One day, I wanted to know how many Stephen King novels hadn’t been adapted into TV shows or movies. And so I went through them all, and, at the time of writing, it’s… actually, it’s complicated. The Dark Tower complicates things. Let’s just address that first and foremost. It’s obvious that Salem’s Lot has been adapted as both a miniseries and a movie, while The Stand has had two miniseries, and Pet Sematary has had two movies, and so on, but The Dark Tower only kind of has The Dark Tower (2017).

But then that adaptation isn’t really an adaptation of one specific book. For present purposes, maybe it’s best to say that it kind of lines up with book #1, The Gunslinger, though not really. And so all the other books definitely remain unadapted, but if they were to be adapted, it would make sense to do them as one big adaptation, like a multi-season-long TV show. So, multiple unadapted books = one potential adaptation that’ll hopefully come out one day. Taking those unadapted books as one story, and almost imagining the unadapted Gwendy books as getting one adaptation, there are 22 unadapted stories, not counting novellas or short stories that haven’t been adapted. And if you separate out the Gwendy and Dark Tower books, there are 29 (out of 66) novels that haven’t yet been adapted into a movie or miniseries. That’s a higher number than expected, in all honesty, even if many of those novels are more recent ones that’ll likely get adapted eventually.

There are also some older books mentioned here that might, post-2026, have adaptations. This whole endeavor will likely age faster than most rankings, but for now, it’s accurate and thorough. For now, you can only really experience these Stephen King novels on the page, or as audiobooks, and that’s one of many good reasons why reading every now and then (like, generally) is worthwhile. Those still-to-be-adapted novels are ranked below, starting with the messy/not-so-good ones and ending with those where it’s surprising adaptations don’t yet exist.

22

‘The Regulators’ (1996)

Image via E. P. Dutton

It would make the job easier to skim over the Richard Bachman books that Stephen King wrote under his pseudonym, as of the seven, only three have been adapted to film (The Running Man twice, though, for what that’s worth). Still, we know Bachman is King now, and vice versa, and in 1996, people knew that, so King releasing The Regulators as a Bachman novel was sort of him being cute.

And he also did so in order for it to be a companion novel with the slightly better Desperation, which has a TV movie adaptation. The Regulators is an incomprehensible book, though, and so it would likely make for a similarly frustrating movie. Points for trying something weird, and the act of comparing and contrasting The Regulators and Desperation is sort of interesting if you’re a big King fan, but The Regulators on its own is just not a particularly good read (sorry).

21

‘Holly’ (2023)

Image via Charles Scribner’s Sons

Even if Holly might not look too long, compared to other very long Stephen King novels, it feels agonizingly drawn out, and is among his weaker books overall. It’s the first novel of his to give Holly Gibney a central role, after she was a supporting player in a handful of other Stephen King books, most of them crime/mystery-focused, but not all without horror elements altogether.

Some of those books have had adaptations, like the Mr. Mercedes TV series that ran for a few seasons, meaning it could also adapt Finders Keepers and End of Watch, and then also The Outsider, which Gibney was a supporting player in. There’s one other Holly book after Holly that’s also unadapted, and is a little better overall (still not perfect, but an improvement nonetheless is still worth appreciating).

20

Two Books in the ‘Gwendy Trilogy’ (2017–2022)

Image via Cemetery Dance

It wouldn’t take much to make the stories in the Gwendy trilogy equal to the books, in terms of quality, were they adapted, though one has to wonder who’d want an adaptation in the first place. This is also a bit of a Dark Tower situation where things get complicated. Here, it’s because there are three books, and no indication of how they’d be adapted if an adaptation were attempted, and also, King didn’t write or co-write the second one, as that was a solo effort by Richard Chizmar.

Honestly, Gwendy’s Button Box is a decent enough read, only really suffering because it’s short and very, very reminiscent of other books by Stephen King. The third book, Gwendy’s Final Task, almost feels like a practical joke, and then the second, written only by Chizmar (and called Gwendy’s Magic Feather) is very forgettable. Judging the series as a whole, it’s not very good, but that first book on its own is just fine (still wouldn’t really ever need an adaptation, though).

19

‘From a Buick 8’ (2002)

Image via Charles Scribner’s Sons/Stephen King

You can write about From a Buick 8 multiple times, and it never gets easier. The same can sort of be said for The Tommyknockers and Dreamcatcher, but even those somehow got adaptations (a two-part miniseries and a movie, respectively). From a Buick 8 might well be unadaptable, since it’s even weirder, despite being shorter and so technically not having as many strange directions it can rampage off in.

But just as the characters in Seinfeld have “got to see the baby,” anyone talking about From a Buick 8 has got to try and say what’s more or less about. A spooky car? Alien life? The nature of storytelling? Policing? It’s far more common to come away from a Thomas Pynchon novel not knowing what the hell you read, but for a storyteller like King, who usually lays everything out so smoothly, to deliver something this weird… well, maybe it’s a sign of range? If you really want a silver lining.

