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Bill Skarsgård is Playing a Shawshank Prisoner in “Castle Rock”!

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If Academy Awards were handed out at the end of the year for horror movie performances, I’m pretty sure Bill Skarsgård would earn one this year for his portrayal of iconic killer clown Pennywise in Andy Muschietti’s IT. What’s next for Skarsgård? As we recently learned, he’s headed back into the King Universe for Hulu’s “Castle Rock”!

The series, which tells an original story set inside the fictional town that Stephen King made famous, debuted a teaser trailer earlier this month, and you probably noticed some strong references to Shawshank Prison, the primary setting of The Shawshank Redemption. As it turns out, Skarsgård will be playing an inmate in next year’s series.

Instead of playing a killer clown as he did in IT, this time around Skarsgård portrays a prisoner at Shawshank, who is directly connected with André Holland’s Henry Deaver, a death-row attorney,” reports Flickering Myth this week.

The only thing I want to stress is that [Castle Rock is] a completely separate thing than Pennywise and IT,” Skarsgård himself recently explained to Rotten Tomatoes. “The world is brand new. It’s Stephen King’s universe… these are places we’ve been familiarized with through his work. But the show is an original story in that world. The character is a lot of fun. He’s — it’s a really weird one. [He’s] so different from Pennywise. I’m using a completely different tool set here for this one.”

From Bad Robot Productions and Warner Bros. Television, “Castle Rock” is named after the fictional town in King’s native Maine that is featured prominently in a number of his novels, novellas and short stories. Per the producers, it combines the mythological scale and intimate character storytelling of King’s best-loved works, weaving an epic saga of darkness and light, played out on a few square miles of Maine woodland.

Castle Rock first appeared in King’s 1979 novel “The Dead Zone”, and has reappeared as late as his 2013 novel “Doctor Sleep” and 2014 novel “Revival”. The name is taken from the fictional mountain fort of the same name in “Lord of the Flies”. “Cujo”, “The Dark Half” and “Needful Things” were set in Castle Rock, while “Creepshow”, “The Stand”, “Sleepwalkers”, “Gerald’s Game” and even “IT” reference the town.

The cast also includes Scott Glenn, Sissy Spacek, Terry O’Quinn, Melanie Lynskey and Jane Levy.

Sam Shaw & Dustin Thomason developed Castle Rock for television and serve as executive producers along with J.J. Abrams, Ben Stephenson and Liz Glotzer.

Writer in the horror community since 2008. Editor in Chief of Bloody Disgusting. Owns Eli Roth's prop corpse from Piranha 3D. Has four awesome cats. Still plays with toys.

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One of Clive Barker’s Final Convention Appearances Will Be at New Jersey’s Monster Mania in August

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Clive Barker

We told you earlier this month that horror legend Clive Barker is leaving the convention scene behind to focus entirely on his writing, with various upcoming projects in the works.

A series of final appearances from Barker will begin at Days of the Dead Chicago this month, and we’ve learned Barker will also be coming to Monster Mania in New Jersey.

Clive Barker will be signing at Monster Mania 59 in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, which runs from August 2 – August 4, 2024. Stay tuned for more info from the convention.

Barker’s official statement earlier this month explained, “… it’s time to focus entirely on writing. I’m not stopping public events because I’ve lost delight in meeting you all over the years. I’m as passionate as ever about sharing my imagination with readers and moviegoers around the world. In the very room where I’m writing these words, I have the manuscripts for a very large number of projects (Thirty-one of them), some very close to completion, others still telling themselves. There are some wild projects in this collection of works, whether close to finished or done. There are also stories that you all knew I would be finishing.”

“Abarat IV and V are amongst the books at my feet,” he continued. “So is the Third and final book of The Art and the sequel to The Thief of Always. There are also return visits to characters and mythologies you may have thought I would never return to.

“I hope I am still able to surprise you in the decades ahead.”

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