Adapted from a Stephen King novel, a gifted boy is kidnapped to the titular mysterious location to hone his psychic skills in the adequate MGM+ TV series The Institute.
Stephen King’s tome The Institute was released in 2019. Tome is right, as the book is one of the inches-thick hardbacks at just over 800 pages. It mostly follows Luke, a genius boy, and other children who are kidnapped and kept at The Institute, a secluded location meant to hone their latent psychic abilities. They are watched over by a crew of administrators and doctors, and lied to constantly about everything. The crux of the plot is surviving the daily routine, figuring out the truth, and trying to get out. On the other side of the plot, an itinerant former cop, Tim Jamieson, takes a night knocker job in the small town nearby. He’s drawn to the mysterious place in the woods all the town whispers about. As each half becomes more invested in their needs, danger ramps up.
It’s better in setup than execution in both versions, with nearly all the issues of the series stemming from the source. For those who have read a lot of King, it seems familiar. The Institute is not unlike The Shop from Firestarter or Golden Years, or the various locales filled with Breakers, meant to tear down The Dark Tower. So much so, I was surprised there was no reveal (in the novel) that The Institute was just that. As it is, as Luke and friends try to discover what’s going on, there is a lot of repetition. Experiments, questions, beatdowns, and the concepts of the series slowly slide forward between “oh look, a scene I’ve watched a couple of times already.” Between these experiments on the kids, there is infighting between the staff: tired administrator Ms. Sigsby, amoral doctor Hendricks, and creepy security Mr. Stackhouse go in circles in arguments they’ve likely had for years. (The small number of kids and adults might feel “low budget, can’t afford more actors,” but it’s part of the book too. Easier to write fewer characters and let’s more drama in the fallen “prestige” of the Institute.)
That’s a fault in the book, too, although the show streamlines and speeds up several aspects, thankfully. Novelwise, after an introduction, Jamieson vanishes from the plot until Luke needs him. It was a smart decision to relocate the small town from Georgia to the Maine burgh The Institute is near. This not only allows that half the plot to be more active in the overall arc, but it also lets a different perspective and knowledge search for the place. Ultimately, it lets the simultaneous stories collide with fewer pieces to move around. For nearly eight hours of story presented, it feels slight and stretched; 4 hours of story in a longer series. The story just trudges along. It’s not bad. But not exactly good either. It doesn’t help that the climax is frustrating and underwhelming.
The eight-episode series is directed by three directors, each taking two at a time (Jack Bender starting and finishing, and Jeff Renfroe and Brad Turner between). Each keeps the dialogue-heavy scripts moving, bouncing back and forth between whoever is arguing about what; lots of heated discussion, always with an edge, rarely anything that doesn’t directly concern what is happening, just happened, or about to happen. Hard to really establish characters, outside of how they can be expected to react to any given situation. They manage to make the Institute a place of dread; it has a great look of fading from glory days (as glorious as an evil place like it might be), even if it feels slight.
The stable of actors is capable, but mostly bland. Joe Freeman as Luke tries really hard, but doesn’t often manage more basic anger and concern. I would like he see how he does in a shorter, more compact assignment where he’s given more to work with. The rest of the kids are good, with Viggo Hanvelt as Avery and Fionn Laird as Nicky standing out. On the adult in, door knocker Jamieson is played by Prince Caspian’s Ben Barnes, and he’s Been Bland (da da chiss), all in the same inflection of slightly bored exasperation. The Institute’s adults are more suitable, although they all play the same note for the whole run. Mary Louise Parker tries to give humanity to Ms. Sigsby. Robert Joy is suitably creepy and skeevy as the lead doctor. It’s unfortunate for him that he’s paired with the ultimate skeevy creeper, Julian Richings, as the head of security. The man makes my skin crawl in the best ways. I love to see him. (He was the lone bright spot in the mess that was King’s adaptation of Kingdom Hospital).
In the end, The Institute is… fine. Essentially a shrug. The Institute is a lesser Stephen King TV show, adapted from a lesser Stephen King novel. The performances are adequate; it moves along with some clip in the bland repetitions. There are certainly worse ways to spend time, but so many better King stories if you need a fix, heck, this year alone has had The Monkey and Life of Chuck both knocking it out of the park. Next week finds the Long Walk and Running Man sprinting up soon after.
After the last episode aired, MGM+ announced a second season of The Institute. With the plot of the first book covered, I wonder where it can go from here. Both the book and show have enough narrative strings set up to be pulled, so there are places it can go; thus, it’s not a surprise or a “same thing again” sort of scenario. As much as I thought season one (and the book) was good enough, I’ll watch Season 2 at its release.