18

‘Sleeping Beauties’ (2017)

Image via Scribner

The idea of Sleeping Beauties is interesting, like, premise-wise. And then it’s also nice that Stephen King wrote a novel with one of his sons, Owen King. As a duo, they made something that wasn’t terrible, and yeah, the premise is good. Sleeping Beauties is about women all being affected by some sort of unknown event that makes them fall into comas, and get cocoons wrapped around them.

The men left conscious all panic, especially because bad things happen whenever someone tries to wake up one of the women. Once answers start being revealed, Sleeping Beauties falls apart a bit, and that’s a problem for obvious reasons. It’s one of those “King started it well, but didn’t really know how to finish it” books. Or, more specifically, “two Kings started things well, but then neither had a great idea of how to finish things.”

17

‘Elevation’ (2018)

Image via Charles Scribner’s Sons

Keeping it short when it comes to Elevation, because this book is tiny, it’s basically about a guy who starts becoming lighter and lighter. That also happened in Thinner, which was a Richard Bachman book (the last of King’s Bachman books before people found out the truth), but that had a horror slant to the premise, whereas this one’s kind of trying to be a tearjerker?

It’s weird, how sentimental Elevation tries to be, not because it plays out more like a fantasy story than a horror one, but because it’s really sappy and just absurd at the same time. Is it a novella or a novel? Different sources define it differently, but that length (or lack thereof) does mean it could be adapted pretty directly. Question is, would anyone want it? Is anyone really that much of an Elevation fan?

16

‘The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon’ (1999)

Image via Scribner

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon is another Stephen King book that keeps things on the shorter side, for better or worse. Or for better and worse? It’s for the better, because it’s about a young girl who gets lost in the woods on her own, and you can only do so much with that premise. But maybe also for the worse, because King’s taken a simple adventure and/or survival story and expanded it in significantly more interesting ways before.

There are also a few more fans of The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, it seems, compared to Elevation, but still probably not many girls or boys or women or men who love The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon. It’s a bit too slight, but it’s not bad. It has its moments. And it would translate well to film (not a TV series, or even a miniseries; there’s just not enough here to adapt).

15

‘Rage’ (1977)

Image via Signet Books

Given how King feels about Rage, and his stance on it being a good thing that it’s out of print, a movie or TV adaptation of it feels like it might well be the least likely unadapted book of the author’s to ever get one. It’s about a student who brings a gun to school, killing two teachers with it before taking his class hostage, and then that whole situation is what most of the story is devoted to.

It’s understandable why King feels the way he does about Rage, even if movies dealing with similarly upsetting subject matter have been made before (see Polytechnique and Elephant). As for the quality of Rage itself? It’s not terrible for an early work by the author, and you can sort of admire what it’s going for to some extent, but it’s not handled ideally, and even with its relatively short page count, Rage does end up feeling a little drawn-out.

14

‘Roadwork’ (1981)

Image via Signet Books/Stephen King

While not quite as disturbing as Rage, Roadwork is a similarly angry and intense book, and it has some flaws as well, like that other early Bachman book with a single-word title (and that word starts with “R”). It’s also the case that Roadwork would probably work better as a movie, or be a little easier to tackle, even if adapting it, you’d run the risk of making something too similar to Taxi Driver or Falling Down.

That’s because Roadwork is one of those stories about a man pushed to some kind of limit, and then he lashes out because of the injustice he feels in society. Here, he just has a run of very bad luck, and King gets some engaging material out of the whole “How far do you want to go before you start seeing him as a villain more than a victim” kind of thing (see also any number of more recent TV shows about anti-heroes).

13

‘Never Flinch’ (2025)

Image via Charles Scribner’s Sons

Two years on from Holly, Holly Gibney herself was also the protagonist of Never Flinch, and it feels a bit silly to include it on this ranking at this present time, since it’s very recent and adaptations usually take time… unless it’s Christine, for whatever reason. That Stephen King book came out in the first half of 1983, and the movie adaptation came out right near the end of the very same year.

But to stay focused on Never Flinch, this one might be difficult to adapt because it’s sort of a messy combination of two ideas that might have been two novellas on their own, or overall neither was long enough to be fleshed out into a novel. So King threw them both together here, and had Holly Gibney tackling two different cases that are interesting on their own, but don’t really cross over or come together in an especially satisfying way. It’s a novel that’s less than the sum of its parts, though at least many parts of it are pretty good.

Former NHL star Ron Duguay gave fans an update about his health journey after revealing he had been diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer.

Duguay, 68, detailed part of his “upgraded” treatment plan in a video via his Instagram Story on Sunday, March 1. 

“Most of you are aware of the benefits of Vitamin C. Most people may take a gram a day, maybe two,” Duguay said, showing his arm hooked up to an IV in a doctor’s office. 

