Finally got around to seeing it despite liking the first a good amount since the negative reviews and length had put me off seeing this right away.
It does feel overly long and the structure does inherently feel like a rehash of the first, and like a typical sequel despite being all one book, but I liked this a lot more than I expected to. The first was definitely the better film for feeling more fresh, and capturing the unease of Derry along with laying out the mystery of Pennywise's origin and threat, as well as laying out the adventure inherent to this group of friends facing this monster. It just all felt more natural in the first film.
The sequel did feel like a good companion piece to the first in that we get to know the losers more (maybe not for Mike and Stanley quite as much) but it really reinforces for me that the story isn't really about Pennywise as a monster or why neither film is really that "scary", it's more about trauma, fears, insecurities, and secrets for not just the Losers, but that festers in the whole town, especially since it's a small town. People don't talk about it and the Losers mainly try to run and hide from it all for most of their lives and it sort of cripples them as adults in some ways. That's why despite the first movie also having the Losers have to face their fears, this time, they can't just win by standing up to their demons, but take away it's power over them. I mean, the metaphor isn't exactly elegant with them shouting things at Pennywise to take away his strength, but some of the emotions that the Loser's had to cope with resonated with me, even if I think the trauma aspect was explored better in the first film, I thought that this might have done a little more exploring of how they actually felt about it.
The ending was odd, but in terms of the idea of the Losers being best friends as kids but then everyone running away from their problems as well as Derry and forgetting about it was an interesting metaphor and to have it resolved by them actually being able to re-establish the bond of the friendships they had lost so long ago. It may not be that scary of a film and it may be pretty hokey because of it, but I really like that the movie is actually more about these themes, because it makes the story that much more interesting to me than just a regular monster horror film. It actually got me emotional at parts and I can't think of the last horror movie to evoke emotions like that besides just fear and dread. Plus, I really appreciate the production values in both Chapter 1 and 2 since horror often doesn't go for spectacle and this was just an awesome throwback to horror movies and even adventure/drama films from the 80s and 90s in so many ways.
