Photo: Robert Falconer/CBS All Access Christmas comes early for Stephen King fans this year, as last week marked the premiere of CBS All Access’ The Stand, a new, nine-part adaptation of King’s post-apocalyptic riff on Lord Of The Rings. There’s an unexpected timeliness to the story’s post-pandemic landscape, in which plague survivors are supernaturally drawn to opposing camps, but don’t go in expecting another Contagion. As with King’s novel, the CBS limited series is primarily about what happens after 99.4% of the world’s population is gone. That much is made clear in the premiere, which, in a departure from King’s novel, begins in the wake of what society names Captain Trips.