The Dark Tower

Spoiler alert! Don't read until after the ranks Trev, and Stan, if you're gonna read this at all, this post shouldn't hurt too much because the spoilers are pretty vague. I started up Stephen King's Dark Tower series 4 years ago, and finally it has come to a close. The series finishes with a 1000-page epic, The Dark Tower, in which Roland and his Ka-tet finally reach the tower. But not after suffering a few setbacks- after the events of Song of Susannah, they first have to find eachother. This made for an excellent introduction. The first 200 pages, in which the six members of the ka-tet return to full strength felt just like the writing in the first few books, which most people agree was the stronger part of the series. Awesome way to start it all off. After this came the two main tasks the group needed to complete before making the last journey to the tower- the liberation of the breakers, and a return to Maine to save Stephen King's life. Yeah that's right, we're not done with Stevie yet. The freeing of the breakers makes up most of the action you get in the book, and along the way you get a great backstory of a psychic who lost his way, but a lot of this part could have been trimmed down- it didn't really need 300+ pages. The return of the King, however, was a little more awkward. I mentioned in my review of Song of Susannah that Stephen King handled insterting himself as a character well, and didn't see what the big deal was. Well, here's the big deal. King makes himself a character integral to the plot, and performs quite a lot of self-fellatio along the way. Sure, some people call him a hack and Roland considers him a coward, but that's where the self-deprecation ends. There's all sorts of lines about how King had written just so many stories and how interesting it is that they all tie together with Roland's journey. Nice subtlety, man. Either way, this part doesn't last too long, and after a few more short episodes (Dandelo being my personal favorite) we finally get to the big finale... with a grand total of 30 pages left in the book. The showdown at the tower is a little underwhelming, sure, but the way it all played out at least felt appropriate. There's an epilogue that's well worth a read, and then a coda before which King advises you not to read it, the ending would probably spoil what you just read. So guess what- I didn't read it! I was very happy with the ending as it was, and had the coda-ending sorta spoiled for me before, so I just stayed away from it. So yeah, while it dragged at parts and certainly didn't need to be 1000+ pages, the book was a great cap to the series. I still feel like if King had put 5 years or so in between writing the books like he did with the first few, we'd have a much better series. Some of the ideas in books 5-7 were really good, but just got bogged down with too much unneccesary crap. And now, for no other reason than to start some DT discussion, here's my Rankems for the entire series!

1. Wizard and Glass
2. The Waste Lands
3. The Drawing of the Three
4. The Dark Tower
5. Wolves of the Calla
6. The Gunslinger
7. Song of Susannah

I probably have Wizard and Glass and The Dark Tower rated higher than most, and The Gunslinger ranked lower, based on opinions I've heard. But The Gunslinger bored me and the series really didn't pick up until just after it. Wizard and Glass was helped much by the fact that I knew it was a long flashback beforehand, so I was ready for the tale to take a break and just enjoy Roland's backstory. It got a little too melodramatic for most, it seems, but I thought it also had the best gunfight in the entire series, as well as the pre-flashback amazing conclusion to Blaine the Mono. And probably everyone agrees that Song of Susannah was the worst. Yeah we get it Mia, you're having a chap. Ugh. Marissa and soon enough Trev, gimme your ranks!