He continued, “I’m doing as much as 75 grams. I’ve been doing 50. My body has been tolerating it. So now I’m moving it up to 75. I’m going to get to the bottom of this. Get stronger. Build up my immune system so I can get out of here. I want to see the finish line! Let’s go!”

Duguay was diagnosed with colon cancer in December 2024, but kept it private until the ongoing financial burdens led to his family launching a GoFundMe last week. 

Shay Thomas, Duguay’s daughter, exclusively told Us Weekly that convincing her father to ask for help was “a fight for many months.”

“His credit card debt was going up and that’s when I told him, ‘Dad, just let me do this. I’m not going to put your name on there. Just let me do this. So many people have asked to help you. You need the help. You’ve helped people. Let them help,’” Thomas said. 

She added, “We spoke as a family and we said, ‘We need to make this GoFundMe. We gotta do everything we can. Because if we don’t, it’s going to kill you.’”

Thomas said her father “had nothing left” when the family resorted to launching the fundraiser, which has since raised over $112,000 at the time of this story’s publication. 

“He does not like asking for help, even when I have to ask him about his finances,” Thomas said. “I can tell when he’s stressed out. I know he hasn’t been able to work. He was able to work comfortably before he got sick and he was able to provide for himself. He was fine. But once he was sick, he couldn’t even walk. He could barely eat. It was so bad. He wasn’t able to work.”

Thomas also responded to some backlash the GoFundMe has faced, with some critics questioning how Duguay, who played 12 seasons in the NHL, had run out of money. 

“I see so many things where people are like, ‘He has millions of dollars from back in the day. I’m like, ‘What are we talking about?’” she said. 

Thomas added, “I never understand some of these people with these crazy opinions. Most people don’t make them unless they need to. Who wants to have an illness where you have this financial strain? You’re desperate, in a sense, and that’s where we’re at.”

Duguay’s daughter gushed about the assistance of former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, who has been in a relationship with her father for years. 

“She’s been involved and incredibly supportive in my dad’s entire journey,” Thomas told Us. “Their relationship can obviously be challenging because they live long distance. She’s in Alaska, he’s in Florida. But they have always remained close.”

Thomas continued, “If we ever need her for something, she would take a red eye flight on short notice. If we have stuff with our kids and couldn’t make it — for example, my dad had a surgery where they went into his colon and liver — and she stayed with him in the hospital for five days. She’s been a huge source of support. Not only for my dad, but for our entire family.”

Hillary Clinton’s Epstein Depo
Leak My Pic?!? I’m Done With This!!!

Published
March 2, 2026
2:36 PM PST

Beyond the Gates spoilers for March 2 – 6, 2026 see Ted Richardson (Keith D. Robinson) getting grilled and Hayley Lawson (Marquita Goings) cornered.

Beyond the Gates Monday, March 2nd: Anita’s Chemo Struggles and Hayley’s Anniversary Crashers

On Monday, March 2nd, Ashley Morgan (Jen Jacob) helps Anita Dupree (Tamara Tunie) through a tough time. She’s getting another chemo session and looks really annoyed but Ashley’s there for her. Anita is in chemo and then she tells Vernon Dupree (Clifton Davis) she doesn’t know if she’ll win her battle or if she can handle this.

By the way, Anita’s in a blue cap thing during chemo and those are cooling caps that are attached to a little A/C system and cools down the head which can help slow hair loss from chemo. So, Ashley might’ve suggested it, we’ll see.

Naomi Hamilton Hawthorne (Arielle Prepetit) gets a proposition from Katherine “Kat” Richardson (Colby Muhammad). Is it about moving in with her while Jacob Hawthorne (Jibre Hordges) is undercover?

Hayley and Bill Hamilton (Timon Kyle Durrett) celebrate their anniversary but they have several crashers that interrupt. Hayley and Bill are at Fairmont Cross Country Club for dinner and looking awfully annoyed when they get unwanted company.

Dani Dupree (Karla Mosley) wishes Bill and Hayley a happy anniversary but sarcastically. Andre Richardson (Sean Freeman) is there with her. Dani reaches in her purse and says she had to commemorate this occasion and Bill looks worried when Dani digs in her purse. Is he expecting a gun?

BTG Spoilers Tuesday, March 3rd: Izaiah Gets Put on the Spot and Bill Wants a Baby

On Tuesday, March 3rd, someone puts Izaiah Hawthorne (David Lami Friebe) on the spot. Is Ted grilling him about him and Eva Thomas (Ambyr Michelle) and intentions as Dana “Leslie” Thomas (Trisha Mann-Grant) asked him to do?

Hayley’s stunned when Bill presses her about expanding the family. Bill asks Hayley if she’s ready to try again for a baby.

Tomas “Tom” Navarro (Alex Alegria) gives Eva advice. Is it about dealing with Kat?

Leslie says she doesn’t know what Eva’s talking about but she reminds Leslie that she taught her everything she knows about revenge.

