‘Castle Rock’ Season 2: How Lizzy Caplan’s Annie Wilkes is Connected to ‘Misery’

Castle Rock Season 2 takes us back to the warped world of Stephen King‘s imagination, but this season introduces an off-putting protagonist: Lizzy Caplan‘s young, desperate, paranoid, and highly medicated Annie Wilkes.

You don’t have to be a Stephen King fanatic to know from the get-go that there’s something off about this young nurse and single mother. It’s not just the way she lurches through each scene and pounds stolen meds like they’re Skittles. There’s something not quite right about Annie. These suspicions are confirmed by the end of the very first episode where she shows off just how ruthless she’s capable of being. Though in true Castle Rock form, it seems that nothing may be all that it seems…

Of course, if you are a Stephen King fan, you’ll know that Annie Wilkes is the antagonist of his bestselling novel Misery. The book inspired a hit 1990 movie, and Kathy Bates won an Academy Award for playing this version of Nurse Annie Wilkes. (In fact, Misery is the only Stephen King film to earn an Oscar.)

So what is the connection between Castle Rock‘s Annie Wilkes and the Annie Wilkes who appears in Misery? Are they simply the same woman? And what is Annie Wilkes’s overall “deal”? Here’s everything you need to know about Annie Wilkes heading into Season 2 of Hulu’s Castle Rock.

Who is Stephen King’s Annie Wilkes?

In Stephen King’s telling, Annie Wilkes (or Anne Marie Wilkes Dugan) is a mentally ill nurse who has crisscrossed the country before settling down in a remote part of Colorado. In Misery, she helps romance novelist Paul Sheldon after he breaks both his legs in a horrible car accident. However, it soon becomes apparent that she is obsessed with Sheldon’s work, most notably a series of books starring a heroine named Misery Chastain. Her devotion to this character leads her to imprison Sheldon, torture him, and press him into penning a new novel just for her where he resurrects the dead Misery Chastain.

As Sheldon discovers, Annie Wilkes is also a serial killer. He discovers that she has a scrapbook detailing all her kills — including the mysterious deaths of infants who were in her charge as a nurse — and that she intends to kill him in a murder/suicide. Sheldon eventually confronts Annie, who dies in their violent melée.

Is the Annie Wilkes in Castle Rock the Same as the Annie Wilkes in Misery?

Castle Rock is a show that plays with characters, locations, and elements of Stephen King’s writings, but it doesn’t canonically connect. It’s more like a twisted sandbox where all his ideas can collide. In Castle Rock Season 2, we see what would happen if a young Annie Wilkes wound up mixing with characters, locations, and themes from “Stand by Me,” Needful Things, and Salem’s Lot.

Season 1 of Castle Rock also established that there are parallel universes/alternate timelines crisscrossing over each other in the area, and some characters can travel between with harrowing result. However, it’s still unclear if that plot device from Season 1 will have anything to do with Castle Rock Season 2.

So is Castle Rock Season 2 supposed to be a prequel to Misery? From what we’ve gathered, no. Though we’ll have to wait to see how the season ends.

Watch Castle Rock on Hulu