When reimagining such an oft told story as Carrie, it’s in everyone’s best interests if the creators change up the established order a bit. Obviously, Mike Flanagan’s had to add a fair few embellishments to make the story stretch to fit eight episodes, and such things as social media, school shootings and online bullying wasn’t a thing when Stephen King had the original book published back in 1974. However, after a first half that’s managed to make Carrie incredibly relevant to modern times, we find that the series is teetering on something of a dilemma.
With so much new stuff added to the basic story, it seems that Carrie’s now torn between sticking to the original tale, or letting the modern additions dictate a new path. But in forgetting the original mission (super powered nobody goes nuclear), is Carrie in danger of losing the very identity that made it so beloved in the first place?
Despite Carrie and Sue discovering that Chris is the online muck flinger known as Carrie Red, it seems like the desperate mean girl has no intention of deactivating the account despite all the damage it’s causing to everyone at school. In fact, even the rampant slander the page puts out is starting to damage the reputation of teachers in town. However, after finally retreating to her controlling mother for help, Carrie discovers that Margaret White is fully willing to fight fire with fire. Starting by literally going around the corridors of the school telling everyone Carrie Red’s identity, she ups her campaign by actually setting up her own account, shares everyone she can, and attempts to out Chris that way.
With this online arms race not looking to calm down any time soon, Chris’ lawyer father grumpily has to get involved, but in a brazen counter attack, both Chris and her psycho boyfriend Billy, decide to break into the White residence to search more more dirt that’s fit to print.
Meanwhile, Carrie hasn’t exactly been passive during this exchange, and after using her telekinesis to break Chris’ nose in a fit of rage during lunch, has decided to practice her formidable powers, with Emaline acting as an overexcited cheerleader. Levitating trash, bending metal bars into knots and crunching a car is all very well and good, but having funky abilities doesn’t prove to be especially useful when it turns out that Chris has gotten hold of the memory card from the security camera system set up in White house. While Sue Snell decides to finally come off the sidelines and provide damning evidence that her former best friend is behind Carrie Red, Carrie White is rocked by home footage of her apparently talking to thin air when she thought she was talking to Emaline.
Has Emaline been a figment of her imagination all along? If so, it’s no wonder the majority of the school treat her with such confusion.
It seems like I’ve found myself stuck in the trap of being in two minds about how I feel about a modern interpretation changing up the rules of an established classic. While I’ve never been one to shut down a new take just on the basis that it’s new, not every attempt to rejuvenate a horror classic has been golden and often dilutes the purity of what made the original verson so special. Making Freddy Krueger an overt pedophile in the Nightmare On Elm Street remake was one such mistake and making Chucky a malfunctioning toy in the redux felt far inferior in comparison to a voodoo possessed doll, and it seems joining that list is the idea of Margaret White starting an Instagram account. Now, while Samantha Sloyan’s take on the character has been good enough to help us put the Piper Laurie and Julianne Moore versions of the character to the backs of our minds, and launching an online hate campaign against a teenage girl is an act of Stephen King spite right out of Needful Things, transforming a reclusive, hateful, religious fanatic into some wannabe parental crusader just feels like a step too far. Yes, again I understand this is a modern take, but the Margaret White I grew up with was a terrifyingly narrow-minded matriarch who wielded her beliefs like a club and was all about desperately holding control. Seeing her now actually protect her daughter while defiantly planting one foot in the modern world may be a stirring progression for the character, but it also stops her from being what I want her to be – utterly, skin crawlingly, scary as fuck.
While I’m struggling to accept this new, slightly more empathetic version of Margaret, another thing that’s seemingly bugging me is the suggestion that Carrie herself has serious mental problems. That’s right, as we’ve now established that Emaline is a figment of her imagination (or at least a mental projection of one of those telekinetics we briefly saw in the first episode), Carrie’s thread has now turned into something that’s somewhat reminiscent of Chronicle, as her earlier scenes of honing her skills at a scrap yard proves to mirror that of a telekinetic Dane Dehaan. But again, having Carrie fret about her sanity all just feels like unnecessary extra stops on the way to an inevitable finale and at times, it feels that Flanagan’s additions are taking the show further away from what it should be, rather than enhancing them. On the other hand, watching Summer H. Howell go through a range of emotions as she perfects her powers is admittedly damn cool, and at least the character’s of Chris and Sue are remaining on-mission.
In fact, I’ve been somewhat quiet concerning Siena Agudong’s goody two-shoes as she’s tended to drift into the background over the last few episodes other than providing rare spots of kindness to our eponymous lead. But now she’s finally taking that leader role as she pleads with her former best friend to step back from the brink of her weaponized cruelty. Ultimately grassing up Chris will no doubt push the high school sadist to further double-down on her illegal activities, but it’s been pretty fascinating watching Chris and Billy Nolan bond in increasingly nefarious ways. In fact, if any character is managing to nail that line between honoring the old while embracing the new, it’s these two. In fact, their gradual descent from pretty crime to something far more sinister is the glue that holds “Physical Education” together and while it continues to have valuable things to say about the use (or misuse) of social media, the old Carrie perfectionist in me is starting to call foul and these YA shifts.
The performances, the message and Kyra Sedgwick’s direction all still combine to ensure that Carrie remains a organic mix of classic King and modern anxieties, but the balance is starting to tip too far away from the original aspects of the story that make it hit so hard. I’m certain that we’ll eventually come back around to those original beats soon enough, but I can’t help but fret that Flanagan’s getting a bit Carried away…
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Where to watch Carrie – Season 1, Episode 5: Physical Education:
I think the departure was as much necessary as it was to be faithful to the material. When something has been done as much as this, to varying degrees of success, it’s clearly time to do something else with it. It’s easy to see why people are of two mind’s on it: it’s both incredibly faithful and yet completely reimagined. I’m obviously biased, as I love Flanagan’s work and to me, there’s no one who is a better tonal fit for the work of Stephen King. I mean, Midnight Mass is the best Salem’s Lot story never told. This just makes me excited for the potential of his Dark Tower series.