10 Biggest Movie Tropes Of 2017

Seen in: It, The Dark Tower, Gerald's Game, 1922

The release of It this autumn was met with almost exclusively positive reviews and the breaking of box office records for a horror picture. So there was at least one old horror icon who'll be celebrating 2017 as a successful year. The icon I'm referring to is not, however, Pennywise the Dancing Clown (although Bill Skarsgard's creepy re-interpretation does stand up well alongside the fondly remembered Tim Curry version in the 1990 miniseries). No, the real old school horror icon to make a big comeback this year was author Stephen King himself.

Back in the 1980s, the master of horror was churning out hit novels at a remarkable rate and their successful screen adaptations would swiftly follow. Often there would be multiple King movies in a space of a few months. Between November 1982 and May 1984, for example, cinema goers could have seen Creepshow, Cujo, The Dead Zone, Christine, Children Of The Corn, and Firestarter. In recent years, however, the King hit factory has become rather less productive, with the Kimberley Pierce remake of Carrie (King's first novel) being the only adaptation of his work to receive a widespread cinematic release in the 2010s. Until now that is.

Of course, the path to a King renaissance was paved by the TV phenomenon Stranger Things, as much a love letter to King specifically as it is to 1980s pop culture in general, right down to the typeface used in the opening credits. And, sure enough, Stranger Things producers Netflix responded this year by releasing not just Stranger Things 2, but also a pair of critically well regarded adaptations of less well known King books, Gerald's Game and 1922.

Sure, not all of this year's King adaptations were as successful. The Dark Tower finally came to big screens in a version stripped down to the point of being completely inconsequential, while the TV version of The Mist failed to capture the tension of its movie predecessor.

However, while Universal's Dark Universe floundered, the possibility of a horror shared universe now seems a more likely possibility through various King adaptations. The Dark Tower, whose book series crosses over with a lot of other King work, is still set for a TV adaptation (whether it references the movie or not is unclear) and the movie itself made connections to The Shining. It: Chapter Two will turn that movie into a franchise and, given its setting of Derry, Maine is the home of some other King stories, it's a franchise that could expand further. Finally, next year will see the arrival of TV series Castle Rock, set in the other Maine town where many of King's stories take place, a perfect locale for a crossover King-verse.