In the nearly 50 years since Carrie first hit theaters, Hollywood has yet to tire of making Stephen King adaptations, in large part because audiences are still so eager to watch them. It’s a good thing, then, that the author is as prolific as ever after five decades of best-sellers—although as this list of our eight most-anticipated upcoming King projects proves, Hollywood is also fond of re-adapting King tales, for better and sometimes worse.
A note: this is not a complete list of all the King adaptations in the works; rather, these are the titles we’re most excited for, as well as the ones that either have a release date, are in production currently (or are about to be), or have had reasonably recent updates to suggest they will actually come to pass.
The Monkey
Osgood Perkins has a lot of eyeballs on him after the blockbuster success of last year’s Longlegs, and this adaptation of a King short story (first published in 1980, but most folks know it from the 1985 collection Skeleton Crew) looks similarly audacious. Yes, it’s about a haunted toy, but its teaser poster also carried the following promise as its tag line: “Everybody dies. And that’s fucked up.” James Wan (The Conjuring, Saw, Insidious) produces, adding to those horror bona fides. The Monkey hits theaters February 21.
The Running Man
When the world learned a new adaptation of The Running Man was coming, only one thing mattered: would it arrive in time to be released in the barely conceivable, far-flung year of 2025 in which the story takes place? Unless sabotage happens between now and November, the answer is yes, and even if we weren’t fans of the 1987 Arnold Schwarzenegger take on the King (written as Richard Bachman) tale, we’d be very excited for this new version.
Edgar Wright’s directing and he co-wrote the screenplay, said to hew closer to the novel than the Schwarzenegger film. The cast is headed up by Glen Powell as an everyman who joins a killer game show, with an almost ludicrously good ensemble filled with Katy O’Brian, Josh Brolin, Lee Pace, Jayme Lawson, Emilia Jones, Michael Cera, William H. Macy, and others. The Running Man hits theaters November 7.
The Long Walk
Director Francis Lawrence has lately been tied up making Hunger Games prequels, but he’s also been linked to a different “Richard Bachman” thriller—an adaptation of King’s 1979 novel about a group of teen boys who embark on an organized death march meant to end with one winner (shades of The Running Man, Squid Game, and, well, Hunger Games). News of Lawrence joining the Lionsgate project broke in November 2023, months before Suzanne Collins announced her next Hunger Games book Sunrise on the Reaping (coming March 2025), and Lionsgate said it’d be handling its big-screen version with a 2026 target release date.
So we may be waiting a bit longer for The Long Walk if Lawrence plans to add another Hunger Games flick to his resume—or if he decides he’s had it with bleak dystopias, and hands the reins to someone else. Either way, this one’s very much in the wings.
It: Welcome to Derry
Unlike other entries on this list, It: Welcome to Derry isn’t a traditional adaptation of King’s work. Like the late, great Hulu series Castle Rock, it expands on the universe created not just by King in his 1986 doorstop of a novel, but also the cinematic world of Andy Muschietti’s recent pair of It films. Muschietti will direct five of the nine episodes, so his vision will very much carry over, and the cast includes Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, James Remar, Stephen Rider, Madeleine Stowe, Rudy Mancuso, and Pennywise himself, Bill Skarsgård. There’s no exact release date yet, but it’s confirmed to be coming to HBO in 2025.
Fairy Tale
A rare fantasy story from the master of horror, Fairy Tale was originally slated to be a feature film, but we learned in October that King’s 2022 best-seller would instead become a 10-episode series. There are some big names attached: studio A24, director Paul Greengrass (whose involvement carries over from its cinematic origins), and showrunner J.H. Wyman (Fringe, Almost Human). It’s about a teenager who befriends an elderly neighbor who then dies—leaving the kid instructions on how to access a portal that leads into another world.
So far there’s no streaming service or outlet attached to this one, but with that very recent update and the talent behind it, including the fact that it’s based on a recent and popular King release, you have to assume it’ll be full speed ahead soon.
The Life of Chuck and Carrie
Serial Stephen King adapter Mike Flanagan returns, first with The Life of Chuck. This Tom Hiddleston-starring tale is not a horror story—it’s based on the 2020 King novella and does have sci-fi elements, but is described as being more in the vein of the Shawshank Redemption or Stand By Me (or perhaps even more upbeat than those; reviews from TIFF called it “life-affirming” and “joyous”). It’s hitting theaters May 30.
Flanagan’s other active King project (apparently no Dark Tower for now, alas) is an eight-episode take on the oft-adapted Carrie, which will see him shift his much-lauded horror series format from Netflix (The Haunting of Hill House, The Fall of the House of Usher) to his new home at Prime Video. No release date yet, but the news dropped just before Halloween 2024, so it’s coming.
The Institute
If you cast Ben Barnes and Mary-Louise Parker in anything, we’re already intrigued, especially if Parker gets to play a villain. So our radar is fully tracking this eight-episode series based on King’s 2019 novel about a mysterious facility hiding kidnapped kids with psychic and telekinetic powers. It’s coming from MGM+—a streaming service that, admittedly, not everyone has on their radar—but in December Variety revealed that King himself is aboard as an executive producer, which bodes well. The trade also got a first look at the younger cast, which is aged up from the book (instead of tweens, they’re teens) and is led by Joe Freeman, son of Sherlock and Marvel actor Martin Freeman. There’s no release date yet but The Institute should be rolling out this year.
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