Dreamcatcher

Dreamcatcher is a novel written by Stephen King.

Gary Ambrose "Jonesy" Jones, Pete Moore, Joe "Beaver" Clarendon and Henry Devlin are for lifelong friends. As kids, they saved Douglas "Duddits" Cavell, a boy with Down syndrome, from a group of bullies.

As adults, they go on an annual hunting trip where they come across a delirious stranger talking about lights in the sky. It becomes revealed that he's infected by an alien parasite. The army arrives lead by the psychotic Colonel Abraham Kurtz who puts the area under quarantine. It Gets Worse.

Was made into a film directed by Lawrence Kasdan in 2003.

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The novel and film provide examples of:

• Adaptation Decay
• Adaptation Name Change - The film changes Kurtz to Curtis because of the Apocalypse Now/Heart of Darkness reference. King asked them to change it to a name that still sounded similar to Kurtz.
• Affably Evil - Mr. Gray
• Alien Invasion
• Anyone Can Die - Beaver and Pete both die in the first half of the story. By the end of the book, Jonesy and Henry are the only surviving characters.
• Battle in the Center of the Mind - Between Mr. Gray and Jonesy.
• Body Horror - The aliens are referred to as "shit-weasels". Guess where they come out of infected people.
• Canon Welding - Takes place in the fictional town of Derry, Maine, the site of previous King novels IT and Insomnia. At one point a character comes across a memorial written by the Loser's Club from IT. Scrawled on in graffiti is "PENNYWISE LIVES.
• Evil Brit - Mr. Gray speaks with a British accent in the film.
• Evil-Detecting Dog - The animals are seen fleeing in mass migration.
• Face Full of Alien Wingwong - Mr. Gray's head explodes, infecting Jonesy with hundreds of alien spores and transferring Mr. Gray's consciousness into him.
• Fartillery - One of the signs that you're infected with one of the shit-weasels.
• General Ripper - Kurtz.
• Inspirationally Disadvantaged - Duddits is of the Type C variety.
• Nobody Poops - Subverted horribly.
• Omnicidal Maniac - Mr. Gray plans on infecting the entire world.
• One-Winged Angel - In the film both Mr. Gray and Duddits are able to transform into monstrous creatures a their 'final form'.
• Puppeteer Parasite - Mr. Gray to Jonesy.
• Race Lift - Kurtz is played by Morgan Freeman in the film.
• The Rainman - Duddits.
• Shout-Out - Kurtz is named after the character Apocalypse Now and Heart of Darkness. Lampshaded with a comment that it's probably not his real name and probably something that he decided to call himself.

Perlmutter had read Heart of Darkness, had seen Apocalypse Now, and had on many occasions thought that the name Kurtz was simply a little too convenient. He would have bet a hundred dollars (a great sum for a non-wagering artistic fellow such as himself) that it wasn’t the boss’s real name-that the boss’s real name was Arthur Holsapple or Dagwood Elgart, maybe even Paddy Maloney. Kurtz? Unlikely. It was almost surely an affectation, as much a prop as George Patton’s pearl-handled .45.

• • The government nickname for the alien fungus is "The Ripley" after Sigourney Weaver's character from the Alien movies.
    • Jonesy is also the name of Ripley's cat from Alien.
• Trademark Favorite Food - Mr. Gray loves BACON.
• Unexplained Accent - In the movie, Jonesy speaks with a British accent whenever Mr. Gray is controlling him for some strange reason.
• Vagina Dentata - The "shit-weasels" in the film.
• Vorpal Pillow - How Mr. Gray is killed.
• Water Source Tampering - Mr. Gray's plan of spreading the alien infection.
• Your Head Asplode - Mr. Gray's head explodes early on to infect Jonesy with his spores. Later on, Kurtz's head is blown off with a gun.