IT: chapter II - Pennywise the clown is so #cancelled

[RumblyTumbly]

He put a preteen gang bang in his book...

And then King wonders why people don't adapt his work to the letter, lol.

 

[Scarlett Johansson]

Someone brought that up in a twitter thread and some idiot argued that because Stephen King is a straight white male he has no business writing about lgbt hardships or some schlock.

But he did. He wrote it 30 years ago and it got published. Little too late.

He based it off of a real gay bashing tho

 

[Vanja]

I have yet to see the second movie, but I saw a random, low-effort tweet that listed “potentially triggering content” that would be in Chapter II, warning potential viewers of what ~terrible things~ would be in their beloved yaoibait movie.

That’s a bit of a killjoy-ish move, isn’t it? Aren’t horror movies supposed to be enjoyed, so to say, blind?

 

[Maggots on a Train v2]

The left has reached the same sad low as fundie 1980's moms, freaking out because there are antagonists in media. Imagine expecting other adults to watch some conflict-free Wonder Pets type of shit.

More unsolicited opinion: was Georgie exceptional? Just straight exceptional? Why would he go into a sewer? Were children stupider in the 50s?

The big sewer drain pipe behind my kindergarten had to have rebar welded over it to keep all the kids out. I'm pretty sure the whole class would have gone in without it.

 

[Rudol von Stroheim]

Saw it the other day in a double bill alongside the first one - I had a kind of mixed reaction...

Spoiler

The adult actors were all pretty solid and did a good job of portraying each character - special mention to Mike, Ben and Eddie's actors, on the other hand I wasn't a huge fan of Jessica Chastain as Bev. She just seemed so weepy and pathetic throughout the two first thirds of the movie. James McAvoy was pretty good as Bill but I felt the scene in the carnival was fairly pointless and would have been better had he seen an illusion of Georgie getting got, not some random kid that just keeps conveniently popping up wherever the protagonists are (seriously, the fuck is with that kid?).
I liked the Adrian scene at the start - although I did chuckle at the fact that one of the attackers looks like a total troon (honestly didn't know what gender they were meant to be).
I didn't mind the gay subtext with Richie although it did feel a little shoehorned in because of the 'Reddie' shippers. Which disturbs me to hell because they were shipping kids and also at no point in the first movie does Richie seem like a kid struggling with his sexuality. I mean, they did it well - but it didn't feel entirely needed / right.
I'm one of the few I think who actually liked the letters left by Stan at the end. It fit the character that they'd fleshed out for Stan in these movies and made him more than just that guy who offs himself because he's scared. It made him look a little more important to the gang, I guess, and I liked what was said in notes.
On the other hand, I didn't like how they did Stan's suicide. In the book - it's very hard hitting. In the miniseries, it's tragic (and the 'IT' written in blood is badass), in this one...it just seemed a little 'meh'.
I'm still unsure of how I feel about how they defeat Pennywise - it fits the narrative and the wackiness of the story but I felt like they should have swapped the endings of this one and the first one. AKA have the kids talk shit to him and then have the adults beat the fuck out of him. It makes more sense in my mind that way, I guess.
My main gripes with the movie would be that I didn't like the editing / how jarring it all felt. Nothing felt like it fit neatly into place and I felt like they were still trying to tell parts of the story from the first movie which...I figure they should have just left out all together or have included in some special edition of the first one.
I found the comedy in the movie a bit weird, too. Like - it's funny. Don't get me wrong, there are some laugh out loud moments but...I didn't feel like there should have been? I felt like it should have taken itself a little more seriously (despite the clown and haha etc) but yeah, in parts it felt like a Sam Raime film *which I don't mind* - in other scenes, it just looked like the cast was fucking around and talking shit.
The CGI isn't great and it would have benefited from having more practical effects, the old lady Pennywise would have been scary as fuck if done like a Del Toro monster or something.
I didn't really like what they did with Henry Bowers. I mean, in the first movie he's an asshole kid who goes insane and wants to kill everyone. Although he has a mullet and is kind of an embarrassment - he at least poses a threat to the group. In this one he just seemed like a massive joke. Nobody really takes any of it seriously and his appearance is almost entirely played for laughs. I would have preferred to have seen a more menacing / threatening Bowers or nothing at all.
Finally, Mike. Blessed be Mike. He holds down the fort for these hoes, spends alllllll his years not getting rich and famous and instead monitoring murders and shit in the area and he doesn't even get a flashback scene or a final encounter with Pennywise scene (like all the others do). He's a good boy and he dindu nuffin - Mike deserved more.
All in all it was pretty good, I'm watching again next week so I'll probably change my thoughts.

