The Stand is very similar to the biblical story of Noah’s Ark. Instead of a super-flu, God creates a great flood that cleanses the earth; laying waste most of humanity, while sparing none but a handful of good people and animals, of course. What’s different in The Stand is that this time, the Devil has a dog in the fight named Randall Flagg and Mother Abigail, his level adversary, represents the side of God as the leader of the Free Zone. So we wind up with two societies, one good, one evil, both who’s own choices will make its fate and determine who will inherit the earth. HEAVY; and it’s important to note that King seems to be making a point by having God reboot civilization by means of its own evil invention. Poetic.

Several readers are of the opinion that the ending trivializes the Free Zone’s heroic and epic journey to halt the threat of those on the other side of the fence, that fence being the Rocky Mountains no less. If you’ve read this book and you came to that conclusion yourself, then it’s no wonder why you’d feel let down.

So, here’s what I think some of you missed. If the Free Zone hadn’t sent Stu, Larry, Glen and Ralph to Las Vegas to stand against Randall Flagg and his minions, then Randall’s anger wouldn’t have led him to expose the depth of his depravity by orchestrating the public torture and execution of both surviving Free Zoners Larry Underwood and Ralph Brentner. It was this act of barbarity that drove minion Whitney Horgan to protest in front of the public gathering and it was in that moment of humility and feelings of betrayal that Randall, like everyone else who had survived the flu epidemic, made a choice. Using his magic he produced a hot blue ball of lightening, made for ruin. His choice was revenge.

Randall Flagg worked his evil invention both to kill Whitney and to amaze the now turning crowd back into complacency. At that same moment Trashy shows up with his own device, a surprise for his leader, an A-Bomb. So while Randall, distracted, turned his attention towards this unwanted hazardous gift, God’s hand once again used two more of mankind’s devices of destruction, combined together against all of neo-western society, and vaporized Las Vegas, blowing it’s radiation westward, leaving the Free Zone to inherit the earth. Job finished, the Ark gently comes to rest on top of Mount Ararat.

If you still don’t get the ending, it’s that King seems to believe that it’s us who ultimately decides our own future, but it’s the righteous man (baby can you dig) who will be handed the keys to that future. That much God will make sure of. I guess it didn’t have to go down this way, but that’s how God rolls in the universe according to King. Randall Flagg had his chance and so did his followers, but the good people of the Free Zone brought out their true nature and wrong choices were made. Personally, I thought it was a pretty cool conclusion and it was the perfect ending to a perfect novel. I’m sorry if you’re experience “sucked”.

Like you say , King’s main strength is his characterisation and fleshing out the little idiosyncrasies all readers love. ‘The Stand’ is purported to be his magnum opus , and to an extent it is , but the ending is a major blemish which is hard to ignore.

Larry Underwood was a character I had come to really like and you would think there was redemption at the end for him(and I don’t mean death by the ‘hand of god’) but he was swiftly eliminated along with all the major characters except Stu to facilitate an unsatisfying ending. Nick Andros , who was a deaf-mute , was also killed off in a blast. Realistic endings are nice but in this case it was obvious that King had no clue how to end what he had started , so he decided to cop out by killing everybody.

A better plot could have had two growing groups led by two opposing forces , developing independently of each other , starting society from the very beginning in their own way and finally meeting in a grand battle , good vs evil , god vs satan etc etc. It would have made it even longer but I think that point is moot because it was pretty long to begin with.

I have to say , i found it massively underwhelming after the fantastic first half with Captain Trips and how it spread through America and the superb character development(King is the best at it , no doubt). It did not even make sense , I am afraid.
I also dislike the way King introduces dispensable characters(Dayna , Judge , Weizak) for the sole purpose of ‘increasing the body count’ so to speak.

Anyway , the book was like a great evening drinking fine wine only to end up throwing up at the end of it, that is how I feel about it.

Sorry, but character arc and a satisfying ending aren’t mutually exclusive.

Hubris? Hardly.

I don’t think I agree with your interpretation. If it wasn’t God that set off the nuke, then what was it? It was a blue ball of flame – or something like that – and was clearly supernatural in nature. It wasn’t figurative, because everyone saw it. The hand itself may have been, but I doubt it based simply on people already being aware of the supernatural.

I may have to see the movie version!

So did I like the ending? I remain undecided. But here’s my interpretation: First of all, I’m not so sure “The Hand of God” in literal terms was responsible for setting off the Nuke. I’m sure it was God who intervened, but did he reveal himself as a Hand, like He did in the cheesy movie version? No, I don’t think he did. From what I remember, Ralph looked up into the sky at the ball of light, and his faith, his longing for God at that moment to “show up” is what lead him to “believe” he saw the Hand of God. And because Larry was in the same state of mind, he saw the same thing too. It isn’t mentioned as far as I can remember that anyone else actually SAW the Hand of God at all.

I’m a big fan of the TV show Lost, and I love how ambigious the show is. But I’m afraid the religious aspects of the show were a bit too on the nose for me regardless of whatever form God actually appeard in.