Leslie runs into Nicole Dupree Richardson (Daphnee Duplaix). Next week, Vanessa McBride (Lauren Buglioli) tries to keep the peace when things get heated between Leslie and Nicole. Vanessa and Nicole are at Uptown and Leslie plops down being catty and Nicole reminds Leslie that the last time she goaded her, naughty Nicky came out and put her hands on her—she asks does Leslie remember how that turned out? Vanessa reaches for Nicole’s hand before she does anything impulsive.

Beyond the Gates Spoilers Wednesday, March 4th: Ashley Helps Grayson and the Duprees Get a Surprise Visitor

On Wednesday, March 4th, Vernon supports Chelsea Hamilton (RhonniRose Mantilla). Is this about her wedding plans or something else? Bill calls in a favor. Is it from the Duprees? Is this about what he wants from Hayley?

The Dupree family receives a surprising visitor. Kyle gives Vanessa an update that will affect Nicole. Is Kyle house hunting to stick around the DMV because he’s really into Nicole and wants to be around to pursue her?

BTG Thursday, March 5th: Ryland Keeps Hayley on Track and Derek Gets Stuck in the Middle

On Thursday, March 5th, Derek Baldwin (Ben Gavin) is stuck in the middle when Leslie and Vanessa are bickering. Madison and Chelsea notice an unusual couple. Who’s together that stuns them? Joey Armstrong (Jon Lindstrom) doesn’t want to do something but agrees anyway. Does Bill ask him or Vanessa?

Friday, March 6th: Jacob’s New Assignment and the Plasma Ring Reveal on BTG

On Friday, March 6th, Jacob gets a new assignment but it may wreck the undercover op into the plasma ring. Martin tries to connect with Bradley “Smitty” Smith (Mike Manning) and Samantha Richardson (Najah Jackson). Why is he feeling disconnected?

A shocking person is revealed to be involved in the plasma ring. Joey? Izaiah? Leslie? When Vernon’s surprise arrives, Anita doesn’t feel well. These side effects are really starting to take their toll and she’ll need the family to rally around her. That’s your Beyond the Gates weekly spoiler outlook.

‘Real Housewives of New York City’
Carole Radziwill’s Back in the Mix for Season 16!!!

Published
March 2, 2026
2:18 PM PST

The nominations have been announced, and the stage is almost set for the 98th Academy Awards, which takes place at the Los Angeles Dolby Theatre on March 15. Paul Thomas Anderson’s politically poignant One Battle After Another, Ryan Coogler’s acclaimed vampire flick Sinners, and the quietly stunning Danish-Norwegian drama Sentimental Value lead the way as favorites, although, as the recent BAFTAs have proven, anything can happen on awards night.

Of course, taking home a gold statue is certain to cement someone’s legacy in the annals of cinema history. However, as years pass, the respect and reputation of any given win can fluctuate, with many now being considered to have aged like milk. Instead of focusing on those negatives, here’s a look at ten 21st-century Oscar wins that keep getting better with age, proving the Academy very often gets it really right.

10

Peter Jackson – Best Director for ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King’ (2003)

Image via New Line Cinema

Nominated, but not winning, for The Fellowship of the Ring, and being entirely snubbed for The Two Towers, director Peter Jackson went into the 76th Academy Awards in 2004 as the overwhelming favorite to take home the Best Director prize, with many seeing a triumph as collective adulation for the trilogy as a whole.

As one of Return of the King‘s record-tying 11 Academy Awards that night, Jackson’s victory for Best Director was arguably the most deserved, the long-overdue recognition for one of modern cinema’s most impressive visionaries. Over 20 years on, as shown by the trilogy’s recent hugely successful box office re-release, love for the Lord of the Rings franchise hasn’t faltered, making Jackson’s win all the sweeter.

9

Christoph Waltz – Best Supporting Actor for ‘Inglourious Basterds’ (2009)

Image via The Weinstein Company

Twice Christoph Waltz has been nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the Academy Awards, and twice he has won. His first victory, three years before triumphing for Django Unchained, came at the 82nd Academy Awards in 2010, as he swept aside the competition to take home a golden statue for his intelligently deceptive portrayal of S.S. Colonel Hans Landa in Quentin Tarantino‘s revisionist WWII epic, Inglourious Basterds.

Oozing with charisma and frighteningly evil, Hans Landa is one of Tarantino’s best creations. As time has passed, it has become evermore clear that no one could’ve nailed this duplicitous and challenging role quite like Waltz. The Austrian actor’s methodical approach to the art of acting is able to squeeze every last ounce of menace out of an already wicked character.

8

‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ (2004) – Best Original Screenplay

Image via Focus Features

In the past 27 years of cinema, there’s perhaps no better screenwriter than Charlie Kaufman. Despite being involved in some of the most intriguing philosophical movie musings in modern memory, the genius behind the likes of Being Jon Malkovich and his directorial debut, Synecdoche, New York, has only ever won one Academy Award.