 

[Mariposa Electrique]

Nothing ruins a movie more than people laughing at it when they aren't supposed to. I once saw Bride of Frankenstein at a special showing and people were cracking up every other scene. It was fucking irritating.

That's what really pisses me off. Skarsgard looked great, but he sounded more like Winnie the Pooh. Also, the music in the original mini series really set a horrific tone, especially with the circus themed song. The music in this film just didn't create a horrific atmosphere. How is it that a made for TV film can still scare me in my 30s, yet this huge budget film made me bored.

 

[UnKillFill]

It's a shame that MTV isn't still producing music interesting content. I'd love to see a celebrity deathmatch of Bill Skarsgård vs Joaquin Phoenix.

 

[Ughubughughughughughghlug]

I found that to be really anti-climactic. I mean, here's this being that can take on any size and shape it wants, yet it can be destroyed by a simple tongue lashing. I mean, when it was small...I felt sorry for it. In the book, I don't believe the deadlights were actually destroyed because they weren't manifest in this reality.

My friend wouldn’t shut up through it. I heard “RIP” and “bruh moment” all throughout the three hours. I wanted to murder-suicide.

Edit: I replied to the wrong post.

 

[CatParty]

Pennywise Is Surprisingly Anti-Queer in ‘It Chapter Two’

The killer clown isn’t the ally we thought he was.

www.out.com

In the aftermath of 2017’s It, Bill Skarsgård’s Pennywise the Dancing Clown became something of a gay icon. Between memes and makeup tutorials, Pennywise was everywhere — he and another monstrous LGBTQ+ favorite, the Babadook, were seen as #couplegoals. But after seeing It Chapter Two, I’m sad to announce that Pennywise is not gay, or even an ally. In fact, Pennywise is surprisingly anti-queer.

Spoilers for It Chapter Two follow.

As has been previously reported, the film opens with a scene straight from Stephen King’s original novel, in which a gay couple (Xavier Dolan and Taylor Frey) are attacked by a group of homophobes, who beat Dolan’s character Adrian and throw him over the side of a bridge. His boyfriend, Don, follows him down to the river below, just in time to watch Pennywise literally eat his heart out. This attack, inspired by the real-life murder of Charlie Howard, could be written off as simply Pennywise taking an opportunity to feed (although its implied, moreso in King’s novel than the film, that the entity It — the name the Losers Club gives to the monster otherwise known as Pennywise — controls the town of Derry and may have telepathically inspired the homophobes to attack the couple.)

But what really cements Pennywise’s bigotry is his treatment of Richie (Bill Hader), who is revealed to be closeted and in love with his childhood friend Eddie (James Ransone). When Richie sets off to Derry’s arcade to procure a token needed for the ritual to defeat It once and for all — which turns out to be a literal arcade token — he reminisces about being called a “fag” as a child (Finn Wolfhard returns as his younger incarnation) by bully-turned-sociopath Henry Bowers (Nicholas Hamilton). Then he’s attacked by a giant Paul Bunyan statue and, eventually, Pennywise himself.

The killer clown isn’t content to just threaten Richie with violence. Instead, he reveals that he knows Richie’s secret, his “dirty little secret.” He doesn’t just say it, he sings it — the song even appears on the album’s soundtrack (coming for all the pop girls’ necks, I see). So Pennywise isn’t just the physical manifestation of what is revealed to be some kind of cosmic entity that feeds off fear and human flesh, he’s a homophobe. Trump’s America strikes again!

 

[The Nothingness]

I don't think a Lovecraftian cosmic entity, who is fictional to begin with, gives a damn about being an ally for the alphabet people.

Now they can be as pissed off at Stephen King as that obese Twilight fan was when King said Stephenie Meyers was not a good writer.

