Have to disagree with Stephen King on this
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Mark_Graisons_Moustache — 14 years ago(February 11, 2012 02:48 PM)
In the commentary, the director says King wrote his own draft of the script that was not used, but in that draft, Tad lives.
"Mr. Bond, you defy all my attempts to plan an amusing death for you." -
nicksaviking44 — 13 years ago(October 12, 2012 09:08 PM)
In the book, Tad's death seemed like penance for Donna's past sins. The book seemed more true to the theme of the story to me, but having the kid survive in the film wasn't a complete cop-out as Donna's retribution could be interpreted as her mental and physical battle with her suddenly tangible demon (Cujo).
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seahawk3133 — 13 years ago(February 04, 2013 06:49 AM)
The kid living or dying didn't matter. The family got through the first demon (Cujo), they still have this terror, the memories of the affair, her injuries and the psycho guy to get through. The woman is going to suffer plenty from this and odds are the marriage won't last anyways
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april_l — 13 years ago(March 10, 2013 11:22 PM)
I saw the movie (when I was 11) before I read the book (not until I was 13) so I was absolutely devastated when I finally did read it and get to the end. Of course, now that I'm an adult, I can see why the book ended the way it did. The shock of having the child die is very effective. However, I don't mind that the child didn't die in the movie. Maybe if the movie were made today, they MIGHT go with the original ending but I do doubt that.
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Godzilla1981 — 9 years ago(January 26, 2017 05:48 AM)
How does it make "dramatic sense"? In a super cynical age, the kid has to die at the end for it to be "dramatically powerful"? I could see a lot of people saying that, like "HOW BRAVE of the filmmakers, as kids usually don't die in films". I wouldn't consider it brave. I'd consider it sadistic. And beyond that, it would be a real sh** of an ending. As if the mom and kid haven't been through enough, nope, kid's dead too. Oh well.
But no, as I'm sure everyone else has pointed out, King actually wanted them to keep the kid alive for the movie. When he wrote stories like this and Pet Sematary, he was in the darkest part of his drunken, drugged up stupor phase, before his family had an intervention, and he finally got sober. It shows, because, honestly, his stories from that era are pretty awful, and VERY dark, mean-spirited, etc. His work post-sobriety, IMO, became much stronger.
