While Randall Flagg is known to most Stephen King fans, even if they haven’t dived deeply into his books, he’s actually not the King of Horror’s worst villain. Stephen King’s books are remarkable in the sense they’re unremarkable – the horror usually starts slow, in a small town, or unfolds in an everyday scenario that suddenly goes nightmarishly wrong. The protagonists fighting the evil are usually no mythical heroes, but everyday people, the kind you might make small talk with while waiting in line at the grocery store, or wave hi to while you’re walking your dog.
It’s the ordinariness of his settings and of his characters that makes Stephen King’s villains so memorable. His villains take all forms, too, with the author willing and eager to spread the horror around; Stephen King’s villains are human, supernatural, and other. A rabid dog, a possessed car, an unhinged nurse, a malevolent vampire, a resurrected child, a psychotically sentient monorail, and a cosmic entity can all play prominent antagonist roles in the universe Stephen King has created. A few of his villains are particularly terrifying. Still, even they bow down to one even greater – Stephen King’s worst villain of all.
Randall Flagg Is Stephen King’s Most Recurring Villain – But Not The Worst
Randall Flagg Has Appeared In Many Universes Wearing Many Faces
It’s understandable that when people think of Stephen King’s worst villains, they immediately think of Randall Flagg, or even Pennywise, especially if they’ve only watched movies and not read his books. It’s understandable. Randall Flagg is King’s version of the Devil: a shifting, immortal deal-maker who has walked on our earth and others for millennia, sowing chaos, discord, violence, and death. His presence is as undeniable as it is evil; Randall Flagg is a relentless, creeping blight, a malevolent god who can change his face as he wishes.
His ambiguous nature and immortal lifespan are what make him such a great Stephen King villain; he’s able to change to suit whatever villain the story needs, which is why he’s appeared in so many, not just The Stand. The Ageless Stranger, The Walkin’ Dude, The Man in Black, Marten Broadcloak, The Dark Man, Walter Padick, The Man With No Face, The Harcase, Walter O’Dim, and more, perhaps even He Who Walks Behind The Rows, Randall Flagg is legion and the most regularly recurring Stephen King antagonist. Even so, there’s one villain even Randall Flagg fears, and even Randall Flagg bows to, and that’s the Crimson King.
Who Is The Crimson King (& What His Goal Is In Stephen King’s Multiverse)
His Goal Is Simple: To Destroy The Multiverse
In essence, the Crimson King is Randall Flagg’s master. While Randall Flagg often seems to be serving his own purposes – and he is – his greater purpose is to serve the Crimson King and carry out his bidding. The things he does, the discord he sows are all in service of his ultimate master. The Crimson King is a Lovecraftian demonic entity, similar to Pennywise, but far stronger. Born from an illicit affair between the mythical gunslinger Arthur Eld and the demonic Crimson Queen, the Crimson King arose from the Prim, the primordial soup from which all things in all universes are birthed.
The number of books and short stories Randall Flagg appears or is referenced is not completely agreed upon by fans, as several books, such as
Carrie
and
The Long Walk
, have scenes that may or may not obliquely reference him.
As the living embodiment of the Prim, all the Crimson King desires is chaos, unending chaos and destruction. His overarching goal is to destroy the Beams that hold up the Dark Tower, the center of not just our universe, but of all universes, and tear down the Dark Tower to throw all universes into chaos. After the Dark Tower is destroyed and the multiverse in ruins, he will rebuild it in his image – dark, chaotic, and primally brutal, with all beings in all multiverses bowing to him.
These goals put him in direct opposition to Gan, who was also born of the Prim and is King’s equivalent to God, a creator whereas the Crimson King is a destroyer. As such, the Crimson King leads the Red – the agents of chaos and destruction in the multiverse – while Gan leads the White, the agents of all that is good. While the Red seeks to break the Beams and destroy the Tower, the White wants to protect it and keep the multiverse from falling into ruin.
Why The Crimson King Is So Much Worse Than Randall Flagg
He’s The Monster The Other Monsters Fear
To put it simply, the Crimson King is the villain of villains. As terrifyingly powerful and malevolent as Randall Flagg is, the Crimson King is more powerful, and far worse. He is unimaginably powerful: omnipotent and able to exist in multiple levels of the Dark Tower simultaneously, and thus, in multiple universes simultaneously. That would make him bad enough, but he also possesses the powers of necromancy and dark magic, shapeshifting, elemental manipulation, telekinesis and mass mind control, the ability to control the weather and the dangerous, primordial energy known as the Deadlights, which fans of It will recognize.
If Randall Flagg is an immortal monster, that makes the thing the monster serves – that the monster fears – even worse.
His power is so vast and his influence so strong that the Crimson King manipulates Pennywise to gain more strength and power, and uses Randall Flagg to carry out his dark orders. He also controls a host of other minor Stephen King villains, such as vampires like Salem’s Lot‘s Kurt Barlow, Atropos, and John Farson. If Randall Flagg is an immortal monster, that makes the thing the monster serves – that the monster fears – even worse.
The Crimson King is the villain behind the villain, the puppetmaster controlling the rest. He doesn’t appear that often on the page in Stephen King’s books, but he doesn’t have to. Like all great mythical figures, his legend is shaped by the whispers and stories and fear of other characters, and their words alone are enough to outline his cosmic evil.
|
Stephen King Works In Which The Crimson King Appears Or Is Mentioned |
|
|---|---|
|
Title |
Type of Work |
|
The Gunslinger |
Novel (Book #1, The Dark Tower series) |
|
Insomnia |
Novel |
|
“Low Men In Yellow Coats” |
Short Story (in Hearts of Atlantis) |
|
Black House |
Novel (coauthored with Peter Straub) |
|
The Dark Tower |
Novel (Book #7, The Dark Tower series) |
|
The Gunslinger Born |
Comic book series |
|
The Long Road Home |
Comic book series |
|
Treachery |
Comic book series |
|
Ur |
Novella |
|
Gwendy’s Final Task |
Novel (coauthored with Richard Chizmar) |
With so many of Stephen King’s short stories and books tying into The Dark Tower, the Crimson King’s existence and will being so intimately tied to the Tower’s destruction makes him the author’s ultimate villain. When Randall Flagg achieves his aims, he wipes out a city in one book or thwarts a character’s destiny in another. In the grand scheme of the multiverse, his destruction is small and surgical, serving a larger end. If the Crimson King achieves his aims, however, the multiverse – the multiverse Stephen King created – is destroyed. All his stories, all his books, all his characters, they all crumble and unravel. And that, more than anything, makes the Crimson King the greatest Stephen King villain.
Stephen King
Discover the latest news and filmography for Stephen King, known for Creepshow and Sleepwalkers.
- Birthdate
- September 21, 1947
- Birthplace
- Portland, Maine, USA
- Height
- 6 feet 4 inches
- Professions
- Author , Screenwriter , Producer , Director , Actor