For his simply stunning screenplay for Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Kaufman carved a story that was ahead of its time. The film itself has become iconic, a defining piece of 21st-century romance that has inspired waves of creatives and become a masterpiece in the eyes of audiences. It is because of this that the Academy’s choice to declare it as the best in class at the 77th Oscars in 2004 is so impressive, and it has aged like a fine wine.

7

J. K. Simmons – Best Supporting Actor for ‘Whiplash’ (2014)

Image via Sony Pictures Classics

Few actors could turn a bitter jazz instructor into one of the scariest villains in modern movie history. That’s exactly what J.K. Simmons did with Terence Fletcher in Damien Chazelle‘s pulse-pumping masterpiece Whiplash, as he goes head-to-head with budding young drumming prodigy Andrew Neiman (Miles Teller).

Against a stacked 2015 line-up, Whiplash entered the 87th Academy Awards unsure of victory in any category. However, if anyone deserved a golden statue, it was Simmons, with this most likely his career-best work. A decade on, and no Supporting Actor winner can really come close to this stunning performance from Simmons, and thankfully, the Academy recognized it.

6

‘Spirited Away’ (2001) – Best Animated Feature

Image via Studio Ghibli

The success of an anime at the Academy Awards might not look so surprising today, especially in light of The Boy and the Heron‘s 2024 win, but back in 2003, it was unheard of. Against tough competition in the form of Treasure Planet, Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron, Ice Age, and Lilo & Stitch, Spirited Away left the 75th Academy Awards as the surprise winner of the Best Animated Feature prize.

Today, anime has boomed from a niche interest to a global phenomenon, and, through that simple fact, this win for Spirited Away back in 2003 is truly one of the best the Academy has ever awarded. It goes without saying that Hayao Miyazaki’s modern fairytale masterpiece is worthy of this Oscar and many other accolades.

5

Charlize Theron – Best Actress for ‘Monster’ (2003)

Image via Newmarket Films

Of all the 21st century Best Actress victories, none have proven as enduring as Charlize Theron‘s in Patty Jenkins’ 2003 crime drama Monster. Completely unrecognizable as serial killer Aileen Wuornos, Theron’s performance is the epitome of an actor losing themselves to a role, with people still shocked to this day to learn that it is the Bombshell star behind the dental prosthetics.

The best performance in a career stacked with great turns, Theron’s work is simply spectacular. The Academy’s choice to award Theron the victory might’ve been unsurprising given the star’s victories at the Golden Globes, SAG Awards, and Critics’ Choice Awards, but let that take nothing away from how well this has aged. If Roger Ebert calls it “one of the greatest performances in the history of the cinema,” who are we to argue?

4

Bong Joon-ho – Best Director for ‘Parasite’ (2019)

Image via NEON

There are few superlatives left to attribute to Parasite. Ever since the genius South Korean thriller debuted in 2019, it has been praised to the highest degree by anyone with even the slightest interest in film. Despite all that acclaim, director Bong Joon-ho‘s win for Best Director in 2020 is an easy choice for this list.

Although Alfonso Cuarón won Best Director for the Spanish-language film Roma in 2019, Joon-ho’s win a year later will forever be heralded for ushering a new Academy appreciation for non-English language filmmaking. There is plenty more to be said about the movie itself, although that should be saved for later in the list.

3

‘Moonlight’ (2016) – Best Picture

Image via A24

For a few moments on February 26, 2017, the winner of the Best Picture Oscar was the colorful, romantic musical La La Land. Thankfully, although La La Land is an excellent movie, the mistake made by Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway was quickly rectified, Barry Jenkins‘ Moonlight was announced the winner, and the rest is history.

One of the best coming-of-age drama tales of all time, Moonlight won three of its eight Oscar nominations, with Mahershala Ali‘s Best Supporting Actor triumph almost worthy of a place in this list. However, given the film’s minuscule budget of just $4 million and the impressive success of small-budget indie flicks since, it is fair to say that today’s film landscape would look considerably different without Moonlight‘s Best Picture win.

2

Daniel Day-Lewis – Best Actor for ‘There Will Be Blood’ (2007)

Daniel Day-Lewis is undeniably one of the greatest actors of all time, and his Best Actor win for There Will Be Blood is the best of his three Academy Award victories. As the misanthropic oil baron Daniel Plainview, Day-Lewis combines with the genius of Paul Thomas Anderson to craft one of modern cinema’s greatest performances.

Many actors go to extreme, seemingly performative lengths to prove their ability. Day-Lewis’s two-year isolation in Ireland to prepare for this role is one of the only times such radical methods paid off. Earning a plethora of best actor nominations from various award boards for this performance, There Will Be Blood is Day-Lewis’s magnum opus, and his Best Actor win is one of the best decisions the Academy has ever made.

1

‘Parasite’ (2019) — Best Picture

Image via NEON

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As the first non-English language film to win Best Picture, Parasite‘s win at the 2020 ceremony marked a huge shift in the Academy. Today, the likes of The Secret Agent and I’m Still Here are easy considerations for Best Picture nominations, and the Academy itself now boasts a much more international blend of members.

