Stephen King spills 'there's going to be a second season' of The Outsider with 'spooky paranormal element'

The Outsider, the Stephen King adaptation telling the story of King mainstay Holly Gibney (Cynthia Erivo) and Detective Ralph Anderson (Ben Mendelsohn) as they try to understand and catch an inhuman killer, is getting a second season at HBO — even if what was originally a miniseries ended with the content of the book. This confirmation comes straight from King, who'll know better than most what's going on with an adaptation of his material.

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, the legendary horror author explained what's going on with the show's future — and teased a bit about what's to come from the show's mid-credits setup for Season 2. When discussing how Holly has developed in both The Outsider and Mr. Mercedes, where she's played by Justine Lupe, King said that "Cynthia may get that time, because there's going to be a second season of The Outsider as soon as they can get the production going."

That's because the writing, at least for some episodes, has already taken place. "I know exactly where it's going because I have seen some of the scripts," King said. "I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you. I'll just say that it's really great and a real spooky paranormal element." That last bit may refer to the post-finale tease given by the show where Holly is revealed to have been scratched by the Big Bad of the first season ... which could lead to its own mess of problems.

King also gave updates on Mr. Mercedes, which is coming to Peacock, and CBS All Access' The Stand, which just dropped its first trailer. "I'm so happy that Peacock is doing this because I felt like with Mr. Mercedes at AT&T we had brought a stadium show to a folk club," King said of the former. "Now people are going to get a chance to see it."

As for The Stand, King praised Alexander Skarsgard's evil Randall Flagg, saying that "he just knocked it out of the park. It's big, let's put it that way." And the show is effectively done, as far as King knows — he's seen the final episode (with a new ending) that he penned himself. "I can't tell you anything about the episode other than to say that I've seen a rough cut of it, and I think it's fine," the author said.

No word on when The Outsider will begin production on its second season.