teenage boys from across the country enter in The Long Walk, a televised event in which they walk until there is only one remaining. There is no finish line, and the prize for winning is riches beyond belief and one single wish. This will be a review and comparison of both the novel and the movie, so there will be spoilers!

Ray Garraty is the lens we look through while reading. His inner monologue and actions really captivated me. He had complex emotions throughout the entire book and ended up making good relationships with his fellow walkers. Even though he was the main character, I somehow couldn’t exactly put all of my hopes of him being the winner, and that is what kept me reading. I feel like each character has their own faults and I like how complex each character was.

My favorite while reading had to be McVries. I feel as if he may be a popular character in the book just based off of how the movie portrayed him. It seems as if The Long Walk is his final choice in life, and he tried to make the best of it without truly understanding the weight of his decision. I mean, did any of the 100 boys know what they were really in for? I honestly think that only one truly did, and that was Stebbins, the self-proclaimed “bastard of the Major”. Their naivetes is heartbreaking at times, and reading Garraty make his own realizations about life and it’s meanings and about The Long Walk made me feel like these teenagers stepped into their adulthood, and the rest of their lives.

We all know that movies are never replicas of the book, but I believe this movie adaptation did a pretty good job of sticking to it’s parent material. The small differences are that now, there are only 50 boys who participate, which makes sense to me, they only get 10 seconds in between each warning instead of a minute, and it seems the boys aren’t as hormonally driven as they were in the novel. I think that’s a Stephen King thing though? I’ve heard some things…

But one thing that I found the most interesting is that, in the book, The Long Walk is a huge event, every time the walkers hit a town or a city there would be crowds cheering, signs waving, someone’s mom kept showing up and trying to run out to her son, it was wild.

In the movie, however, I really think they tried to paint an accurate view of this world and its financial issues. There were many scenes of barren land, and if there were any onlookers to the walkers, they happened to live close by, and they were dressed a little shabby. There weren’t any crowds until the last scenes, when the winner was about to be announced. It made it seem like there was a deeper reason for these boys signing up. I honestly enjoyed both perspectives, because I had recently read the short story The Lottery, and their attitude about their weird yearly tradition was very disinterested and very “any other day” type.

Now, the biggest twist that I did not see coming, both my favorite and least favorite moments in the film, the winner and the ending. In the book, McVries gets his ticket first, then Stebbins has a moment where he turns to Garraty, and collapses, leaving Garraty as the winner. It is an opened ended scene where Garraty sees his friends and starts walking. Many interpret this to be him dying, but I am not too sure. I believe maybe he was hallucinating.

The movie though, let’s get into it. Imagine being me, just having read the book about a week or so before, fully prepared for the ending and wondering how they will make it more emotional for the film. McVries slows, stops, I’m thinking here it comes. Garraty runs to him, not allowing him to sacrifice his life, lifts him up off of the ground on their last warning. They both continue walking, and I am still prepared for McVries to fall. Garraty lets go of McVries, and he steps back.

He had spent his last warning, there was no winning. McVries is yelling at him but it is too late. McVries wins the dang Long Walk. What?! The gasp I let out when Garraty sacrificed himself. What a huge twist for me, I had even thought while reading that maybe the main character wouldn’t win, and the movie went ahead and showed me what would have happened if he didn’t.

I just didn’t understand the ending with McVries though. He shoots the Major because it was Garraty’s wish and then walks into the end of the movie. I mean I guess that is an open ended conclusion, however its not as intellectually captivating as the book, I feel like this was more of a “What just happened?” situation. Either way it was pretty interesting overall.

I feel as if there is so much more I could have added about my thoughts on the novel, especially because we got to meet so many characters and learn about their lives, but this post is long enough, and it is part of my Blogtober series so it is best if I keep on writing for my future posts and projects. I will reluctantly leave you here, then!

Have you read the book and/or watched the movie? What were your thoughts on either? Let me know and I will see you all tomorrow!