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.
Tagline: You’ll Float Again
Starring: Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy, Bill Hader
Runtime: 2 hrs 49 minutes | Release Year: 2019 | Space Krakens Earned: 3 out of 5
Source: Self-purchased, in theatre
It Chapter Two Review
I debated on whether or not to even write this review. If I had loved It Chapter Two, I would have eagerly done it. Hell, if I had hated it, I would have happily done it. But this is one of those cases where my thoughts on the movie are so strongly middle of the road that I can’t help but think of it is a mediocre follow-up to the fantastic promise shown with It Chapter One, and it’s hard to push myself to write more than that.
But I will.
Let’s start with the positives. The cast, both bigguns and littles, did a solid job. The Losers Club won my hearts with the original made-for-TV film. They won it all over again in It Chapter One, and mostly they grew up to be exactly what they should have been in this second movie. Ben Hanscom’s actors are a stand-out. Jeremy Ray Taylor is so sweet as young Ben, and Jay Ryan does a phenomenal job of channeling that exact same sweetness. (Also, Jay Ryan is incredibly freaking hot. Just saying.) It should be no surprise that James McAvoy delivers a solid performance as grown-up Bill Denborough. And even though I wanted to smack the ever-lovin-bejesus out of him, Bill Hader’s Richie Tozier seems entirely appropriate. (Though I do miss the almost-frenetic energy that Harry Anderson brought to the original Richie. More crazy than crude.)
Normally I’m a fan of Jessica Chastain, but I’ll be honest, she didn’t bring it the way she could have. Sometimes she shined, but mostly she was just kind of…flat.
Unfortunately, moving on from performances, I don’t have a lot of other positive things to say. Every time Pennywise appeared on screen as other-than-clown the CGI was laughable. (I giggled every time.) To a certain point, it can be forgiven because things don’t have to be truly scary to appear to kids as scary, but sometimes there’s just no making excuses unless they were intending to go for comedic. (Which, if they were, is a damned shame.)
The final battle between the Losers Club and Pennywise probably looked a lot better on the script than it played out on the film. A disappointing bit of fizzle where an epic show-down could have raised my overall thoughts on the movie. But the warm’n’fuzzy wrap-up was… well, it was warm’n’fuzzy and they pushed a certain relationship that wasn’t even hinted at in the book that will probably piss a lot of people off but I rather liked it.
Overall, It Chapter Two was okay, but it could have been so much better. I think I’m going to rewatch Chapter One and just forget this one was made.
Lilyn G is the founder of Sci-Fi & Scary, and leader of the Coolthulhu Crew. She does book and film reviews for both genres the site focuses on. Her tastes run towards creature features, hard science fiction, and lots and lots of action. She also has a soft spot for middle-grade fiction that rears its head frequently.
She is also a co-founder of Ladies of Horror Fiction, though she has stepped down to regular crew level.
Feel free to chat her up on Twitter as long as you aren’t hitting her up to review your book.
You and my son have exactly the same opinions, Lilyn. I was going to see is this past weekend until he deemed it ‘very average’. Looks like I made the right choice.
I know a few people that have really loved it, by so far “Meh” seems to be the most common take.
I was watching a cinema program here in Spain and they were also pretty nonplussed by it. The director said he wanted to do a full version combining both movies and adding more scenes but,who knows? Thanks, Lilyn!