Whether you believe it is one of the greatest movies of all time or not, the film undeniably changed Western attitudes to international filmmaking for the better. Reported to be the most-logged movie on Letterboxd, Parasite‘s popularity continues to grow thanks to the increase in attention to non-English language films — a movement the movie itself helped propel forward.

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Dane ‘Spent His Final Days Surrounded By Dear Friends’

Eric Dane Announced A Memoir In December 2025

Patrick Dempsey Paid Tribute To His Late ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ Costar

By Joshua Tyler
| Updated 16 seconds ago

During World War 2 millions of American men were forced to march in lockstep to their death. Whether you think the cause was just or not, the truth is that for years these men had no say, no agency, and no independence. When the war was over, those who survived were released from bondage and returned home. They responded by doing what men have always done in those circumstances: by getting away from those who would control them.

The result was the rise of the American suburb, as returning soldiers left the city life of reliance on government apparatuses like public transportation and cramped apartment regulations for a place that promised more breathing room, your own home that you controlled, and the ability to hop in a car and go anywhere you want, anytime you like. The elites who’d been ordering them around during the war were soon unsettled by this shift in American culture and launched a campaign to demonize those returning soldiers and their suburbanite quest to get the hell away from them.

This pushback against suburban flight culminated in a cultural trend that would last for decades, but it first clicked into place with a singular movie that’s still persuading impressionable minds today. This is the story of how The Graduate screenwashed Americans into redefining success as a prison and failure as the real key to happiness.

Sympathy For A Spoiled Brat

The Graduate is about a recent college graduate named Benjamin Braddock. He’s played by a young Dustin Hoffman who, in addition to being a great actor, is also naturally sympathetic. The movie begins as he’s returning home after completing college. Once home, he’s supposed to figure out his next steps, and he hates every minute of it. 

We follow Braddock everywhere, and the film makes sure you sympathize with him, even when you shouldn’t. That’s important because Benjamin Braddock acts like an asshole throughout almost the entire movie. 

He bails on a party his parents threw to show him how proud they are of him. He mopes around their house, freeloading, and refuses to get a job. He complains when his Dad offers to help him or when his parents say nice things about him. He’s presented with reasonable choices and opportunities, and treats them like an attack on his soul. He stalks and harasses a woman he barely knows, ruins a marriage, and uses everyone around him.

The Graduate excuses Benjamin’s behavior as if it’s everyone else that’s the problem, even though they’re doing nothing to him at all. On paper, Benjamin Braddock is a total tool, but as the Simon & Garfunkel music swells and he slinks through the flatly shot airport, the movie frames him as a victim entering a trap.

The Graduate frames Benjamin as its surrogate, creating a situation where hating him means hating yourself. You won’t do that, so with a little help from creative camera work, your brain assumes Ben’s in the right, even though he’s clearly a passive-aggressive jerk. 

How Moral Reframing Turns Bad Into Good

The movie makes that ridiculous flip happen using a persuasion technique called Moral Reframing. Moral Reframing is the persuasive repositioning of behavior, motives, or outcomes so that actions widely seen as harmful, selfish, or unethical are interpreted as virtuous, principled, or necessary by shifting the moral lens through which they are judged.

The Graduate pulls off that reframing because of the way director Mike Nichols shoots and constructs his film. Nichols frequently aligns the camera with Benjamin’s POV, making the audience experience situations from his perspective. Every shot frames him behind glass, water, plastic, or some kind of architecture. 

Benjamin often says very little, even when asked questions. In the real world, that behavior would be rude, but Nichols lets pauses linger, making his confusion and anxiety feel authentic and earned rather than what it really is, which is lazy and passive-aggressive.

Affected By Affect Heuristics

Early scenes show adults crowding him, speaking at him rather than to him. The camera stays close to Benjamin, trapping the viewer in his discomfort. Everything Nichols does makes sure you FEEL that he’s trapped by the world around him, and that world is the suburbs. In doing so, he’s taking advantage of something called Affect Heuristics.

Affect Heuristics are a mental shortcut all humans take, in which immediate emotional reactions, such as fear, liking, disgust, or comfort, are substituted for deliberate analysis. That means judgments of things like risk, value, or truth are guided more by feeling than by evidence.

So The Graduate never outright says the suburbs and success are evil. It doesn’t even show most of them (with one big exception, and we’ll get to HER in a minute) doing anything bad. Instead, Nichols uses reframing to make you FEEL his message. And he does it indirectly, so you’ll never notice what he’s doing to you. So while on screen you see nothing but paradise-like suburbs filled with mini mansions, swimming pools, and supportive parents and friends, The Graduate’s director subtly manipulates the audience into FEELING that, despite all evidence, this place of success is actually one of festering rot.

That’s where Mrs. Robinson comes in.

