Spoilers!
Stephen King’s 1982 book, The Running Man, written under his pseudonym Richard Bachman, feels perhaps even more salient in our present authoritarian slide than when it was initially released. The story, incidentally, takes place in a dystopian 2025, which is perhaps why they re-released the book this year, as well as to plug You Like It Darker — surprisingly not to plug the upcoming Glen Powell adaptation/remake. In this dystopian future 2025, the Games Network control a United States in tatters, split quite literally between the haves and the have-nots. France is under martial law, Egypt and South America are engaged in germ warfare (not sure if against each other or within their areas), and the western states of America are considered too hot to live in.
The haves have nose filters to avoid the poisonous air (which King later alludes to being intentional?), enjoy abundance, and are the audience for the barbaric, deadly Games, including The Running Man, one of a few games that runs on Free-Vee, but which is the most popular. The have-nots, like Ben Richards, our protagonist, are destitute beyond belief, living in Co-Op City, and because of their destitution, are driven to be “contestants” in the Games for hopes of “New Dollars.” In his case, Richards decides to go for The Running Man because his daughter, Cathy, has lung cancer and needs medicine, and he doesn’t want his wife, Sheila, turning tricks to make ends meet. The Running Man game takes a man, puts them on the run with money in their pocket, a camera to film proof-of-life, as it were, and a head start before Hunters come after them and the whole country is turned into a network of snitches. If found, they will not be apprehended; they will be murdered. Most don’t last the initial few days. The house always wins. But should Richards survive for 30 days, ostensibly he would receive one billion New Dollars (the catch there seems to be an entire country would still want him dead!).
Richards is rather crafty, though, and is able to avoid capture longer than expected. It helps that he links up with Bradley and Stacey, two Black brothers in Boston, who have done something seemingly shocking in this time in America: they read and they learned about the intentional air poisoning of the have-nots. Bradley has a network of people throughout the country who go on to help Richards continue to evade capture.
The salience for today includes a.) a people believing only what the government wants them to see on the Free-Vee; b.) a people believing anyone the government says is a violent societal degenerate is indeed a violent societal degenerate, effectively “othering” them; c.) a people having bloodlust for those “others” seen as the enemy now; d.) turning it all into a reality show, i.e., governance via reality show; and e.) even when confronted with the truth, as I’ll talk about later, the haves still deny it. I’m sure there is more, but King was ahead of his time with the reality show/gamification angle. Our present government and their mouthpieces on the “free-vee” effectively wield both a.) and b.) resulting in c.), and Trump, whose main thing is being a reality show host, has governed as if all of this is a reality show or a game. Certainly, his MAGA follows also deny the truth of it all in favor of comforting lies and distortions.
Since he knows about it, Bradley is the one who helps open Richards’ eyes to the pollution situation. Richards, obviously, already had plenty of baseline animus toward the Games Network, but this new knowledge only fuels that. In other words, he didn’t realize his daughter’s emphysema was the result of the Network. We also learn that by 2012, the pollution had gotten so bad in Tokyo, they started using nose filters. (That’s where I’m like, okay, it seems intentional in the United States, but what about Japan?!) Bradley then helps Richards get to Portland, Maine with his connection there, Elton Parrakis. When Richards arrives, he’s met by Elton’s anxious mother, who doesn’t like Elton befriending a “darkie.” From her (an unreliable narrator), we learn that the “darkies got out of hand in 1979.” I’m not sure what that is implying! Perhaps that the official narrative from the Network is that Black people are the reason the Games had to assert more control?
There wasn’t as much action as I expected in The Running Man; it’s primarily about Richards’ inner thoughts, hiding, learning, and traveling to new cities. But there are still moments, including blowing up a number of cops as he escapes a house in Boston, shooting at cops and sending their cruisers crashing and exploding, and he experiences considerable damage himself. Action-wise, I was more so expecting Richards would have hand-to-hand encounters with the police, Hunters, and/or the public trying to snitch on him. Speaking of, Elton’s mom snitches, and Elton dies in his bid to cause a diversion so Richards can escape. Richards then resorts to carjacking a “haves” woman named Amelia Williams. By this point, I believe Richards’ ankle is broken, his nose broke when Elton’s “aircar” crashed, and he’s been shot at least twice. Flesh wounds, I suppose!
Richards wants Amelia to continue on to Derry, Maine (Derry!) and an airfield there. When they encounter a police roadblock and the police realize Ben Richards is in the vehicle, they shoot at the vehicle. Amelia can’t believe they shot at her and would have killed her to kill Ben Richards. But as I alluded to, she’s in denial and rationalizes that they meant to take out her vehicle and missed. Fortunately, Williams redeems herself later when she helps Richards lie to the Network and the leader of the Hunters, Evan McCone. Richards is able to bluff his way through a small army of police, military, and the Hunters and onto the airfield because he ensured the media and both haves and have-nots were present, so the Network couldn’t distort what happened, i.e., they wouldn’t risk shooting Amelia now, and by bluffing that he had some sort of bomb. The bluff works so well that Richards is able to commandeer a plane with a crew and get both Amelia and McCone onto the plane.
McCone tells Richards he’s made it further than any other contestant, making him perhaps the greatest contestant of all time. But even then, he only made it eight days and seven hours! A full 30 days would be unimaginable. While on the plane, McCone tries to call Richards’ bluff and Richards counter-bluffs by suggesting he’ll detonate the bomb right there on the plane. McCone promptly turns into a sniveling coward. This is the other great, salient insight from King’s book: authoritarians, like the bullies they are and bullies always are, are sniveling cowards when confronted. Do not acquiesce! Do not obey in advance!
Eventually, Dan Killian, the executive producer of The Running Man, comes on the Free-Vee and has a proposition for Richards. He knows Richards is bluffing because the plane’s detectors didn’t detect a bomb when he got on, but he’s so impressed by Richards’ ingenuity and creativity, he wants to bring Richards on to be the lead Hunter of the show replacing McCone. Part of Killian’s spiel is also letting Richards know Sheila and Cathy were brutally murdered 10 days ago, stabbed multiple times, ostensibly, of course, by intruders. Again, the House always wins, right? Richards, who by this point, I should note, was shot two more times, including in the gut, continues his bluffing by agreeing to Killian’s proposition.
While the plane, being flown by Otto, a machine, is going toward Harding, where the Games Network skyscraper is, Richards is able to attack and kill the flight crew and McCone. Interestingly, one of the flight crew members seemed to have “mesh” underneath his skull. Was he a robot?! I think Richards’ original plan is for him and Amelia to use the parachutes to jump from the plane and the plane crash into the Games Network building. Instead, Amelia is sucked out of the plane when they open the door, and quite frankly, Richards, whose intestines are quite literally trailing him, is near death. He ensures the plane hits the Games Building head-on. We get the perspective of Killian seeing the plane coming, and somewhat cartoonishly, seeing Richards and his middle finger in the cockpit. The book ends with a fiery explosion, effectively killing Richards, Killian, and at least for now, hobbling the Games Network.
And the ending finally answered what I was wondering from the get-go: Each chapter is counting down from 100. Since the countdown started before Richards even entered The Running Man, I knew it had nothing to do with that. But what then? In this case, the climax and his death.
Overall, The Running Man resonated with me due to its salience regarding present authoritarianism, its prescience about reality shows and the lust humans have for seeing conflict on TV, and the enjoyment of seeing, well, the running man take on the Man.
Milam's Musings 