His family shattered, Ollie Peterson shoots Terry Maitland to death outside of court, and with his last breaths the coach again swears that he's innocent. Meanwhile, the crime tears the Peterson family apart, and his mother suffers a fatal heart attack, leaving her husband and elder son, Ollie, suddenly doubly bereaved.

In the face of the strong evidence that somehow suggests that the coach was in two places at the same time, the local DA reluctantly withdraws the charges against him. And his fingerprints are found at the conference site, too. But Maitland was also captured on video in a totally different town at the time the crime was committed, attending a teaching conference with countless colleagues who can all vouch for his presence. The crime scene is fingerpainted in his prints, his blood type was present, too. He was spotted offering the kid a ride in his van, and then later seen covered with blood. The first two episodes play out pretty much like the beginning of the book, slowly unfurling the mystery: After the discovery of Frankie Peterson’s body, witness after witness can tie local coach and family man Maitland to the crime. The series is loyal to the novel’s dryly grim tone, with Mendelsohn perfect as the weary but honorable small-town cop and Jason Bateman cooly moving as a man who’s watching his life explode in front of him. But Maitland has a solid alibi for the crime, which means that it looks like Frankie was murdered by a man who was somehow in two places at once. Detective Ralph Anderson (Ben Mendelsohn) investigates, though it’s not a tough case to crack as mountains of forensic and eyewitness evidence point to beloved local teacher and baseball coach Terry Maitland (Jason Bateman, who also executive produced the series and directed its first two episodes).

The Outsider tells the story of the gruesome murder of a young boy in the fictional town of Flint City, Oklahoma.

The book features some character overlap with that series, but in terms of its structure and tone, it also often feels far more like a murder mystery than a horror story. In The Outsider, classic King and the Hodges trilogy collide, both literally and stylistically.

But in recent years, he’s also written his Bill Hodges trilogy, hard-boiled detective novels that are full of murder and intrigue but very light on the paranormal. The author is best known for scary stories like Carrie, It, and The Shining, along with some beloved non-scary ones like The Shawshank Redemption and Stand by Me. The 20 Best Stephen King Adaptations, Ranked.

The outsider stephen