....can't go with you on that......the characters are for the most part unlikeable, the story is such that the Mist is just staging and background....very little other than some references, bears any resemblance to the novella it's VERY loosely based upon....
I can't say I thought about the likeability of the characters so much, although I did notice it, and as time goes on, that does sometimes affect me when watching something; in this case, though, it just didn't register.
However, the second part of your point did register -- how loose the basis is. I don't know that it was a negative, but it did cause me to think about how King perceives something like this. Is he disappointed? Do the filmmakers think to themselves this could have been done without transferring investment funds to the source material? And in a sense, is this based on the novella, or the Darabont vision? I'm still fine with it, but this is just to say I get that part of what you are saying, and did think about it. My hope is King is giving a lot of input and will at least write some story treatments if not whole teleplays to balance things out.