Hello everyone and welcome to the Stephen King cast, One Man's Musings on the Works of Stephen King.

Each week I will review one entry in the bibliography of Stephen King and the chronological order of publication.

What I am doing this week, actually I am re-releasing an episode of the original adaptation of the Running Man,

the one starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.

And the reason why I am re-releasing it is because

when I originally reviewed that movie

and released it, this was prior, I mean, this was a while ago.

It was a long time ago.

And there were a lot of things that had not happened in the world of politics since then.

So in the decade that, you know, it's been just about a decade since I had originally reviewed that novel.

Politics completely has changed and there is now a very more insidious form of politics

that has to do with ratings, it has to do with celebrity, it has to do with um propaganda which is really really on

on the forefront of things so a lot of what we saw in that original running man um unfortunately

really aligns with what we see today in in politics that grandstanding the um the the the

the really um, the, the, the, the, uh, really that you, um, completely, um, ignoring

humanity and, um, uh, putting other people in danger for our own entertainment, um, and

vilifying people for our entertainment, um, it, it, it really has become what 2026 is in a way that when the

movie originally came out, you know, it was a recognizable to somewhat, you know, to somewhat

degree of a reality. But like all dystopian fiction and futuristic settings, we weren't there yet.

You know, you could see where it was going, you know, and this original movie, you know, used the, the, the visual language of the time with game shows and professional wrestling and 1980s action

movies to really tell this story but I with our current reality being what it is these elements

are still on display this this this belief in what strength really looks like,

...