Mrs. Robinson Gets The Blame

Even if you’ve never seen The Graduate, you know who Mrs. Robinson is. An older woman who has known Benjamin since he was a baby decides to seduce him, and she does so aggressively. 

She’s played by Anne Bancroft, who was actually only thirty-five at the time. Hoffman, by the way, was twenty-nine. But the movie goes out of its way to age her, while simultaneously de-aging Dustin Hoffman. 

Nichols shoots Bancroft in hard, shadow-casting lighting that accentuates cheekbones and facial lines. Heavy eye makeup, dark liner, and sculpted hair add severity rather than youthfulness. In real life, Anne Bancroft was a smokeshow, but in The Graduate, nothing about her is attractive. 

I know the movie’s reputation is that she’s some kind of hot MILF seductress, but that’s a marketing distraction. It’s not what the movie wants you to FEEL. The reality is that, compared to Benjamin, she looks much too old, and their entire relationship is a creepy, creepy betrayal.

What’s more, the movie puts all the blame for their creepy relationship on Mrs. Robinson and almost none on Benjamin. The Graduate never says this overtly, but she’s consistently filmed looming over Benjamin, emphasizing power and experience. Low angles and dominant framing make her imposing and authoritative. She’s always placed in adult spaces like dim bars, bedrooms, and cocktail settings that reinforce her status and power as being superior to Benjamin.

The Power Of Symbolic Guilt Transfer

Mrs. Robinson must be creepy, and she must be to blame, because she represents the movie’s true motives. Mrs. Robinson exists in the film to be the chief representative of suburbia, and it’s suburbia that The Graduate is out to destroy. This is Symbolic Guilt Transfer.

Symbolic Guilt Transfer is a persuasion effect in which negative moral judgment or blame attached to a person, image, or symbol is psychologically shifted onto the broader group, place, or idea that the figure is made to represent, causing audiences to condemn the larger target through its symbolic stand-in.

Mrs. Robinson is the rotting, putrid core at the heart of the suburbs. She’s there to make you FEEL negatively about a place, not a person, and it’s all hidden beneath a veneer of smoky-voiced, granny panties seduction.

Boring Is The Worst

But what are the suburbs really? Everyone has a nice house, they have friends, and aside from Mrs. Robinson, they seem happy and well-adjusted. The suburban lifestyle is so obviously superior to the crowded, restrictive, crime-ridden city alternatives people were familiar with in 1967 that there really was no way to attack that honestly. 

So instead, The Graduate makes them dull. Boring. It makes you think BORING is the worst. That boring rots the soul, that boring turns you into Mrs. Robinson. The camera lingers on beige walls, manicured lawns, polite smiles. It sells the idea that nice things are inherently empty and creates an inverted morality in which good is bad and bad is good.  

Things snowball as the movie goes on, with Benjamin basically going insane. He becomes a full-on stalker, harassing Mrs. Robinson’s daughter, who behaves like a brain-dead zombie and follows his commands for basically no reason.

Through it all, the movie’s groovy Simon & Garfunkel-powered soundtrack blares, and to audiences back then, that music felt hip and cool, a signal that Benjamin is on the right track. Seen through a modern lens, that endless 60s soundtrack sounds haunting and disturbing, and the film takes on the form of a horror movie as Benjamin increasingly acts irrationally, violently, and abusively.

Because the film was stylish, funny, and backed by a soundtrack that felt modern and restless, the teenage Boomers who piled into its audience didn’t see it as a horror movie. It felt edgy, it felt cool. It felt right. And so The Graduate spread a message of insanity and irresponsibility as optimal, based entirely on feeling and vibes. It packaged and sold a ridiculous anti-suburb, anti-responsibility lie that made success look cowardly and respect look like conformity.

Hollywood Provides Impressionable Minds Social Proof That The Graduate Is Right

The Graduate worked, and the Hollywood elite rewarded it for pushing exactly the right message. Mike Nichols won the Academy Award for Best Director, while the film earned additional Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Dustin Hoffman, and Best Actress for Anne Bancroft. 

It exploded into one of the era’s biggest hits, grossing over $100 million worldwide, an extraordinary figure for the late 1960s, and becoming the highest-grossing film of 1967. It’s still regarded by the modern-day press as one of the greatest films of all time, and if you ask most average Boomers about it, they’ll probably tell you The Graduate changed their entire life.

Perhaps more importantly, The Graduate’s runaway success signaled a shift toward youth-oriented propaganda and helped usher in the New Hollywood era, which led to even more manipulative films, like The Stepford Wives, which you can learn more about right here on this channel. 

The Ultimate Straw Man

The powers that be couldn’t argue against the Greatest Generation’s post-World War II success, so they constructed a straw man and made people hate it. The Graduate was that straw man, a symbol of everything that stood in opposition to America’s post-War prosperity. You can’t fight a symbol.