 

[Pumpkin Girl IRL]

The funhouse mirror scene was a holy shot moment, lol. Don't think anyone so much as breathed in the aftermath.

 

[Timmy Testicles]

was a pretty alright flick. the first movie was better. but that's to be expected. some of the scenes dragged on for too long, and it just wasn't as scary as the first. also, a lot of the effects seemed kinda cheap. can't complain too much though, it was way better than i was expecting. i'm feeling a strong 7.5/10.

 

[RumblyTumbly]

The funhouse mirror scene and the bleacher scene are the two best scenes in the movie, and work great as short horror stories onto themselves.

Unfortunately, nothing else in the film lives up to it, and neither scene works within the context of the larger story of the film. Both scenes feel like detours. The girl in the bleachers scene has zero connection to any of the characters, and nobody in the film reacts to it (I think it was brought up in one of the newspaper headlines or something, but other than that, nothing). And the Funhouse Mirror scene felt like a huge detour for McEvoy's character, and again, didn't really impact the larger story (though it was a nice break from all the flashbacks and failed creepy moments).

 

[Bread Fetishist]

Pennywise Is Surprisingly Anti-Queer in ‘It Chapter Two’

The killer clown isn’t the ally we thought he was.

www.out.com

In the aftermath of 2017’s It, Bill Skarsgård’s Pennywise the Dancing Clown became something of a gay icon. Between memes and makeup tutorials, Pennywise was everywhere — he and another monstrous LGBTQ+ favorite, the Babadook, were seen as #couplegoals. But after seeing It Chapter Two, I’m sad to announce that Pennywise is not gay, or even an ally. In fact, Pennywise is surprisingly anti-queer.

Spoilers for It Chapter Two follow.

As has been previously reported, the film opens with a scene straight from Stephen King’s original novel, in which a gay couple (Xavier Dolan and Taylor Frey) are attacked by a group of homophobes, who beat Dolan’s character Adrian and throw him over the side of a bridge. His boyfriend, Don, follows him down to the river below, just in time to watch Pennywise literally eat his heart out. This attack, inspired by the real-life murder of Charlie Howard, could be written off as simply Pennywise taking an opportunity to feed (although its implied, moreso in King’s novel than the film, that the entity It — the name the Losers Club gives to the monster otherwise known as Pennywise — controls the town of Derry and may have telepathically inspired the homophobes to attack the couple.)

But what really cements Pennywise’s bigotry is his treatment of Richie (Bill Hader), who is revealed to be closeted and in love with his childhood friend Eddie (James Ransone). When Richie sets off to Derry’s arcade to procure a token needed for the ritual to defeat It once and for all — which turns out to be a literal arcade token — he reminisces about being called a “fag” as a child (Finn Wolfhard returns as his younger incarnation) by bully-turned-sociopath Henry Bowers (Nicholas Hamilton). Then he’s attacked by a giant Paul Bunyan statue and, eventually, Pennywise himself.

The killer clown isn’t content to just threaten Richie with violence. Instead, he reveals that he knows Richie’s secret, his “dirty little secret.” He doesn’t just say it, he sings it — the song even appears on the album’s soundtrack (coming for all the pop girls’ necks, I see). So Pennywise isn’t just the physical manifestation of what is revealed to be some kind of cosmic entity that feeds off fear and human flesh, he’s a homophobe. Trump’s America strikes again!

It's almost like....he's a villain, or something.

 

[RumblyTumbly]

Wait...

They adopted the kid eating killer clown as a gay icon?

Y'all need to pick better role models.

EDIT: Okay, I've read the article. They took on the Babadook too? The personification of depression and a destroyer of families?

Seriously, LGBTQ+ people: GET BETTER ROLE MODELS!!!

 

[BrunoMattei]

The flashbacks got a little annoying after a while. Seems ripe for fanedit material. I didn't like the CGI on the giant lumberjack statue. But otherwise it was great. Th ending is kind of weak. A better ending than the TV movie though.

Freddy >>>>> Pennywise.

