It: Chapter Two review: An egregiously bloated conclusion to the story

This take on the rest of Stephen King’s brick-sized novel is full of wit and imagination but also suffers from narrative excess

Dir: Andy Muschietti. Starring: Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy, Bill Hader, Isaiah Mustafa, Jay Ryan, James Ransone and Bill Skarsgard. 15 cert, 169 mins

It: Chapter Two is what happens when you put off the inevitable. There was a simplicity to its 2017 predecessor that worked beautifully: it was a tale of innocence lost, told through the battle between seven outcast kids and one murderous clown. Yet Andy Muschietti’s first adaptation barely scraped the surface of Stephen King’s brick-sized novel. Its follow-up has been left to pick up all the pieces – each part of the story that felt too messy or complicated to include before but can now no longer be ignored. While the director does his very best with the material, there’s no escaping how egregiously bloated this film feels.

While King flips between two time periods, the films have separated them entirely – 2017’s It dealt exclusively with the Losers’ Club’s first encounter with Pennywise (Bill Skarsgard) in 1988. Post-victory, the group swore a blood oath – a promise they’d return to their hometown of Derry if the great evil ever reared its head again. Twenty-seven years later, those fears come true. Mike (Isaiah Mustafa), the only one to have stayed behind, is tasked with organising this baleful reunion. Bill (James McAvoy) is now a successful mystery novelist, while Richie (Bill Hader) has made it as a stand-up comic. Eddie (James Ransone) has, in a purely Freudian sense, married his own mother (both wife and matriarch are played by Molly Atkinson). The formerly overweight Ben (Jay Ryan) is now a wealthy architect with washboard abs. Beverly (Jessica Chastain), meanwhile, remains trapped in a cycle of abuse. What was once her father’s reign of terror is now her husband’s.

On top of that, however, the film has to deal with King’s habit of narrative excess. Even two films could never cover all the subplots, random thoughts and bits of lore contained in the book’s 1,138 pages. It’s always been the price we’ve had to pay for his wild imagination – he just can’t keep a story on track. On the bright side, the filmmakers don’t bother with Pennywise’s mortal enemy, the very big turtle, but the film’s faithful enough to have inherited a lot of the novel’s core issues. Take, for example, the vaguely gross way everyone obsesses over Ben’s weight loss, and how that suddenly makes him a now-eligible contender for Beverly’s affections. There’s the return of Henry Bowers (Teach Grant), the school bully, and a lot of hackneyed backstory about Native American rituals. Most glaringly, the film fails to rectify how blatantly underwritten Mike, the story’s one non-white character, is. To Muschietti’s credit, he does deal sensitively with the book’s real-world violence, encompassing hate crimes, sexual abuse and suicide. Although King links them directly to Pennywise’s machinations, the film allows these scenes to stand independently as very human tragedies.

Muschietti, alongside screenwriter Gary Dauberman, has at least done well to excavate the heart of King’s story. Put aside the clown antics and you’ll find a mournful observance of time’s effect on memory. “We are what we wish we could forget,” the opening narration posits. The more painful the memory, the bigger the scar it leaves. And if we don’t hold on to good experiences, they’ll soon fade out of existence. Those who have left Derry may not remember that fateful summer of 1988, but they’re still changed by their experiences. The second they return, it all starts to come flooding back.

It: Chapter Two exists in direct communication with what came before, as the adult Losers’ Club turn back time and relive their greatest traumas. Thematically, it’s a considered interrogation of the kind of hazy nostalgia that made the first film such a hit. In practical terms, it creates an overlong, repetitive narrative. It’s been two years since we’ve seen these characters, so there’s an explanatory flashback every time an element is reintroduced. We’re revisiting the same locations, ideas and even scares. The adult cast do an impressive job of mimicking their younger counterparts, maintaining the same sense of easy camaraderie. Although it’s interesting to see Chastain, a champion of headstrong characters, play it so subdued here, it’s hard not to feel like these performances exist as an echo of something that came before.

The film’s highlights are, admittedly, the moments that deviate entirely from the book. Here, Muschietti works in the same vein as his debut Mama, concocting truly phantasmagorical creations that owe much more to the world of traditional folk tales and legends than they do to the pages of King’s novels. There’s some truly scary, nightmare material in here. However, It: Chapter Two is also a lot funnier than you’d expect. Hader pitches his performance in the perfect place between self-awareness and sincerity, especially when he nails the line: “Let’s go kill this f***ing clown.” Skarsgard is on top form once more, but he’s smart to realise his Pennywise is too much of a pop culture icon now to be truly terrifying. He’s a more rounded character here – a sad, embittered bully.

Above all, It: Chapter Two is horror created in the blockbuster mould. For all its terrors, the film is equally concerned with its A-list stars, its venerable literary origins, its need to provide light entertainment, and its CGI-laden climactic showdown. That would explain why the film is nearly three hours long – it’s one to put side to side with the action films and superhero franchises, as opposed to the usual, more humble mid-budget horror fare we’re used to. It’s an admirable attempt, and there’s a lot of artistry on show here, but there’s no escaping how truly unwieldy the final product is.

It: Chapter Two is released in UK cinemas on 6 September