Stephen King’s 4-Part Classic Horror Epic Is Officially One Of The US’ Biggest TV Hits

Published Oct 20, 2026, 12:01 PM EDT

Felipe Rangel is a Movie and TV Journalist ScreenRant. He has been writing about movies and TV since 2021. Felipe joined ScreenRant in 2022, working across different teams, covering everything from breaking news to features to reviews and more.

Felipe is a writer who is an avid film and TV fan, with superhero movies and series being his biggest passion. He graduated from college in 2019, having studied Journalism. Before college, he spent a month studying at the Oxford English Centre. His superhero knowledge expands to the comics, with his undergraduate thesis being "Politics Reflected In American Comics."

Stephen King's classic horror series with just four episodes has returned as a United States hit, and the genre TV show climbs an important chart. The last few years have been quite positive when it comes to adaptations of King's novels. For instance, just a few weeks ago, horror auteur Mike Flanagan's Carrie series debuted on Prime Video to instant global streaming success. Other recent King adaptations include the MGM+ TV show The Institute, as well as movies like Glen Powell's action-packed The Running Man, the dystopian horror The Long Walk, and Theo James' gory The Monkey from director Osgood Perkins.

Prime Video's Carrie is a good example of a hit King novel that has been adapted into live-action multiple times, being the latest version of the iconic Carrie story to make it to screens around the world. That is the same exact case as a King post-apocalyptic horror novel that has now found success on VOD in the US with the return of a 1994 series. That would be The Stand, which has been adapted as a TV show multiple times. This version of the story debuted on ABC in 1994 and ran just for four episodes, with the horror classic now finding new life.

King's First Adaptation Of The Stand Is Back As A Streaming Sensation

According to data from FlixPatrol, 1994's The Stand as become the 4th most popular TV show on the Apple TV store in the United States. The classic horror series just re-entered the chart this Tuesday, October 20, leaving behind several hit series on the Apple TV Top 20 TV shows chart nationwide. Some of the TV shows that are now left sitting below King's The Stand include classics like the sitcom I Love Lucy and HBO's crime thriller The Wire, as well as more recent releases, such as Taylor Sheridan's Marshals, Dexter: Resurrection, the fantasy sensation Game of Thrones, and more.

At the time of writing, the only three TV shows to rank higher than King's The Stand on the Apple TV store chart in the United States are the historical drama Rome, HBO's genre-defining crime drama The Sopranos, and David Lynch's generational mystery series Twin Peaks, which leads the nationwide chart. According to JustWatch, this iteration of King's The Stand is not currently available to stream anywhere in the US. As such, 1994's The Stand is a horror series that can only be watched through the usual VOD storefronts, including the Apple TV store, where it is trending right now.

The Classic Horror Epic Has A New Incarnation In The Works

After the 1994 series, The Stand would be adapted as a 9-episode limited series on CBS All Access — now Paramount+ — that debuted on December 17, 2020. The star-studded King horror adaptation featured actors like James Marsden, Alexander Skarsgård, Whoopi Goldberg, J. K. Simmons, Hamish Linklater, and more. Now, another adaptation of The Stand is in the works at Paramount. This time, it is a movie, with Doug Liman, who directed movies like Tom Cruise's sci-fi thriller Edge of Tomorrow, the spy classic Mr. & Mrs. Smith, and Matt Damon's action thriller The Bourne Identity, helming the project. The Stand's VOD resurgence comes at the right time.