Stephen King and one of his sons, Joe Hill, collaborated on a short story for Esquire magazine back in 2012. That story was In The Tall Grass. It has now been turned into a very popular and creepy AF Netflix film.
The story follows a brother and sister who run into a field of tall grass to save a little boy who is lost in there. They quickly get lost and start to experience a time loop where they die over and over again. That being said, like every book to movie adaptation, there are subtle to big changes. In The Tall Grass is no different. Here are a few of those changes.
Correction (October 11th): An earlier version of this article incorrectly listed Travis as Trevor.
Becky Miscarries
The baby in the short story is born in a completely different way than in the film. It isn’t near the rock and Ross has nothing to do with it. In the film, we see Becky going in and out of consciousness as Ross delivers her baby near the rock. We don’t see the actual delivery, we just see Ross feeding Becky her own baby in quick, short frames. We even have to question if that is really happening.
In the book, she fights off Ross after he kicks her in the stomach about 4 times. She gets away, but this induces labor at six months. The baby is a silent baby girl. In the next paragraph, Tobin takes Cal, the brother, to the rock and tells him the rock said Becky miscarried. “She miscarried. If you can’t find her, I think she’ll probably die.” Once they find her it’s Tobin and Cal delirious from touching the rock that eats the baby and feeds some to Becky who they later force to touch the rock.
Ross Murdered The Dog
When Cal finally finds Tobin he sees he is eating a dead crow. He warns him not to eat it and Tobin’s response is “the crows aren’t bad. I couldn’t eat any of Freddy. I loved him, see. Dad ate some, but I didn’t.” This indicates that the dog, Freddy, was probably attacked and killed and then eaten by Ross, who, by that time, had touched the rock probably several times after the level of crazy he displayed. We can assume that Tobin by this point has also touched the rock because he is eating a crow and enjoying it.
The Mom Is Already Dead
When Ross finds Becky in the film, he says he knows the way out. He instead leads her to the rock and tries to entice her to touch it, but, right before, she gets distracted.
In the book, Ross leads her to the rock where she finds the twisted up and mutilated body of the man’s wife, who we now know as Natalie. Essentially, Ross has ripped her arm off, taken bites out of her, (he’s a cannibal now?) and left her freshly dead. He then says that unforgettably creepy line about laying on the rock naked and “feel me in you”.
Becky Uses Her Key As A Weapon
In the film, we see Cal as the brother who will do anything to help and later find his pregnant sister in the grass. Once he realizes they are in danger from some of the other people wandering around the tall grass, he decides to arm himself with whatever he had.
At that time, it was his car keys. He places them in between his fingers to quickly attack whoever attacks him. In the book, it is Becky who uses a set of keys to defend herself. She shoves the key right into Ross’ eye, and King and Hill do not skimp on the details.
There Is No Travis
In the movie, Travis is the reason why the siblings survive the tall grass. He shows up looking for Becky, who never made it to San Diego to give her baby up for adoption. He is mentioned close to the end of the story, but only in the memory of a disillusioned Becky. He says some pretty horrible things about the pregnancy and even eludes to the weird relationship Becky and Cal have. Becky never tells her brother or anyone who the father of her child is. Travis is truly the deadbeat that her movie brother says he is.
There Is No Morning Or Night
In the movie, we see it get dark and then light again to indicate that maybe days are passing. We can’t totally trust that since we know that the tall grass is manipulative in many ways; we can only use the knowledge we have been given to determine what is happening with the weather and everything else going on around the characters.
In the book, King and Hill write that “there is no morning or night here, Cal thought, only eternal afternoon,” meaning that, even if the time of day was changing, they would truly never know because the grass only shows you what it wants you to see.
Becky Had Premonitions About This Day
Becky tells the readers that this place is familiar to her. Something like this was haunting her dreams for the last two months. She could not connect it to this incident until she gets deeper and deeper into the grass and begins to remember. King writes “nor did she connect the way she felt then with the dreams that had been bothering her for close to two months now, dreams she had not discussed even with Cal—the ones about driving at night. A child shouted in those dreams, too.”
The Mom Tried To Warn Them
In the movie when Tobin is calling for help, we hear a woman in a very faint voice mumbling something. We aren’t sure what it is, but it sounds as though she is hurt. This makes the brother-sister duo want to run into the tall grass even more.
However, in the short story, Tobin’s mother actually tries to warn them to stay away. She is already hurt and has realized something isn’t right with the grass. She says “Don’t! Please! Stay away! Tobin, stop calling! Stop calling, honey! He’ll hear you!” This means her husband, Tobin’s dad, has already gone crazy and has hurt the mom. This isn’t enough to keep them away in the story, either.
People Still Lived In The Town
In the movies, the town is desolate. No sounds, no signs of human life, and barely any animals. The most recent signs of life we see are the cars parked at the church. We later find out that those cars belong to people who were called into the tall grass.
In the book, there are still a few families and businesses that are running. You can hear people in their homes and the faint noise of children playing and neighbors talking. The people in the town know to steer clear of the tall grass. They even steal valuables from the new parked cars knowing no one is coming back for them.
They Never Get Out
At the end of the film, the audience breathes a sigh of relief; we get instant gratification when Becky sees a dirty Tobin run out of the abandoned Black Rock church and shows her the necklace (or maybe keychain) that Travis gave him. She follows her instincts and convinces her brother to leave with her, and they take Tobin with them.
We can assume that, since they never step foot into the tall grass, that none of this happens to this version of the siblings, which means Tobin will probably be traumatized forever from what he saw. Still, Becky and Cal have seen nothing, and life goes on as usual.
