ATTENTION:: Spoilers Ahead!!!!
If you haven't seen IT Chapter 2, stop reading right now.
It has finally arrived, the second (and last) installment of IT. Stephen King's novel has come to to the big screen. I was a huge fan of IT Chapter 1, I thought it was inventive. Not only was it a horror film that left you thinking about what those two small lights were in the middle of a dark room, but it gave a great underlying coming of age story.
Just to give you a quick rundown of the first film left us where the 7 friends: Bill, Beverly, Ben, Mike, Richie, Eddie, and Stanley beat up the demon clown Pennywise. Pennywise crawls, hurt, down into the depths of the sewer. As the seven kids recap the events of the sewer brawl they promise too each other they will return to Derry, Maine, if "It" returns. Bringing us to now, 27 years later. Mike (played by Isaiah Mustafa) never left Derry and has been monitor the police scanner waiting for a day that Pennywise would return.
After a brutal hate crime as the movie starts, Pennywise returns. Mike calls the rest of the gang and secretly gets them to come back to Derry. Not all of them make back but those who do are going to have to dig up their past to secure their future.
Now that you're caught up, let's get into the nitty-gritty. Let me just start off by saying, I liked the second chapter. Do I like it as much or more than the first? No. But, it was good and definitely kept me on the edge of my seat. It did not go unnoticed that this chapter was a little more gruesome. The themes and violence were a bit stronger this time around.
While the film was good, it just made me miss the underlying theme that the first movie had. The coming of age storyline was so strong in the first. They were growing up and facing their demons as they fought Pennywise that summer. This movie was missing that extra magic. For the characters, Richie, Eddie and a little bit of Ben, you could see some growth from them. They had a good stretch of character development. Unfortunately, the other characters took more of a back seat. Sometimes it felt like Mike wasn't their. Bill, who was the leader in the first one, got over shadowed. And Beverly, wasn't as great to me as her teenage counterpart, played by Sophie Lillis. And some ideas were half baked and did not necessarily have the ending they deserved. The hate crime that began the movie had a gay couple as the targets. The film also gave Richie (played by Bill Hader) what seemed to be a storyline that involved him being gay. It would have been nice to see him become a little bit more comfortable to be himself.
An interesting part of the movie was it had some heavy-hitters representing the adult Losers. James McAvoy playing Bill, Jessica Chastain playing Beverly, and Bill Hader playing Richie. But, the stand out was James Ransone who played adult Eddie. While James is a heavy-hitter in Indie films and television, we haven't seen him in a lot of blockbuster films like this. He totally stole the show. Him and Jack Dylan Grazer, who played Eddie as a child, are the same person. He was absolutely incredible in the role and the casting could not have been more spot on.
Although there was a bit of magic missing this time around, the film as a whole was good. It kept me entertained, sweating, and on the edge of my seat. I genuinely laughed, gasped, and even cried watching this saga come to an end. IT has been a great ride and I'm interested to see what Stephen King novel they bring to life next. I would give this movie a 7/10.
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