A Tale of Two Kings...

The partnership of horror supremo Stephen King with Marvel Comics is one of the best thing to happen to the House Of Ideas for a long time.

It takes them out of their capes and costumes comfort zone and forces them to bring their best game to the table because King has a massive, established fan-base who will expect nothing less then brilliance from the comics.

On the other side of the equation, it eliminates the voluminous character set-ups and scene descriptions from King's doorstop-sized novels and replaces them with quality artwork ("a picture is worth a thousand words"... and all that) and succinct speech bubbles.

Marvel have also taken the wise decision of not trying to serialise King's works directly, but are publishing their take on his two most famous epics, The Dark Tower and The Stand, in a series of easily digestible mini-series, each covering a story arc, which will then function both independently or as part of the greater whole.

The strange, almost surreal fantasy/western/horror The Dark Tower series has reached its third story arc with the mini-series Treachery, which sees our hero Roland returned from his adventures, with his companions Cuthbert and Alain, but still troubled by the insidious seeing sphere Maerlyn's Grape and the mental assaults by the evil Crimson King.

Of the two, The Dark Tower is probably the least accessible to readers unfamiliar with the original works, as the lore and language of the lands in which the adventures take place is deeply intertwined with the story and its setting in a "world that has moved on".

Stephen King's sprawling Lord of The Rings style quest saga, set in post-apocalyptic America, The Stand kicks off with the five-part mini-series Captain Trips which concentrates on establishing his main characters and the accidental release of a killer virus, which will sweep the globe.

The Stand, while epic in scope, is the Stephen King that more people, away from his hardcore fans, will be able to immediately relate to - with its core focus on normal people in small town America, suddenly thrust into a horrific situation.

Both series have attracted top flight creators: Peter David writing The Dark Tower, with King's personal research assistant Robin Furth plotting, and Richard Isanove painting over Jae Lee's pencils; while The Stand is written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, who penned the recent Secret Invasion: Fantastic Four mini-series, with art from Captain America's Mike Perkins.

These are fantastic adaptations of King's work, adding a depth that films and television perhaps cannot and a distinctive visual interpretation that presents a stunning and unique view of two of Stephen King's most imaginative stories.