King Me: Castle Rock- 'Severance'

Well, I've put off this Show until October- for obvious reasons- so let's see if it was worth the wait...

A man leaves home for work, but decides to kill myself in dramatic fashion.  Why not combine decapitation with hanging?

As it turns out, he was the Warden of...Shawshank Prison!

With a new Warden, a closed-off Ward is discovered.  Time to lurk around in the dark.

They find a strange, unmarked Prisoner down in a cage.  Oh no, it's Pennywise!!!

A Guard realizes that they won't let the strange Prisoner go, so he calls the Lawyer that the guy asked for.

The man- naturally- is from the same Town and is back with his adopted Mom- Sissy Spacek.

His past in Town is full of questions, including the mysterious death of his Stepfather and how he survived in the Woods long enough to be rescued by Scott Glenn.

Back in Shawshank, they hide the Prisoner from the Lawyer, but something strange is happening.

To find out, watch the Episode and read the next Review...

A slow, but somewhat tense start to a Show.  Castle Rock is certainly in now hurry to explain things.  They aren't in any hurry at all, it seems.  I'm not going to say that anything was boring here, but it was definitely drawn out.  We get a lot here too- don't get me wrong-, but many Scenes feels stretched out and some are unnecessary.  A second Scene with the Warden discussing the Prisoner- cut it.  Like I said, it is still interesting, but you can't keep this pace going for 10 Episodes if you want anything to get done.  I liked the first Season of American Gods, but look what happened to it.  They lost a SECOND Showrunner, some of the Cast and the whole thing seems to be in limbo.  Here's a thought- maybe if you had gotten more done, what we got would at least feel satisfactory.  In contrast, The Handmaid's Tale- which I'll get to the 2nd Season of in November- did a lot in 1 Season and has kept going strong.  Castle Rock already has a 2nd Season lined up, but, again, so did/does American Gods.  There's some neat stuff set up here and I want to see it paid off well.  Here's hoping I'm just unnecessarily pessimistic right now.  Just remember, this is all about Maine, so naturally, it was shot in West Virginia and Massachusetts...

Next time, let's see if we get more answers than questions.  Will I say Hail to the King?  See you then...