The only scene true to the tone of the source was the opening gay bashing scene. It's gross, it's awful, and it's the tone that IT should have.
Instead it's Goosebumps, making the intro scene stand out like crazy.
Agree with this 100%. The scene feels like a leftover from the True Detective/Fukunaga stage of development, it would have fit and worked in a film with a much different tone. I'm not against including it, but it set expectations for a vibe that was completely deflated through sentimentality, quips, and bizarre comedy.
I also liked that the Losers didn't forget each other again, and that they accepted their past (both the good and the bad). Felt like a more optimistic take on the book ending, with the five of them finally being able to move on from their collective trauma - while also remembering how much they all mean to each other.
Oh man, this was the worst part for me. I'm fine with cutting out the tounge-biting cosmic confrontation, but losing the bittersweet ending hurt me a lot. The sharp divide between childhood and adulthood is such a huge theme of the book, and while the ending is happier as is, it loses so much of its emotional punch.
I will write about all of this one day, he thinks, and knows it's just a dawn thought, an after-dreaming thought. But it's nice to think so for a while in the morning's clean silence, to think that childhood has its own sweet secrets and confirms mortality, and that mortality defines all courage and love. To think that what has looked forward must also look back, and that each life makes its own imitation of immortality: a wheel. Or so Bill Denbrough sometimes thinks on those early mornings after dreaming, when he almost remembers his childhood, and the friends with whom he shared it.
The last few chapters of the book bring me to tears every time, especially after the exhausting 1200-page journey, but I didn't feel anything when the movie was over.
If I recall corrrectly, The magic that bound them together helped to make adult Bev and Bill attracted to each other and Bill was thinking about cheating on his wife with Bev. Once the magic fades they are fine. Something like that.
In the book Bill and Bev actually do sleep together, which is another plot point I missed. I don't particularly fault this adaptation for it, it's more of a larger trend in Hollywood where they seem to be actively trying to avoid portraying sex at all these days... Like, besides Tony Stark sleeping with the reporter in Iron Man 1, is there even a hint of sex throughout the entire MCU after that?
Now, I'm not saying they should have kept the infamous sewer sex scene, it just doesn't work today, though I do understand what King was going for when he included it in the book. Sex is traditionally a major rite of passage from childhood to adulthood, in a way it can also be seen as the titular 'It,' I.E., "have you done It yet?" and having Bill and Bev follow through on their desires would have made the love triangle much more engaging.
EDIT: accidentially had my whole post in italics just like 50% of the end of the book
This got a bigger laugh from me than anything in a movie. I love when King interrupts his normal prose with just massive paragraphs of run-on italic inner voice.
I guess my one big gripe with both the modern It movies is Pennywise's lack of personality. He's just such a monster from the get-go, the growly, snarly type, not the cerebral type. In the book, Pennywise is constantly talking shit, he's not scary because he's got big teeth and monster eyes, he's terrifying because he knows your innermost fears and secrets and knows exactly what to say to exploit them. Tim Curry was phenomenal at this aspect of the character, I know the effects failed him but I just prefer it so, so much to the jerky, weird voice and guttural sentences of the current iteration.
I still enjoyed both movies though, I've read the book so many times and I always get a kick out of seeing a King adaptation that at least attempts to take the source material seriously.
