‘The Mist’: Spike’s New Stephen King Series Rolls in with First Trailer!!! Check It Out!!!

Spike has revealed the first trailer for The Mist, the new horror series inspired by the Stephen King novella of the same name. Set in small town where a mysterious mist rolls in over the hills, with deadly forces in tow, The Mist follows the denizens of the neighborhood, recently rocked by a tragic crime, who find themselves suddenly cut off from the world and trapped together in a nightmare where morality and sanity threaten to unravel as the rules of society break down.

However, if the setup sounds familiar, the new series from creator Christian Torpe (Rita) has plenty of surprises in store. Torpe is looking to the novella for inspiration, but he also has to flesh out a short form narrative into an ongoing series, which means the series is leaving behind the local grocery store in favor of much more broad structure that introduces multiple locations throughout the town, including the local mall and church, where hundreds of people are taking refuge from the monstrous mist creatures. “We establish different little pressure cookers under the influence of whoever the leader would be in those locations” Torpe told EW. “Each of them come up with different theories or beliefs about what’s going on. Eventually, the story lines will dovetail and turn into conflicts.”

The Mist’s 10-episode run debuts Thursday, June 22 at 10 PM, ET/PT on Spike. Watch the first trailer below.

There’s also the fact that we’ve already seen a fantastic by-the-book (well, at least except for that infamous ending) film adaptation of King’s story. “I wanted to be respectful to the source material, but my feeling was there was already a great adaptation out there by Frank Darabont,” Torpe said. “The novella is 200 pages and one location, and we needed to change that to make an ongoing series. But we wanted to remain faithful to the heart of the story.”

That means that Torpe is introducing a whole new cast of characters to round out his horror drama, and updating the material with painfully relevant themes of sexual violence and bigotry. “Unfortunately, I thought it was incredibly timely to do a show about what people do when they are blinded by fear,” Torpe says. “We look around at what’s going on in the world, and everyone is constantly looking for someone to blame, or someone to lead them to the promised land. They find people to hate, either because of their gender or race or faith. Those are elements we tap into — how fear drives things like misogyny and homophobia.”

EW also got the scoop on our new heroes, and maybe some villains. Here’s a brief breakdown:

Eve Copeland (Alyssa Sutherland): a schoolteacher with a past as a wild child who stirs up new small-town controversy with her sex-ed class.
Eve’s husband, Kevin (Morgan Spector): “a prototypical nice guy” described as a modern-day liberal man who believes in values of kindness and forgiveness but has never had them tested before.
Their daughter, Alex (Gus Birney): a good kid who’s always behaved by the rules but starts developing a rebellious streak at the exact wrong time.
Their neighbor, Nathalie Raven (Frances Conroy): a spiritually inclined woman who is “party prophet, party wanna be martyr” and has a maternal but twisted relationship with the local sheriff (Darren Pettie). Sounds like she’s created the mold of Mrs. Carmody, but she mentions “mother earth” in the trailer and her promo image is of her holding a gardening can, so I’m guessing she’s maybe a nutty environmentalist rather than a pious Christian.
The sheriff’s son, Jay (Luke Cosgrove): a high school football star accused of a violent crime.
The mall facility manager, Gus Redman (Isiah Whitlock Jr.): a bureaucrat whose career stalled out before he earned the respect he thinks he deserved. When the mist rolls in and a hundred survivors are trapped in the mall, Gus finally has his moment to exert authority and “Establish his own empire.”

Hoping to see Mrs. Carmody pop up and show this new town what a villain really is? Well, that’s super weird because who would ever want that lady to pop up anywhere, but it’s not out of the question! Torpe describes The Mist as “a weird cousin” to the source material hinting that some of the original characters might just make a cameo somewhere down the line.

via Collider