The Dark Tower Series

Did a search and only found reviews of the individual books from years ago, so I've created a catch-all thread.

Last month I did a review of Marvel's new Dark Tower mini-series, and it prompted me to revisit King's magnum opus in audio book form. My library only has the first (2003 edition), fourth, fifth and last books, and I'm 2/3 of the way through Wolves of the Calla. I've read the whole series once before, although this was my third time experiencing the first book, so this has been like checking in with old friends. Sure I know I'm in for a letdown with the Crimson King himself at the very end, but the buildup along the way is worth it.

The first book is a strange beast; it's so desolate, surreal, and lonely. There's a sense of no background, that the world only exists directly in front of Roland. It's unfortunate that as the series progresses forward it simultaneously cements the "reality" of Roland's world (Calla Bryn Sturgis, for instance, is very lived-in and functional, and the people don't walk around in a purgatorial haze like in Tull) while getting more fantastical. In the first book it's Roland in a facsimile of the Old West chasing a wizard, but by the later books it's become Mad Max meets The Terminator meets The Lord of the Rings meets Sliders. From a story perspective that's all fine and good, as there's fun in infinite possibility, but post-Wizard and Glass the books lack the same mood and atmosphere. None of the books can recreate the pacing and drive Roland has in pursuit of Walter; the Dark Tower is, for too long, such an abstract concept and the distance and time to get there is left so vague, to the point where in the last book Roland gets magicked there (after all that walking)!

Still, I have a lot of good will for King and these characters, and the element of self-awareness adds much. The characters questioning the world around them makes it a bit more acceptable, although I wish King wouldn't rely on deus ex machina so much. Whenever the plot needs to get sped up again, Flagg or the Turtle leaves a clue for the Ka-Tet. That's cheating, King! 

Wolves of the Calla, I think, isn't that popular among Tower enthusiasts but I like it. In my head I subtitle it as "Why We Fight", because it demonstrates Eddie, Susannah, and Jake's prowess as gunslingers for the first time and the people of the Calla represent concrete victims of the Crimson King's plans. Also, Pere Callahan is such a well-realized character (I've read 'Salem's Lot since the last time I read The Dark Tower, so it's nice to have him expounded on), and he represents a divergence in King's usual tendencies: religious characters are usually fanatics in King's work (including in The Gunslinger), but Callahan is devout but reasonable. It's not his defining trait, but it's the most important thing in his life. I'm not religious, but I appreciate a refreshing change of pace when it comes to King characters. Sometimes he starts to repeat himself, especially in the way people talk in his later books; all jingles and rhymes over and over again. If anyone says "chap" or "someone saved my life tonight" again I'm gonna smack 'em.

So, thoughts on the books that are already out and the new book, The Wind Through the Keyhole, that's supposed to come out this year?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Andy Bain 

My overriding thought on this series is always:
What if King hadn't been run over?
That put so much of a slant on the rest of the series, and I'm sure him writing the last 3 (4?) back to back had an effect to.
Getting into spoiler territory but was Shardik originally mentioned as just a shout out (in the same way the brief mention of Dwight Holly in the Kennedy assassination book is a shout out to Ellroy) or did he always intend for it to be a meta analysis of where ideas come from?
Would we have had sneetches etc had he not been hit, contemated his own mortality and how that would effect this Universe.
I do like the series, the quality does dip after Wizard & Glass, but I love the ending.
I'd love to see him carry in from that ending but that won't happen. Given the ideas he has about the Butterfly Effect in the Kennedy book (don't have it to hand and can't remember the title) it would be interesting to see where it goes.
Any news on where the new book sits in the series?

In one of the earlier post-release threads, I think for Wolves of the Calla, our own Jesse Custer discussed pretty thoroughly the concept of Mid-World conflating into a smorgasbord of fictional ideas. It's no coincidence that King includes so many allusions and homages to popular culture, even if it comes across as uninspired at times (re. the Wolves). 

In terms of meta-analysis, he may be playing simultaneously with how much an author brings to his work, and death-of-the-author. If God and the Man-Jesus are the authors of the multiverse, and the room at the top of the Tower is empty, then there is no more author. Even when the Ka-Tet meet Stephen King, which borders on jumping the shark, he admits that he doesn't so much as write as attempt to contain the ideas that come to him (meaning he didn't create Roland, he just channels him).

If, for instance, the Crimson King represents Chaos then Stephen King and the Ka-Tet he guides are avatars of Order. The Crimson King is ultimately a perfunctory villain (I would've preferred Flagg to have killed him and been the one to reach the Tower), but thematically he fits: he's trying to kill ideas, he's trying to kill fiction. The irony is that Roland lacks imagination; but whereas the Tower used to be held up by "magic" (divinity?) and later by machines, Roland plans to hold it up by sheer force of will. 

What I do love about the ending, post-Crimson King grenados, is that although Roland had become a bit softened over the series his reaching the Tower is ultimately selfish. Yes, he saves the multiverse (and infinite story possibilities), but ultimately reaching that room at the top is about his own selfish obsession. The fact that he's trying to escape his own limbo (and mayhap will next time, he's got his father's horn now) is what's important. 

