10 Stephen King Stories That Wouldn't Work As Movies

10. Mrs. Todd's Shortcut

Included in the short story collection Skeleton Crew, Mrs. Todd's Shortcut is a strange little sci-fi yarn about an aging woman who seems to violate the laws of space and time by finding shortcuts to wherever she goes in her car. Each trip also seems to de-age Mrs. Todd. The story is told from the perspective of Homer, who experienced these trips with Mrs. Todd firsthand.

The plot concerns Mrs. Todd, who is obsessed with finding shortcuts. Homer admires her persistence but begins to have doubts, as there are only so many shortcuts someone can find. Mrs. Todd compares the shortcuts to folding a map, suggesting she has discovered a warped version of reality, like a worm hole.

Homer joins Mrs. Todd on one of her trips and begins to suspect he's in another reality. He sees trees reach for him with humanoid hands and animals that don't belong on planet Earth. Rattled by the experience, Homer says he doesn't want to take anymore shortcuts. Nonetheless, Mrs. Todd is changing and growing younger with each trip she takes, and the appeal of this is too much for Homer to pass up. In the end, Homer gets into Mrs. Todd's car and presumably sets off to whatever strange world Mrs. Todd discovered.

While very effective as a short story, a bloviated feature-length version would likely only dilute the charm of the story in its original format.