DOUBLE TROUBLE
You could be forgiven for missing Stephen King’s 2018 novel The Outsider when it came out — the guy’s too damn prolific to keep up with — but catch up by following HBO’s 10-episode series starring Ben Mendelsohn (Rogue One, Ready Player One, Captain Marvel) as a Georgia cop pegging local school baseball coach Terry Maitland (Jason Bateman) as a child killer on the loose. What emerges from the first two episodes is that Terry — who’s carted off in handcuffs in the middle of a little league game — has as much evidence clearing him as there is placing him at the scene of the crime.
With his hangdog expression, Mendelsohn is effective as your typical King local good guy who’s been pushed too far by personal tragedy to always make the right decisions. Bateman is curiously blasé for a guy being railroaded for crimes he’s 100 percent sure he didn’t commit — but that just keeps you guessing.
Enter Cynthia Erivo (2020 Oscar nominee for Harriet) as a private eye with cornrows, Asperger’s-like tendencies and a belief in the unexplainable, and it becomes even more watchable.
What sets The Outsider apart from many Stephen King adaptations is the somber, serious, procedural tone — that same tone you see in HBO dramas like The Night Of, Sharp Objects and True Detective. But this is Stephen King, not Law
and Order, so of course there’s gonna be some supernatural explanation afoot. How can Terry be on a surveillance camera in one state while shown on camera attending a book conference in another state? Early episodes suck us in; we hope The
Outsider stays on course for its duration. (Showing on HBO Mondays, 10 a.m.)