 

[US Marine Hyde]

I was disappointed in how not-scary it was. I thought the first one was a lot better.
olesmithey:
The story seemed so surface-level for how LONG it was. Mike has been researching this creature for 27 years, brings them all back to fight it, but we barely even see him at all or learn much of what he’s found out. We just get a stereotypical “Native American drug-induced vision” for him and Bill. He then doesn’t even let the others drink whatever the drug was, so they all have to go off on formulaic missions to uncover old memories and get scared by Pennywise. The scary parts weren’t that scary at all- the only ones that got me were the bleachers scene and Bev’s scene with the old woman, though that was more creepy than scary. There wasn’t enough build up and once we got through the first “totem” discovery it was way too obvious what was going to happen and when.
The scene at the beginning with her abusive husband was so gratuitous for never coming up again. They could have easily cut that out entirely and just have made her single or recently divorced so she could still end up with Ben at the end. It was also super disappointing how they totally wasted Bowers. He’s completely insane, is an acolyte to an Eldritch horror, and drives around with a zombie, and he gets like two scenes.
The ending was extremely gay. Them fighting it was much more action/sci-fi, and then they ended up defeated an almost limitlessly powerful monster by hurting It’s feelings. And of course there was like twenty more unnecessary minutes of movie to show them all living happily ever after.

Overall, I didn’t feel like I got really attached to any of the characters, and the movie could have been way shorter with the scenes that they had. The first one was way better. 7/10

 

[Duncan Hills Coffee]

Freddy >>>>> Pennywise.

The RLM guys commented on this. They said that the movie was paced like a Nightmare film except Freddy usually kills someone at the end of a scene.

I haven't seen Chapter 2 myself, and I'm a little iffy now since I like the book and the first movie.

 

[omori]

Lmao

 

[dopedodo]

The funhouse mirror scene was a holy shot moment, lol. Don't think anyone so much as breathed in the aftermath.

It was one of the better/scarier scenes, but I'm still annoyed they wrote in new material and effectively a new "Georgie" for Bill to not save again, like the audience won't feel Pennywise is a real villain unless we see him kill more kids.

I have a few gripes. Mostly adding in flashbacks that didn't happen in the book and still not giving Mike his bird scene or Stan's standpipe scene which were two of the scariest I remember from the book and I remember feeling Stan was pretty justified in offing himself to avoid a repeat of. The reveal in Eddies childhood too that he didn't actually have asthma and his mom was basically MPBing him, and his "asthma medication" was just camphor and water was quite important in the book but might have relied on 50s style pharmaceutical prep. Lots of scenes about the history of the town (like the shootout) could have been included if the characters had talked to more townsfolk and not just each other. I find this is what King adaptions lose the most - the omniscient narration that really builds up the feeling of dread. Also why the fuck can't Richie tell his childhood best friends he's gay?? It's the 2010s, no one gives a fuck nowadays in the West. Henry Bowers was played a bit too loopy, but to be fair nearly 30 years of daily Haloperidol will do that. I missed the scary M-O-O-N telling him what to do though.

Good stuff - no fucking Audra ending. My biggest gripe about Chapter 1 is how Bev becomes a victim of IT for no reason but to "get the gang back together" (why her? why the only girl?), but her lack of complete catatonia afterwards means the book's ending wouldn't make any sense (see also: Richie in this film) and saves us from the mawkish (just my opinion) final scene of the 1990 film. The Mrs Kirsh scene was unnerving AF as it should be. Maybe not as much of a gradual WTF like the book, but i understand time constraints etc. I liked the constant references to Bill's terrible book endings as a friendly nudge to Stephen King's own ones, and it worked to prepare the viewer for a rewrite in this film. The actors were all excellent, any character changes like Beverly no longer being so tough and now prone to crying all the fucking time could be explained by time away from Derry and being overwhelmed by being back. Similarly how she and Eddie have managed to marry their abusive parents, in Ed's case literally so (check the cast list!).

They didn't discuss the fact that none of them had children, though, which was quite a pivotal conversation in the book.

I didn't like it as much as the first film, it wasn't as scary even when it should be (Spider-Stan stopped being scary after a few minutes) and old/new stuff jarred. But solid performances from a good cast, new scenes were good despite my grumbles, satisfactory conclusion. 7.5/10, with the .5 for injokes and fan nod casting.

oh and as for the orgy, i think there was a subtle nod in the first film at the end to it having happened off screen.