Pennywise Better Watch Out! The Now Grown Losers Club Will Kick His Ass!

Rating: 10/10 (7 September 2019)

When we last left the Losers Club, the six boys and one girl made a blood vow to come back to Derry, Maine to finally destroy the evil, shape-shifting clown, Pennywise. It was late summer 1989 when the vow was made and the children except lone black character Michael Hanlon (Chosen Jacobs as young Mike, Isaiah Mustafa as grown Mike) have left Derry.
The club members are wildly successful except for poor Mike who has stayed in the cursed town and is waiting to see when and if the members will fulfill the oath they made as children. William aka Bill Denbrough (Jaeden Martell as young Bill, James McAvoy as grown Bill) is a very successful writer who is married to Audra (Jess Wexler). She is an actress who is staring in a movie based on one of Bill's books. Everyone agrees Bill is a good writer but they criticize his book endings. The lone girl, Beverly Marsh (Sophia Lillis as young Beverly, Jessica Chastain as grown Beverly) is a wonderful clothing designer married to Tom Rogan who abuses her horribly. Bill Hader is Richie Tozier the club comedian who doesn't write his own material. Finn Wolfhard plays young Richie. I think the adult actors really look like the children actors with James Ransone nailing Jack Dylan Grazer's Eddie Kaspbrak mannerisms to a T! Andy Bean has a short, memorable role of Stanley Uris and he channels Wyatt Oleff's mannerisms and hair quite well! I can also see Jeremy Ray Taylor as Ben Hanscom growing up to be quite a hunk like Jay Ryan! Last of all, Bill Skarsgard as Pennywise is back to his own tricks and this Pennywise is truly terrifying and in a rage!
The catalyst for Mike's contact of his old friends is the hate murder of a gay man named Adrian Mellon (Xavier Dolan) in 2016 at the Derry Carnival. These hateful punks beat up Adrian and his boyfriend Don Haggerty. They throw Adrian in the canal and Pennywise, just waking up and starving after 27 years, takes a bite out of Adrian. As the movie goes on, the flesh of Adrian doesn't satisfy the clown for long. He feeds on a little girl named Victoria who has a birth mark on her face. Pennywise tricks her into thinking he can cure her mark but devours her instead. He also eats a young boy in the fun house in front of Bill.
The Losers all come together in their old town with the exception of Stan who cuts his wrist in the bathtub after Mike's phone call. Pennywise is determined to make the Losers relive their childhood traumas. He even breaks Henry Bowers (Teach Grant) out of Juniper Hills institution to exact revenge. Henry killed his father Butch Bowers as a boy and was committed. The scares come on after another! The spider Pennywise with Stan's boy face is way more scary than the fake looking creature from the almost 30 year old TV movie! Well, to give the TV movie credit, TV has a more limited budget than movies and the producers and directors did their best with what they had. I never really liked Stephen King acting in the movies based on his books, but I thought he was great as the antique store owner who sells Bill the bike Bill had as a boy. Bill missed his beloved Silver and needed it back.
The Losers stick together and finally defeat Pennywise. Eddie is killed by the spider and Richie is heartbroken because he had a crush on Eddie but never told anyone he was gay. This movie did follow the classic TVmovie in some scenes especially with the Chinese restaurant and the special fortune cookies. Pennywise says "Kiss me, fat boy" to young Ben like TV Pennywise (Tim Curry) said to TV Ben (the late John Ritter). A rain slicker clad Georgie also confronts young Bill and grown Bill and tells both that it's their fault he is dead.
All in all, I was satisfied with this movie and the cast! Both Bills (Hader & Skarsgard) were awesome! It's safe to say that Bill Skarsgard and Tim Curry before him have ruined clowns for everyone! I recommend this movie as a satisfying swan song to this movie!