“Would you go back in time and kill Hitler?” is a frequently asked moral and philosophical question. (Just ask Jeb Bush.) Leave it to Stephen King to pose the less obvious follow-up: “Would you go back in time and save JFK?” That’s the potent premise behind the horror maestro’s 2011 bestseller, about an English teacher from small-town Maine who is shown a portal that leads directly to America’s past, specifically 1958. That gives him five years to plan his Kennedy-rescuing mission while also trying to avoid outing himself as a visitor from the future.

Related: See ‘11.22.63.’ Photos

James Franco plays this man out of time in Hulu’s upcoming 8-part adaptation of 11.22.63, appropriately set to premiere on President’s Day 2016. Overseen by executive producers J.J. Abrams, Bridget Carpenter (Friday Night Lights), and King himself, the eight-episode series also boasts a supporting cast that includes Chris Cooper, Cherry Jones and Josh Duhamel. But Franco is the focus of the show’s short-but-tantalizing first teaser, debuting here just days before the 52nd anniversary of JFK’s death. The teaser opens with a brief glimpse of the present day before plunging Franco back to 1960. And if this trailer doesn’t get you excited for watching the whole thing, allow Stephen King to provide some additional enthusiasm. Speaking to Yahoo TV recently, the author described 11.22.63 as: “Remarkable. Terrific. They did a great job.”

11.22.63 premieres Feb. 15 on Hulu