Stephen King’s The Long Walk Is Hiking Up the Streaming Charts on Starz

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The thrilling survival film is enjoying a resurgence in popularity. It was already a box office hit and has consistently performed well around the world.

The dystopian thriller The Long Walk is back in the Top 10 on Starz, according to FlixPatrol. Since its release earlier this year, the show has consistently been popular, and it currently ranks at number nine.

Right now, the box office is led by a new heist movie and Ana de Armas’ Ballerina. However, The Long Walk consistently stayed near the top as well. In fact, it was in the U.S. Top 10 for 54 days. Since the film started streaming on January 2nd, it spent over half of that time ranking among the most popular titles.

The Long Walk Scored the Best Rating in Years

Stephen King had a lot of his work adapted for the screen in 2025. While many of these adaptations were well-received, The Long Walk stood out as the most popular. Critics gave it a ‘Certified Fresh’ rating, and audiences scored it an impressive 85%.

This success gave Stephen King his highest approval rating in four decades. His most critically acclaimed film remains 1976’s Carrie, with a 94% ‘Certified Fresh’ rating. Close behind are The Dead Zone (1983) and The Shawshank Redemption (1994), both earning 89% and a ‘Certified Fresh’ badge, followed by Stand By Me (1986) at 88%.

Some recent films like and Netflix’s 1922 also feature scores above 90%, but with fewer reviews.

In 2025, several adaptations of Stephen King’s work were released. These included Mike Flanagan’s The Life of Chuck, which received positive reviews (80% Certified Fresh, 88% audience score), and The Monkey, also well-received with a 77% Certified Fresh rating. Another adaptation earned a 62% approval rating, making it the lowest-scored of the year.

Despite a $20 million production cost, the dystopian thriller The Long Walk performed reasonably well at the box office, earning approximately $63 million worldwide – enough to cover its costs.

The Long Walk Was Stephen King’s First Novel

Inspired by Stephen King’s 1974 novel, The Long Walk is a chilling dystopian story set in the 1970s. It centers around fifty boys competing in an annual walking contest, designed to inspire audiences. They must walk continuously at three miles per hour for days, and if they fall below that pace after three warnings, they are executed. The last boy walking wins a significant cash prize and gets one wish granted.

Stephen King’s first published book was Carrie, and it’s a landmark achievement. However, he actually wrote his very first novel, The Long Walk, much earlier – while he was a freshman at the University of Maine in 1966-1967. It wasn’t published at that time, and when it finally did appear, it was under the name Richard Bachman, a pseudonym he would also use for The Running Man.

Francis Lawrence, who directed The Hunger Games films, helmed this movie. The script was written by JT Mollner, and the film features Cooper Hoffman as the lead, with supporting performances by David Jonsson, Garrett Wareing, Tut Nyuot, Charlie Plummer, Ben Wang, Joshua Odjick, Roman Griffin Davis, Josh Hamilton, Judy Greer, and Mark Hamill.

The Long Walk is streaming on Starz.

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2026-03-23 04:08