So he's trying to save stories, but end his own stories. He doesn't want to be a character in a book anymore, he wants to be outside Ka (King).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Andy Bain 

but would this have happened had he not been hit?  Apart from the (potentially) throwaway Shardik mention there's not much of this in the previous books.  There's the possibility of tying in Flagg I guess, as Walter, but nothing so overt.  Yes he had the other universes in there ('there are other worlds than these') but himself as the lynchpin??.. Not a gripe, I just wonder how it would have turned out.  I'm pretty sure that the very ending would have been identical.

 

One bit I did like (and I really, REALLY struggled with King writing himself into it) was when they talk to a woman who reads King, and she says "he has a tin ear for language" because boy does he ever.

 

In a weird way though, I've always thought that ideas come form somewhere other than people's brains, it's almost like they are tapping some other quantum stream sometimes.

 

Let's break down the mythology of the series before and after King's accident in 1999:

Pre-Accident:

The Gunslinger (1982)

-Hints at there being other worlds

-The world has "moved on"

-There's some technology, but it doesn't work

-Dying can be a way to travel between worlds

The Drawing of the Three (1987)

-"Unfound" doors are another way to travel between worlds

-The concept of Ka-Tet

The Waste Lands (1991)

-Ka-Tet encounters Shardik, and the concept of the beams that lead to the Tower and the Totem guardians of said beams (with the Turtle, introduced in 1986's It, being the only surviving guardian)

-Jake meets Calvin Tower, buys Charlie the Choo-Choo

-Jake finds the vacant lot with the rose

-Susannah has sex with a demon, becoming impregnated with the future Mordred

-The Tick-Tock Man meets Richard Fannin, also known as Randall Flagg, revealed to have not died at the end of The Gunslinger

Wizard and Glass (1997)

-The Crimson King (who was introduced by King in 1994's Insomnia) is hinted at

-The concept of thinnies

-The gunslingers pass through a version of Topeka, Kansas, a possible future of The Stand?

-Wizard's rainbow introduced; the Pink Grapefruit plays a large part, setting up Black 13

-Most of the backstory of Gilead and the upbringing of gunslingers

-John Farson (hinted at actually being Walter/Flagg here, later that's dismissed)

-Rhea of the Coos

Post-Accident:

The Gunslinger Revision (2003)

-Retroactively introduces the importance of the number 19

-Retroactively adds "Resumption" as a subtitle, and has Walter hint at the events of the story having happened before

-Retroactively adds the importance of Roland's horn and its loss at Jericho Hill

Wolves of the Calla (2003)

-Roland remembers the Battle of Jericho Hill

-Black 13's affect on the door

-The Low Men (introduced in King's 1999 Hearts in Atlantis, published after his accident in June of that year)

-Father Callahan

-'Salem's Lot is a book, so Stephen King exists in one of the multiple worlds

-The world with the rose is the Key world, connected to Roland's Mid-World

-"Todash turnpike", seemingly related to thinnies being soft places to travel between worlds (perhaps connected to "Mrs. Todd's Shortcut" from Skeleton Crew)

-Mia

-19 is emphasized as "coincidence is cancelled", so is 99

-Thunderclap

Song of Susannah (2004)

-It's revealed that the demon that had sex with Susannah in book 3 is the same succubus that had sex with Roland in book 1, so Mordred is Roland's child

-Susannah travels to 1999

-Eddie and Roland meet Stephen King in 1977, learning that he's not their creator but a medium for their story, and learn that he dies in 1999

The Dark Tower (2004)

-It's revealed that the Low Men have been kidnapping "breakers" (people with psychic ability) to bring down the beams of the Towers, tying together every psychic character King has written (from Danny in The Shining to Firestarter, to Hearts in Atlantis)

-The Ka-Tet save King in 1999 from the Low Men

-Patrick Danville from Insomnia turns out to be the key to getting to the Tower

-Mordred kills Flagg

-Roland and Susannah meet an evil spirit that, when dying, turns into an evil clown (Pennywise?)

-Only descendants of Arthur Eld can enter the Tower; so Roland, Mordred, or the Crimson King (who is a distant cousin)

So although King's ideas may have evolved over time, it's obvious that the later books are picking up from threads introduced early on. After the accident, the main differences that I doubt he ever planned to involve are himself, the number 19, and Father Callahan (who works as a catalyst for meeting King, as them discovering 'Salem's Lot leads to investigation into King). 

Quote:

Originally Posted by Schwartz 

That's really sort of cherry-picking the mythology elements that stuck or were expressly retconned out.  Not that it can be helped, since the books are such long and overstuffed with mythology (invented or borrowed) that there's no way to remember every reference or element that was never picked up on. 

 

I don't think it matters in the end whether he planned out a lot of the elements of the later books in advance; writing yourself into your epic as the (inadvertent) savior of the universe is stupid and self-indulgent whether you have the idea in 1977 or 2002.

But see I'm not talking about planning out in advance (then we'd be venturing into Lost territory), but consistency. The elements I cherry picked flow naturally, in concept, from the earlier books. The execution wasn't always on target (Patrick Danville may be connected to the Crimson King, but his introduction in the last book is sloppy), but it doesn't contradict the earlier books.

The reason King including himself doesn't bother me is the series always had an element of exploring the nature of storytelling. I love that Roland, who is already on a meta-physical journey to find the center of the universe, gets to meet his "maker" and tell him what he thinks of him. 

Speaking of Lost, we can talk about the similarities. Psychic children, center of power protected by a guardian, limbo place where time is funny, personification of evil taking many forms to trick people...