Stephen King has been watching a lot of great television in 2022. He kicked off the year back in January sharing love for the freshman series Yellowjackets; he called Severance the "coolest, loopiest" show of the spring; he dubbed Shining Girls as being "exactly what streaming is made for;" and just a few weeks ago, he hailed the work done on Black Bird. That's quite a lot of praise being thrown around for a lot of great projects – but now he has offered what is arguably his highest complement for a 2022 original, as he has named Five Days At Memorial as the best limited series he's seen this year.
Five Days At Memorial premiered on Apple TV+ back in mid-August, and with the finale airing this past Friday, Stephen King was quick to deliver it an exciting superlative. The author took to his personal Twitter account the night that the last episode arrived on the streaming service, and he directly explained that it is one of the best things he's seen on the small screen in 2022. Check out his Tweet below:
FIVE DAYS AT MEMORIAL (Apple+) is the best limited series I've seen this year. Heartbreaking. All episodes are now streaming.September 16, 2022
Created by Carlton Cuse and John Ridley and based on the book of the same name by Sheri Fink, Five Days At Memorial is set during the devastation of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, Louisiana back in 2005. The majority of the series follows the events that transpired in Memorial Medical Center as thousands of people were trapped without power – forcing doctors and administrators to make controversial and deadly decisions. The impressive cast in the Apple TV+ original series includes Vera Farmiga, Julie Ann Emery, Cherry Jones, Robert Pine, Cornelius Smith Jr., Adepero Aduye, W. Earl Brown, and Michael Gaston.
Stephen King is hardly the only person lavishing praise on the show. On Rotten Tomatoes, critics have delivered a 90 percent score while the audience score sits at 86 percent.
Following Stephen King's Tweet, it didn't take long for actors on Five Days At Memorial to respond to the message, clearly appreciating the author's compliments. Julie Ann Emery, who plays administrator Diane Robichaux, Retweeted the message and added:
You guys. You guys. You guys. Thx for spreading the word @StephenKing So honored you are watching. https://t.co/e9PbRZhCowSeptember 17, 2022
W. Earl Brown, who plays Ewing Cook is seven episodes of the limited series, returned Stephen King's compliment with a compliment of his own, recounting how the pandemic epic The Stand was a book he "absorbed" while discovering the joys of reading for fun as a teenager:
I vividly remember being 15, sitting on the sands of Daytona Beach during a family vacation, reading THE STAND. I had only recently discovered the joy of reading for fun and I was absorbed by that book. That was over 40 years ago…September 17, 2022
To date, neither Julie Ann Emery nor W. Earl Brown have starred in any Stephen King adaptations, but now I would love to see that come together, if not only because it seems like they would sincerely appreciate the opportunity (and there's definitely a lot of upcoming King movie and TV projects that they could be a part of).
Five Days At Memorial is now available to stream in its entirety with an AppleTV+ subscription.
