‘Castle Rock’ Episodes 2 and 3 Prove to Be a Stephen King Lover’s Dream

Jacob Bryant
TV Streaming
TV Streaming Hulu Horror

Castle Rock — Hulu’s new horror streaming series — is a hit among Stephen King fans. Not only for the deep characterizations and dark plots the writer is famous for, but also references to his numerous other works.

FANDOM previously broke down all the easter eggs in the series premiere — here’s a look at Episodes 2 and 3.

Episode 2: “Habeas Corpus”

Castle Rock’s second episode came out swinging.

Henry worked to finally meet the mystery man who had been caged up in Shawshank for who knows how long, while Molly showed more signs she has The Shine — along with a longstanding obsession with Henry. We also learned more about the recently departed Warden Lacy, and his motivation for locking up a man in a closed-off section of the prison. Apparently, he wasn’t acting alone. Pangborn seemed pretty clued in on the former warden’s plans for the guy.

The episode was also packed with more Easter Eggs to Stephen King’s larger works — including the opening credits which was brimming with them. Here’s what FANDOM spotted in Episode 2.

Opening Credits

Castle Rock Salem's Lot
19 is a recurring number in Stephen King's works.

The show’s opening credits play for the first time at the beginning of the second episode and they’re chock full of references — including literal pages from King’s books. To name a few:

  • Pages from IT are shown — including one that includes the famous line “We all float down here.”
  • The 19th chapter of Salem’s Lot is shown. The number 19 holds a lot of significance in King’s books — particularly The Dark Tower.
  • The word Arrowhead flashes across the screen quickly. The Arrowhead group is responsible for the monsters being released in The Mist.
  • REDRUM from The Shining is underlined, as well as the typed page repeating “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”
  • The title page for Dolores Claiborne is shown.
  • Storm of the Century — a mini-series King wrote in ’99 — appears on a map.

The Dog and The Strangler

The episode begins with a monologue from Dale Lacy about all the terrible things that have happened in Castle Rock. He asks if people remember the dog or the strangler. The dog is a reference to the rabid animal in Cujo, while the strangler means the Castle Rock Strangler — the antagonist from The Dead Zone.

The Body

In that same Lacy monologue, he references a point in his life that took place “the summer after that body was found out by the train tracks.” This is the storyline to King’s short story The Body, which was adapted into Stand By Me.

Shopkeeper Missing

Lacy has an obsession with the goings ons in Castle Rock — which explains a manilla envelope Henry finds in his home packed with articles about the town. One of them is about the sudden disappearance of the shopkeeper of an oddities shop. The villain of Needful Things was said shopkeeper.

The Rabid Dog

Castle Rock Cujo
The rabid dog mentioned is Cujo.

Another article in Lacy’s folder is a news story about the rabid dog attacks in town. Another Cujo reference.

The New Torrance

Henry meets a new friend at the Castle Rock church named Jackie Torrance. Her name should ring an immediate bell to King fans. It’s nearly identical to Jack Torrance — the doomed caretaker of The Overlook Hotel in The Shining.

Molly’s Obsession

Young Molly Strand had a pretty serious obsession with Henry Deaver. The two sent flashlight signals to each other from their bedroom windows, and when that wasn’t happening she wrote his name over and over in a notebook. It could just be a childhood crush, but it strikes similar chords of Jack Torrance writing “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy” over and over as he goes mad in The Shining.

Episode 3: “Local Color”

“Local Color” was the strongest episode of Castle Rock of the initial batch released. That’s mostly due to the focus on the series’ most interesting character, Molly. She clearly suffers from The Shine — which we learn has been getting worse since Henry got back to town. The episode shows her desperate struggle to get her business a well-needed jolt, and her trying to keep secrets about what happened to Henry and his father back in 1991.

As the show digs in more to its own story, the Easter Eggs are bound to get a bit lighter. Here’s what we spotted in Episode 3.

Dan Attias

The show continues to hire people who have worked on previous Stephen King adaptations — this time someone behind the camera. Episode 3 is directed by Dan Attias, who back in 1985 directed Silver Bullet — the big screen version of King’s story Cycle of the Werewolf.

Molly’s Slogan

Molly’s a struggling real estate agent in a struggling town. That doesn’t make for a great combination, but at least she’s got a decent slogan for her business — “Live Like a King.”

The Ramones

Young Molly and Stephen King apparently had the same taste in music. She had a poster for the rock band The Ramones hanging in her childhood bedroom. The band was also a fan of the horror writer, enough to write a song titled “Pet Semetary” — an homage to one of King’s more graphic novels.

Castle Rock’s Cult

On a mad hunt for a fix to suppress her psychic flare-ups, Molly stumbles across a creepy group of kids wearing paper masks and conveening some kind of court. The group has some serious Children of the Corn vibes.

Yellow Coats

This one might be a stretch, but there are a number of yellow coats in this episode — Molly wears a yellow blazer and one of the creepy cult kids is wearing a yellow jacket. This could be a call-out to the yellow raincoat poor Georgie Denbrough was wearing the day he was killed by Pennywise. It could also be a reference to the Low Men in Yellow Coats — a group of creatures who work for the Crimson King and chase Ted Brautigan in the Hearts in Atlantis short story “Low Men in Yellow Coats” and Roland’s ka-tet in the final Dark Tower book.

Jacob Bryant
Jacob Bryant is a writer-for-hire with a penchant for the gory and caped shows. He thinks Jericho is the greatest television achievement of all-time.