IT is a 1986 horror novel by American author
Stephen King. The story is about seven children being terrorized by a malevolent monster - known only as IT - that takes the form of their deepest fears but primarily appears in the form of a clown, calling itself
"Pennywise the Dancing Clown." The novel features a nonlinear narrative which alternates between two different time periods and shifts among the different perspectives and stories of its seven protagonists. It deals with themes which would eventually become King staples: the power of memory, childhood trauma and the ugliness lurking behind a small-town façade.
In 1990, the novel was loosely adapted into a television movie featuring John Ritter as Ben Hanscom, Harry Anderson as Richie Tozier, Tim Reid as Mike Hanlon, Annette O'Toole as Beverly Marsh, Richard Thomas as Bill Denbrough and
Tim Curry as Pennywise.
On March 12th 2009, Warner Bros. announced that the production of a remake of IT had started. Dan Lin, Roy Lee and Doug Davison are set to produce.
Tropes:
- Absurdly Spacious Sewer
- Abusive Parents: Beverly's father and Eddie's mother (even if she didn't mean it in that way).
- And both Beverly and Eddie later marry mirror images of the respective parents.
- Adaptation Decay: The movie adaptation.
- Adults Are Useless: Played straight in the fact that most adults are oblivious to IT's existence, averted when the Losers' Club members return and vanquish IT as adults.
- All Grown Up: The Losers' Club members as adults, but especially Beverly Marsh.
- Ambiguously Gay: Henry Bowers and Patrick Hockstetter.
- Author Avatar: Bill Denbrough.
- Axe Crazy
- Big Bad: The titular IT.
- Bitter Sweet Ending: IT is finally defeated and vanquished, but two of the Losers' Club members are dead, most of their hometown is destroyed by a flood with IT's death and the surviving members' memories slowly fade away until they completely forget about each other, but somehow they know that they will be friends forever.
- Brown Note: The "deadlights", which are implied to be IT's true form, cause whoever sees them to go insane.
- Complete Monster: Some of the human villains like Henry Bowers are just as scary as the Monster Clown.
- Cosmic Horror / Eldritch Abomination: IT's true form.
- Crowning Moment Of Awesome: "I'm doing the mashed potatoes all over this thing AND I GOT A FUCKING BROKEN ARM!!!"
- Crowning Moment Of Heartwarming: While most of the movie is considered Narm, this music video
does a pretty damn good job of inducing the warm-and-fuzzies.
- Dead Little Brother: Bill's trauma.
- Deus Sex Machina
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu
- Disappeared Dad: Ben's father and Eddie's father.
- Dogged Nice Guy: Ben Hanscom to Beverly Marsh.
- Domestic Abuser: Beverly's husband.
- Somewhat Subverted with Beverly's Father.
- Dream Sequence: Not exactly a dream but in the novel Richie and Mike have a vision of It arriving to Earth from a meteorite in a prehistoric Derry.
- Driven To Suicide: Stan Uris.
- Five Token Band: The Losers' Club is a Seven Token Band.
- Freud Was Right
- Heroes Want Redheads: All the male Losers are romantically attracted to Beverly at some point, as is Beverly herself to Bill.
- High Octane Nightmare Fuel: The novel. The movie itself is Narm-tastic, but any scene with Pennywise is scary, especially if you are afraid of clowns. Tim Curry did a good job at being a Monster Clown in that movie. Brr...
- Many children that weren't afraid of clowns before became afraid of them after watching this film.
- Jerk Ass: Henry Bowers starts like this. Later, to call him that would be an understatement.
- Kids Are Cruel: Henry Bowers and his cronies.
- Memetic Molester: Look at the the trope below this one.
- Monster Clown: IT's primary form, Pennywise The Dancing Clown.
- Moral Event Horizon: Henry Bowers crosses it at least twice, first when he poisons Mike Hanlon's dog, and then when he murders his father with a razor It gave him.
- Patrick Hockstetter too when he murders his baby brother in his cradle and his hobby which disturbs even Henry Bowers: he steals his neighbor's dog and locks it in a fridge to slowly die while checking it every few days.
- My Beloved Smother: Eddie's mother.
- Narm: Most of the movie, except for any scene with Pennywise in it.
- Parental Obliviousness
- The Power Of Friendship: One of the major themes in the book is of childhood friends who have long since gone their separate ways but must now come together to defeat the Big Bad.
- Redheaded Hero: Bill and Beverly
- The Reveal: The revelation, in the book's later chapters, that IT is actually female. Not only that, but she just so happens to have laid a shitload of eggs...
- Schoolyard Bully All Grown Up: After spending many years in psychiatric hospital, Henry Bowers escapes with IT's help and almost kills Mike Hanlon.
- Skepticism Failure: Stan Uris is the last of The Losers' Club members to recognize IT's existence.
- The Smurfette Principle: Good lord, Beverly
- Spooky Photographs (that start moving and threatening you)
- Squick: They had to do what to get out of the sewers in 1958?
- Fetish Fuel: The scene mentioned here was wisely cut out of the movie adaptation, and the director has gone on record as saying that he felt it was just one of Stephen King's bizarre personal fantasies.
- Survival Mantra: "He thrusts his fists against the post and still insists he sees the ghosts".
- There Are No Therapists: Seriously, after all the parental abuse and emotional scarring it is actually surprising all the Losers' Club members became successful as adults.
- Who needs therapy when you've got the Turtle playing with your memory and with the strings of fate. . .
- Town With A Dark Secret: Mike Hanlon spends much of his life recording testimonies of strange incidents in his town Derry, and he is told once that some secrets bite.
- Ugly Guy Hot Wife: Bill and his wife Audra.
- Verbal Tic: Bill's stuttering.
- You Killed My Brother: Bill's reason why Its Personal with IT.
- Worst News Judgment Ever: Justified: Mike discovers that despite the children's killings and incidents in which many people die, those news are rarely spoken outside the town of Derry; its like something doesn't want those to be known outside.
