Doctor Sleep Is A Good Movie…Until It Becomes A Shining Sequel

39 years after the release of Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of Stephen King’s novel The Shining, audiences have been treated to a sequel. It comes in the form of Doctor Sleep, the 2013 follow up novel to The Shining, this time adapted to the big screen by Mike Flanagan. While most of the film stands strong on its own, the weakest aspects of it come when it tries too hard to be what it really only loosely is, a Shining sequel. This tug-of-war between being a sequel to Kubrick’s horror classic and being a faithful adaptation of King’s work has a lot to do with the material it’s working from.

It’s well known Kubrick took plenty of liberties with King’s original work, which King has been very critical of. Kubrick opted for a far more cinematic adaptation as opposed to a simple retelling of King’s story. Key details such as Jack Torrance’s relationship with his family were altered to give it a far stronger horror feeling. Not to mention scenes such as the death of Dick Hallorann and the now-iconic “Here’s Johnny!” line were straight from the mind of Kubrick. King often describes the film as “like a big, beautiful Cadillac with no engine inside it.”

Because of this, Doctor Sleep‘s director Mike Flanagan had a monumental task set before him. He needed to strike a balance between the story Kubrick’s Shining tells while also remaining faithful to the Doctor Sleep novel, which is, after all, a sequel to the narrative of the Shining novel. Flanagan was faced with the daunting task of bridging the gap between the book’s story and the film’s story, which works (or doesn’t) to varying degrees.

Doctor Sleep Is A Stephen King Movie For The First Two Hours

Doctor Sleep is a film that is very front-heavy in regards to how it handles its source material. Much like the novel it’s based on, it does not feel very much at all like The Shining. In fact, it almost feels like a separate story, carefully sprinkling references and mentions of its predecessor before continuing along its own path. This approach is proof alone that this film didn’t need The Shining in order to still tell an intriguing story. It introduces Dan Torrance in a way that makes him appear as a completely new character, and the inclusion Abra Stone and Rose The Hat as the arguable stars of the show appear to make it very clear that this will not be a Shining rehash.

For the first two hours of the film, aside from some smaller details, the story is fairly by-the-numbers in regards to the book. It is a Stephen King movie, and is very clearly conscious of how to handle the story the Doctor Sleep novel tells. It stays away from Jack Torrance, The Overlook Hotel and really anything and everything Shining related, boldly going out on its own to be a light continuation of the story King had told. This is in similar fashion to the novel, in which The Overlook is burned down and the events that happened within it are nothing more than minor details. King didn’t bank on the Shining story in his writing, so, therefore, Flanagan didn’t need to, either.

Doctor Sleep’s Ending Is Just Shining Fan Service

With that being said, Doctor Sleep tosses all of that away in the final 30 minutes or so, much to the chagrin of many. Trading in a unique story for something akin to a Shining crash course, including just about every pop culture reference Kubrick’s film made famous. To word it simply, the finale of the film is all Shining fan service. From Dan carrying around an axe in similar fashion to his father, to the bloody elevator, Flanagan hit every single note he could to remind audiences that yes, they are in fact watching a sequel to Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 film as opposed to Stephen King’s 1977 novel. In some ways these references were subtle, but in many ways appear gratuitous, all in the name of nostalgia.

This approach is no new phenomenon. It’s the same thing many major franchises such as Star Wars or Jurassic Park have done for years. Especially given that Doctor Sleep isn’t exactly as well-known as King’s other works, there needed to be some extra effort put in so that audiences knew why they should care. Nostalgia is a major Hollywood selling point right now, and what better way to get people to go see the film that includes name drops, references and set pieces from one of the most iconic horror films of all time?  Yes, marketing is a very important factor when producing any film or television series, however there was clearly more than just the almighty dollar that influenced how Doctor Sleep ended.

Doctor Sleep Has To Change The Ending To Fit The Shining

The big sticking point to all of this, and perhaps is the reason why Doctor Sleep‘s final act fell flat in the originality department, was because it was trying to adapt two very different works at once. Kubrick’s vision of what The Shining was bore little resemblance to the novel it was based on. Most of the most iconic scenes of the film were 100% Kubrick, especially the ending. There was no room for the original finale of the novel in the film because Kubrick’s story didn’t allow it to work organically.

In the novel, The Overlook burns down with Jack inside, who had experienced transformations similar to the ones Dan does in the film, allowing Wendy and Danny to escape, which is clearly a departure from the end we got involving the hedge maze and Jack becoming a human popsicle. Due to the changes made by Kubrick, Flanagan needed to find a way to conclude the story in a way that did justice to the original film. The solution was to essentially graft the proper ending of The Shining onto Doctor Sleep in the name of continuity.

Doctor Sleep Should Have Ignored The Movie

In order to respect the works of both King and Kubrick, there had to be compromise, which came in the form of getting the true Shining finale in its sequel while also including as many Kubrick references as possible to tie everything together. For as beloved as Kubrick’s The Shining is, it would have done Doctor Sleep a favor to pretend the film did not exist. Not only did it make the final act of Doctor Sleep fall apart in its final 30 minutes, but it kept the film from getting its footing and stepping out from the shadow of the previous film. The focus shifted from being a largely standalone adventure set in the same continuity to a bloated nostalgia trip.

It was clear from the start that the film was capable of standing on its own without the aid of its predecessor, hence why the first two hours felt so much more natural compared to the ending. In shoehorning the ending of The Shining novel in at the last minute, Doctor Sleep became less of a continuation and more of a reminder of why most viewers came to see the film in the first place. It remains to be seen where the story will truly end, but at the very least it appears that Dan, Jack, The Overlook and The Shining story can finally be laid to rest.