It Chapter Two (2019) Review

Very early on in ‘It Chapter Two’ there is some wink-wink dialogue about an author writing a great book, but messing up the ending. Anyone who is familiar with the ‘It’ book or original mini-series will know the ending was not well-liked. Here now though they had a chance to rectify things, and I can assure you they did. Not just in terms of the ending, but the entire second entry is actually a fantastically made film and in my opinion superior to part one.

The film is exceptionally long for a horror movie at nearly three hours. The thing is though I can’t see it having the same impact if it were much shorter. There was a lot of layers to fit in. This isn’t your average “fast-food” horror like the ‘Conjuring’ universe films. This is as much a drama in a lot of ways as it is a horror. The first half of the film especially. A long-time is taken reintroducing us to the characters, showing us where they are with their lives now and building up their résumés again. Then in the second half of the film (and yes I’m talking about almost an entire 90 minutes), the film kicks into hyper-drive with non-stop, in your face horror – and it is a sight to behold.

The cast were again all perfectly selected. Bill Hader, in particular, steals the show. He is given some great one-liners to work with, much the same as Finn Wolfhard was, and he nails every one of them. There is also a great Stephen King cameo. This isn’t just a case of blink and you’ll miss him, he is given an entire scene with some hilarious dialogue. I wasn’t sure whether ‘It Chapter Two’ would be able to stick the landing and give the story the ending that it deserves, but it certainly did. I had a great time with this movie and I think any lover of the genre will as well.