News Carrie Mike Flanagan Doesn’t Want You to Hate Carrie’s Mom in His Carrie Series How Mike Flangan plans to generate some sympathy for the devil in his Carrie miniseries By Matthew Byrd | Published on July 23, 2026 Photo Credit: Liane Hentscher/ Prime Video Comment 0 Share New Share Photo Credit: Liane Hentscher/ Prime Video In a recent interview, Mike Flanagan explained that he intends to update and change Stephen King’s story for his upcoming Carrie series on Prime Video. While certainly an understandable goal (the existing Carrie movie is pretty darn good, don’tchaknow), eyebrows were raised at the notion that Flanagan also intends to update the portrayal of Carrie’s mom (Margaret White) in order to make her a more sympathetic character. On paper, that’s a radical departure for the character that risks diluting the effectiveness of one of horror’s most powerful villains at a time when Mrs. White’s particular brand of villainy is tragically en vogue. In a more recent interview, though, Flanagan and Samantha Sloyan, who plays Mrs. White in the series, elaborated on the direction of the character and better explained how she will be portrayed. “She loves Carrie more than anything in the world, but like many family members, we’re bound to each other, but we don’t exactly see the world the same way,” Sloyan says of Margaret in an interview with Entertainment Weekly. “She loves Carrie, but she doesn’t understand Carrie.” According to Sloyan, her version of Mrs. White is a deeply religious figure who believes in the conspiracy that there is a global cultural war against her beliefs. That more militaristic mindset seemingly causes her to see Carrie as more of a victim of a cruel world. Well…at least in her own, special way. The conflict between the two in this version of the story is seemingly based more on Carrie’s optimism vs. Margaret’s paranoia. As Sloyan explains, Margaret feels the need to protect and fight for Carrie but doesn’t really see her for who she is. “Margaret’s reaction to fear, instead of trying to learn or to understand, is to really go to war with the world,” Sloyan notes. “Margaret’s really just all suspicion and fear and hatred.” And though it seems like a tall task, Flanagan hopes that this re-imagined dynamic will bring out more of the sympathy for a character whom he feels deserves a touch more sympathy than she has historically received. “I went into this determined not to hate Margaret White,” Flanagan says. “I wanted to understand her. And part of the importance of that is Margaret’s not entirely wrong. There’s a lot she has to say in the show that I agree with, and that makes it even more complicated.” It’s a big swing, to say the least, though choosing to tell a story as established as Carrie again arguably requires a willingness to take some big swings to avoid the eternal question of “Why?” We’ll know if this swing lands when Carrie debuts on Prime Video sometime in October.[end-mark] The post Mike Flanagan Doesn’t Want You to Hate Carrie’s Mom in His <i>Carrie</i> Series appeared first on Reactor.