The Big Picture

• "The Jaunt" is a short but intense sci-fi horror story by Stephen King bursting with potential for a film adaptation.
• While initially casual, the tale takes a chilling turn with a disturbing ending that could make for an unforgettable film finale.
• Many have attempted to adapt "The Jaunt," but finding the right filmmaker is crucial to translate King's terrifying vision to screen.

Between movies, TV, and even a few video games, there is a sea of Stephen King adaptations out there for fans to consume, but there are still a number of his works yet to be lifted from the page. One of these is his 1981 short story, "The Jaunt." This bite-size sci-fi horror story packs a ridiculous amount of substance into just over 20 pages. It's a tale that chronicles the invention of teleportation, referred to as "Jaunting," told from the perspective of a 24th century family waiting to be Jaunted to Mars for a business trip. Initially, King's short story plays casual, but as things move along, it becomes clear that the dangers of Jaunting are much greater than expected. King's full-on novels are one thing, but "The Jaunt" proves that King can be terrifying even when he's paired down to a simple short story. If there's any untapped work of his that is riddled with potential, you're looking at it right here.

"The Jaunt" was originally published in The Twilight Zone Magazine in 1981. King was deep into his career of writing hit horror novels, coming off of a major string of instant classics like Carrie, The Shining, and The Stand, just to name a few. Regardless of the fact that he was a worldwide phenomenon, King continued to sharpen his craft by writing short stories that would go on to be published in magazines. With how popular his works were becoming, any and every property that sported the name Stephen King on its cover, poster, or slogan was sure to rake in boatloads of cash. This meant these short stories would live a temporary life in magazines, then go on to be published again in mass short story collections like his '70s collection Night Shift. "The Jaunt" would eventually come packaged in 1985's Skeleton Crew, the step that gave this story a life of its own, growing its reputation as one of King's best.

What Is Stephen King's "The Jaunt" About?

The story begins with Mark Oates and his family sitting in New York's Port Authority Terminal as they wait to be Jaunted to Mars for a two-year business trip. Oates' children become curious as to how the Jaunt came about, so until the Jaunting service comes to teleport him and his family away, Oates recounts the story of its invention for his children. The process initially came about in 1987 when a scientist named Victor Carune accidentally teleported two of his fingers. He would go on to attempt teleporting a number of other objects. Inanimate objects proved to teleport successfully, yet any time a mouse or goldfish came through the other side, it would either be dead upon arrival, or act strange shortly before dying. It eventually comes to Oates' attention that something would take place during teleportation that caused conscious living creatures to die, making it even clearer as to why all of his inanimate tests had no issues.

For the first half of the story, "The Jaunt" has a similar tone to many other underdog stories. It's initially fun for Oates as he tells his children Victor Carune's part of cracking teleportation, an exciting little sci-fi story about a lone scientist inventing what would be the most important and efficient means of teleportation in history. It is only when the story veers into human experimentation that "The Jaunt" begins to take on a more King-like flare. Without getting into spoiler territory, the second half goes from watching some truly unnerving tests take place to one of the most disturbing endings that King has to offer. "The Jaunt" goes out with a major bang. If it were eventually made into a film, that sucker would have an incredible finale, throttling the audience with an image that, if done right, would surely stick with viewers much like the photo reveal at the end of The Shining, or Carrie standing amidst her destruction on prom night. All this to say, it would take a real master to conjure up an image that could match what King puts into readers' heads after reading this short story.

Why Is Stephen King's "The Jaunt" Perfect for a Film Adaptation?

If there's any short story of King's that's perfect for adaptation into film, it's this one. It's easy to imagine "The Jaunt" as a tight 80-minute sci-fi thriller, one with a knockout ending that would quickly veer into some pretty shocking horror. Better yet, half of the story is told in one contained location, New York's Port Authority Terminal, a set that could be designed for a bigger budget, but perhaps would be done more effectively on a smaller or medium-sized budget. It's a fairly Cronenberg-like tale, similar in more ways than one to his remake of The Fly, so it would be fun if we could see Cronenberg tackle this adaptation after returning to horror with 2022's Crimes of the Future. It could be perfect grounds for his son Brandon Cronenberg, a filmmaker who has released three low-budget sci-fi horror films, including last year's Infinity Pool. It's also enticing to think of people like Duncan Jones, Shane Carruth, and Rian Johnson taking on "The Jaunt." Movies like Moon, Primer, and Looper are the kind of small-scale sci-fi that this adaptation would be in line with.

While we still haven't seen this Skeleton Crew excerpt make its way to screens just yet, it's not like there haven't been attempts made. In 2015, it was announced that Andy Muschietti, the director behind both recent parts of It, was working on a film adaptation. While that would have been interesting, his style is a bit more heightened and ghoulish, better fit for a story that isn't as realistically chilling as this. Safe to say he made the right decision to work on It, as his two adaptations collectively grossed over a billion dollars worldwide. Recently, in 2021, it was announced that Dave Erickson, co-creator of Fear the Walking Dead, would be bringing "The Jaunt" to TV as a series. It feels like a weird move to adapt a 24-page short story into a full-on television show with multiple seasons, at least if their intention is to faithfully bring the source material to life. It could work as a miniseries, starting each episode with Mark Oates setting up the next step to inventing teleportation for his family, followed by 20-40 minutes of flashbacks in which Victor Carune and the scientists that followed him run the short story's progressive Jaunt tests. Let's hope they take the miniseries route!

There have been so many Stephen King adaptations. It doesn't matter if they're critically regarded as "good" or "bad," film and TV versions of his works are almost always fun. This is almost a certainty for "The Jaunt" as well, a story rife with fun sci-fi ideas and shocking horror set-pieces. Let's hope that eventually, the right filmmaker comes around and brings this one to life as well.

Andy Muschietti's It is available to stream on Netflix in the U.S.

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