Twenty-seven years after their first encounter with the terrifying Pennywise, the Losers Club have grown up and moved away, until a devastating phone call brings them back.
“IT: Chapter 2” follows the 2017 release of “IT,” taking place 27 years later with The Losers Club all grown up, all of them outliving their own lives until they get a call from Mike (Isaiah Mustafa). Mike chose to stay in Derry and his call is to inform them that IT has returned and they all must come back. So here we are 27 years later with The Losers Club facing off against Pennywise once again.
Obviously, the hype is there, I remember back in 2017 stepping into the advance screening for “IT.” The whole thing felt like an event, while I walked away feeling kind of mixed about “IT.” I appreciated the spectacle of it all. My thing with Chapter 2 is that it did not feel as much as an event to me. Aside from the first scene, this film starts off strong. I thought to myself “oh man this is going to be great.” There just hit a point for me where the film went from being incredibly unique in the way it was telling its story to being stuck in repetition and very formulaic.
I don’t want to get into spoiling anything because I know a lot of people are excited about this so I’ll keep things as vague as possible. Granted, if you’ve read the book then you already know what is going to happen. Here’s the thing, if I think if you’re a fan of the source material this will be a great time for you. There is a good amount of fan service in there too, the scares to me are more hit and miss. There was one that really got me but other than that it just felt like traditional jump scares. I felt the scares were kind of ridiculous too, I would have loved to see something different and have Pennywise attack the adults on a more psychological level that would mess with their minds.
I will say there is a plotline that I absolutely hated. I won’t say what but I think if it had been excised, the film would have been completely the same. Like with the first, I felt there was a lot of humor in this, more than I wanted there to be. That being said, I love Bill Hader and he is easily the best part of this movie. I’m still in the middle on this movie, there is a part of me that likes it and a part of me that notices a lot of flaws. I did feel the same way about the first one though, so I don’t know where my opinion will mature to. I will say as it stands right now, for me, I think the first one is much better than Chapter 2.
At the end of the day, aside from my thoughts, I love that we are in a time where we are getting big, bold horror films. It personally gets me excited, who knows, I could end up seeing this again when we get closer to Halloween. If you know you want to see this, then obviously go see it. If you aren’t sure, my advice is to go see it anyway. I mean it’s a Stephen King movie and on top of that, it’s IT. Why miss out on the fun? Here’s what I will say, this movie is straight-up fun, it never felt too long to me and I was entertained as well. Just go support horror movies so we can get more of them.
In Theaters Friday, September 6th
