So, with (most of) the nostalgia gone from this part of the story, what’s left? The answer is a movie that is, for the most part, consistent with its predecessor in creepy tone and jump-scare fun. Chapter Two also has some of the same problems as the first part, namely that we are asked to believe Pennywise the Clown is a merciless killer, except when it comes to our heroes. Whenever his target is one of our beloved Losers Club, Pennywise is suddenly very bad at his job. Chapter Two is also interminably long at 169 minutes, with a structure that feels more like a video game than a movie.
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If Stranger Things is an original story that taps into every sci-fi/horror touchstone from the youth of people my age (mid-to-late 30s), then It is one of those touchstones remade with the same sensibility. This is the hard R version of Stranger Things; the one you don’t take the kids to see to get them into what you loved when you were a kid. Maybe you do, though, if you’re the kind of awesome parents mine were, parents who let your kids watch pretty much whatever they want. Thanks, mom and dad.
It is based on Stephen King’s popular – and gargantuan – 1986 novel. The book, and the 1990 TV miniseries adaptation, both play on baby boomer nostalgia. The story is split between two different time frames, following seven people as kids in the late 1950s, and 30 years later as adults. This new version has been updated for the Gen X/Millennial set. The part of the story that follows the characters as kids, which the movie focuses on exclusively, is set in 1989. Thus, we see a Gremlins poster featured prominently on one character’s bedroom wall.
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