Review of It

I saw this two-parter way to early when I was 10 or 11 years old. At that time, I was almost traumatized by Tim Curry as Pennywise. So, returning to the movie many years later, I expected to be scared again. But I wasn't, maybe some of you can relate to that. Why is that? Let me clarify by imaging the 'perfect' version of 'It'.

Don't get me wrong, this adaptation does have its moments and manages to create an overall uncomfortable athmosphere with its mix of 'Stand by me'-like coming of age drama and horror.

• First of all, lets transform this into an HBO-series with 10 episodes. You wouldn't have to squeeze all important plot points into three hours and could show a bit more scary stuff than on cable tv.
• Secondly, lose the strict separation of the childhood years and the grown-up's return to Derry. The novel spends much more time with the kids and most of the stuff happens to them. Maybe the separation was made in order not to confuse the audience. But I believe viewers are more intelligent than studios think and can handle some time lapses. King chose that structure for a reason, so why not stick to it?
• In modern television it is not unusual to have a whole episode with only character introduction, development and motivation. Not every episode must have a climax as we learned from watching Breaking Bad or maybe even Game of Thrones. This version kinda succeeds in bringing us close to the kids but the adults stay relatively flat. The reason for that is that here, every 20 minutes or so a little cliffhanger had to be created for commercial breaks on television to hook the audiences. In the perfect version we could enjoy a whole episode without anything scary only to be hit all the harder in the next one.
• Finally the ending... (no spoilers) In the novel, the final confrontation is intercut between the kids and the adults. The two stories move forward similarly and help each other. How perfect would it be to have that in a series instead of basically repeating the same ending 1,5 hours later. Also, in our perfect version I would prefer a cgi-finale that could really bring across the mythical and strange quality of the novel. But I guess, considering the date of release and the budget of the mini-series, the film-makers did a decent job.

Now I really wish I could see this perfect version of 'It' and wouldn't have to live with this version. But I still prefer it to the 2017-version which also separates the children's and adult's stories but also exaggerates everything and relies to heavily on jump scares.

One can only hope...