Mike Nichols claims his intent was only to show the confusion of youth, but it’s unlikely he’s being honest. That being his only goal doesn’t explain Mrs. Robinson, or the movie’s over-the-top finish, in which Benjamin wards off suburbanites with a giant cross, as if they’re daywalking vampires.

Permanently Implanted With Catharsis

In that finale, by the way, which is the film’s propaganda masterstroke, The Graduate hard-codes all the bad ideas it’s been planting in its audience’s brains by giving them catharsis. Catharsis is an engineered emotional purge that converts built-up tension into relief, binding the audience to whatever action, character, or idea triggered the release.

So when Benjamin storms a wedding, releasing all the tension the movie’s been building up by thumbing his nose at everything, it’s like The Graduate just hit the “save program” button in your brain. It’s why The Graduate still lives rent-free in your Boomer grandparents’ heads, and why there’s no shaking them out of it. 

The last we see of Benjamin, he’s boarding a bus with the girl he stalked, Mrs. Robinson’s daughter. He’s abandoned the freedom with responsibility of the suburbs and set out on an uncertain journey into nothingness. For Benjamin, oblivion is better than opportunity.

For the audience, freedom of choice is now a prison, and basic level responsibility is a curse. Congratulations, future welfare moochers, you’ve been Screenwashed.

Social media users are goin’ IN on a clip of Blueface showin’ off his boxing jabs.

RELATED: Karlissa Weighs In As Folks Think Blueface Shaded Chrisean Rock While Sharing How He & Nevaeh Akira Plan To Have A “Great, Healthy Pregnancy”

Blueface Shows Off His Boxing Jabs

Over the weekend, Blueface apparently took to his Instagram Story to share a new deleted clip showing him practicing his boxing jabs. To note, Blue appears to be gearing up to hop in the ring with Rooga on March 14.

Additionally, it appears that Blue also has a match against Swaggy P, reportedly occurring in May.

Peep the clip of him practicing his boxing jabs below.

Social Media Is Goin’ IN

Social media users started goin’ IN on the clip of Blueface showing off his boxing jabs in TSR’s comment section.

Amid Blueface Showing Off His Boxing Jabs, He Also Shared The Gender Of His Next Baby

Amid Blueface showing off his boxing jabs, he also shared a special moment with the world. As The Shade Room previously reported, on Sunday, March 1, Blueface and Nevaeh Akira streamed their gender reveal after recently announcing their pregnancy. During the latest stream, Blue and Nevaeh learned that they are awaiting a baby boy, and are planning to name him Solar Porter.

RELATED: It’s A What? Blueface & Nevaeh Akira Reveal Their Baby’s Gender & Name During Livestream Celebration (VIDEOS)

The Resident Evil franchise has survived three decades of constant reinvention, evolving across games, animated projects, and multiple live-action adaptations. According to modern Leon Kennedy actor Nick Apostolides, that willingness to hand the series over to new creative voices is exactly why it continues to endure. As anticipation builds for the next chapter of the franchise — including a new film directed by Barbarian and Weapons filmmaker Zach Cregger — Apostolides says experimentation has always been part of Resident Evil’s DNA.

Speaking with Collider’s Hannah Hunt ahead of Resident Evil Requiem’s release, Apostolides reflected on his long personal history with the series, which began decades before he ever stepped into Leon’s shoes.

“I’ve been around for 28 years with this franchise as a fan. I’ve seen it all. And I remember the first time we saw a live-action Resident Evil movie trailer… I was so blown away. I was in for it.”

Since that first film announcement in the early 2000s for Paul W.S. Anderson’s Resident Evil, the franchise has expanded far beyond its survival horror origins, embracing different tones, timelines, and storytelling approaches across mediums. For Apostolides, that flexibility isn’t a weakness, but one of the franchise’s greatest strengths. “They keep trying new things. They let their IP be utilized by different creatives with different visions,” he explained. “And I just love it. It creates fandoms, and it’s continuously giving the community material. It grows the canon, and it’s just fun to see where it goes.”

Reinvention Has Always Been Part of ‘Resident Evil’s Identity

Image via Capcom

Few gaming franchises have maintained cultural relevance as consistently as Resident Evil, which continues to balance nostalgia with experimentation. From reinvention-heavy remakes to animated series and upcoming film projects, the series has repeatedly shifted creative direction while maintaining its core survival horror identity. Apostolides views that openness as essential to keeping the franchise alive for new generations of fans. Allowing filmmakers and developers to reinterpret the world through their own perspectives, he says, ensures the series never becomes stagnant. Rather than preserving a single definitive version of Resident Evil, each adaptation adds another layer to the franchise’s growing mythology — something Apostolides believes strengthens the community surrounding it.

With new games, adaptations, and creative teams continuing to explore the universe, Resident Evil shows little sign of slowing down, and if Apostolides is right, its future success may depend on continuing to evolve in unexpected directions.

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Release Date

September 18, 2026

Director

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Zach Cregger

Writers

Zach Cregger, Shay Hatten

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