20 Recent Movies That Made ONE Huge Mistake

The Long Walk is for the most part an outstanding adaptation of Stephen King's novel, and all the more impressive considering how challenging King's source material is to adapt.

But it's also fair to say that the story's tricky ending is where the film finally falls down, opting for a decidedly more Hollywood ending in favour of the book's bleaker, more ambiguous one.

In the film, Ray (Cooper Hoffman) decides to sit down and die, making Pete (David Jonsson) the winner of the Long Walk. After this, Pete asks for a rifle in victory and promptly shoots The Major (Mark Hamill) dead with it before disappearing into the night.

In the book, however, it's Pete who sits down and dies with Ray winning the Long Walk, but when the Major attempts to congratulate him he simply keeps on walking, following a dark figure he believes to be another walker, his mind seemingly completely broken.

While the novel's ending would've been a tough sell to movie audiences, the film's ending still feels like a bit too much of a concession. 

Even if we accept the grim possibility that Pete was actually killed by soldiers after shooting the Major - hence why nobody else can be seen when Pete walks off - it still feels like something suggested by a studio executive compared to the haunting coda to King's novel.

It by no means ruins the film, but the final five minutes are easily the worst part.