‘The Dark Tower’ Trailer Splits Stephen King Fans: ‘Gives Me Chills’ to ‘Thanks 4 Nothing Hollywoods’

Sony plans to release big-screen adaptation of book series on Aug. 4

dark tower post-credits scene
Sony

The first trailer for the Idris Elba-Matthew McConaughey movie “The Dark Tower” dropped on Wednesday, and fans of the beloved Stephen King book series on which it’s based were divided about what they saw.

“I actually almost teared up a little,” tweeted one fan, while others screen-grabbed shout-outs to other Stephen King projects in the trailer, including a brief glimpse of a photograph of the Overlook Hotel from “The Shining.”

But some fans took a dimmer view of the first peek at the adaptation. “Not where my imagination took me while reading the books … Looks disappointing,” wrote one.

“‘The Dark Tower’ trailer looks like a remake of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s movie ‘The Last Action Hero,’” another griped.

And some fans worried about how much the movie seems to depart from the source material — even though the trailer won praise (“awesome”) from King himself.

The Sony release, which is directed by Danish filmmaker Nikolaj Arcel, stars Idris Elba as Roland Deschain, a.k.a. The Gunslinger, a roaming knight of the Old West who resides in a parallel dimension known as Mid-World.

He crosses paths with Jake Chambers (Tom Taylor), an 11-year-old New Yorker with wanderlust who accidentally crosses over into Mid-World.

Together, the two go on a quest to save Mid-World from destruction, hoping to reach the titular Dark Tower and stop a dark sorcerer (Matthew McConaughey) from using it to control infinite worlds.

King is producing the film with Ron Howard, Brian Grazer and Akiva Goldsman, who is also sharing writing credit with Arcel, Jeff Pinkner and Anders Thomas Jensen. This is the first major piece of promotional material for the Columbia Pictures film, which has yet to release a trailer.

“The Dark Tower” arrives in theaters Aug. 4. See more fan reactions below.

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