Film / It: Chapter Two

Witness the end of It.

"There's an echo here in Derry that bounces back every 27 years. We thought we stopped It back then. We thought It was done, but... [...] That echo, we might have changed It, just like It changed us. But we didn't stop It. Because It just bounced back. We made an oath. That's why I brought you back. That's why you're here. To finish It... for good."

— Mike Hanlon

It: Chapter Two is the sequel to 2017's It and an adaptation of the second half of Stephen King’s classic horror novel.

Twenty-seven years after the events of the first film, the members of the Losers' Club return to Derry to finally put an end to the malevolent force that terrorized them in their youths. While they managed to beat Pennywise the first time, he was only toying with them then; it was the first time he was hurt, ever, and now he is taking off the kid gloves.

The cast includes James McAvoy, Jessica Chastain, Bill Hader, Isaiah Mustafa, Jay Ryan, James Ransone, Andy Bean and Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise, all in addition to the child actors playing the kids in the first film (Jaeden Martell, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Sophia Lillis, Finn Wolfhard, Wyatt Oleff, Chosen Jacobs and Jack Dylan Grazer).

In March 2022, a prequel series to the duology, titled Welcome to Derry, was announced for HBO Max.

Previews: Teaser, Trailer.

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These tropes float too...

• 20 Minutes into the Past: Takes place in 2016, despite being released in 2019, to maintain the timeline of IT reappearing every 27 years,
• Actionized Adaptation: The film is a lot more action oriented than either the novel or the miniseries, especially during the final battle. Whereas in the first two the climax is essentially "Go into It's lair, Eddie dies, knock over giant spider and rip its heart out", the movie has the fight with Pennywise be more drawn out, with the clown actively fighting back against them.
• Abnormal Limb Rotation Range: When Bill, Eddie, and Richie are trapped yet again in Neibolt House's kitchen, the refrigerator starts to rattle and opens to reveal Pennywise in the form of young Stanley, whose body parts look like they have been broken painfully before being hastily stuffed in the fridge.
• Adaptation Expansion: Mike in the book and 1990 miniseries is badly injured by Henry Bowers and is not involved in the final battle due to being in the hospital. Here, he is not injured, save for a mild arm sprain that Ben quickly patches up, and actually does fight IT at the climax of the movie. He is even the one in this version to pull out IT's heart.
• Adaptational Attractiveness: By the time he's back in Derry, Bill in the book has lost all his hair and is said to be much homelier than the cute teen he used to be. In the film, he's played by James McAvoy who has a full head of hair and, although he is dressed down slightly, still looks better than his book counterpart.
• Adaptational Badass: Adrian Mellon in the book is genuinely intimidated by his attackers when they get serious and takes off the hat while begging to be left alone. Here, he's Defiant to the End, even insulting his attackers with his last words. The actor, who himself is also gay, pushed for his character to show some LGBT pride rather than fear in the face of harassment.
  • Pennywise himself, at least in the final battle. In previous iterations, his final form was easily knocked over and beaten to death by the losers, even if they were motivated by him killing Eddie. Here, he actually forces them on the run multiple times, survives being impaled on a huge spike, and it takes them exploitting his Weaksauce Weakness to get him small enough for them to rip his heart out.
• Adaptational Sexuality: It's revealed that Richie is secretly gay, and that he's in love with Eddie (who never learns of this).
• Adapted Out:
  • Understandably, many minor characters were cut from the adaptation. But notably and thankfully, IT hasn't laid any eggs in this continuity.
  • There's a minor subplot where after Beverly walks out on Tom, she goes to her friend Kay first. Tom later tracks Kay down and beats her up to get Beverly's whereabouts. With Tom's role reduced, Kay is removed from the film completely.
  • The Guard, John Koontz, who works at the asylum taking care of Henry Bowers, has a fear of Doberman Pinschers, and is eventually mauled to death by It, who transforms into an enormous Doberman while helping Henry escape. The film removes this subplot and simply has him confront Henry when the latter already knifed one of his colleagues, and both his fate and name remain unrevealed.
• Affectionate Nickname: The rest of the Losers call Richie "Trashmouth". Easy to see how he got that nickname.
• A God Am I: Paired with Badass Boast, Pennywise invokes this in the final fight, in order to scare the Losers. Yet it doesn't work - them having finally realized how to defeat IT.
• Alien Blood: As in the first film, Pennywise's blood is black and floats upwards instead of simply dripping down.
• All Women Love Shoes: It's only shown in one scene, but adult Beverly has a closet filled with them. It's implied, however, that it's only because she is a successful fashion designer who would need a lot of good shoes for numerous events. Indeed, she is shown to skip over all of them when she packs for her return to Derry, opting for a sensible pair of sneakers instead.
• Amusement Park of Doom: Not the whole place, per se, but it's where Adrian Mellon catches the gang's attention in the first act of the film, and is the setting for Dean's death.
• Anachronism Stew: During Richie's flashback to 1989, a cabinet for Mortal Kombat (1992) is visible even though that game didn't debut until 1992.
• And Show It to You: Mike pulls IT's heart out of its chest and crushes it.
• Anger Born of Worry: Bill accidentally snaps at Eddie after the latter freezes up and fails to hand him a kitchen knife when IT attacks Richie in Neibolt House's kitchen. When Eddie tearfully tells him not to be mad at him, Bill is immediately remorseful.
• Animalistic Abomination: A flashback that shows IT terrorizing the ancient Native American population of Derry depicts IT transforming into a massive spider with multiple yellow eyes as well as a huge bird-like monster. For the Final Battle, IT assumes the form of a monstrous-sized arachnid with Pennywise's upper half attached to it. IT's Pomeranian form looks very cute and adorable at first glance, until it suddenly morphs into a hideous and fanged snarling monstrosity.
• Anxiety Dreams: Due to having been exposed to the Deadlights as a child, Beverly has these growing up. They stop once they finally defeat IT for good.
• Anyone Can Die: Two of the seven main characters from Chapter One are killed, one within the first half hour.
• Ascended Extra: The kid on the skateboard. In the book, Bill gives him a quarter to ride his skateboard, then chickens out; he sees him one more time after they kill Pennywise and tells him everything is okay now. In the film, he's a child named Dean who encounters the Losers in the restaurant and has moved into Bill's childhood home, and he's killed by Pennywise rubbing Bill's failure to protect either him or Georgie in his face.
• Attending Your Own Funeral: IT attempts to unnerve Richie as an adult by having Adrian's rotting corpse hand him a flyer for his own funeral.
• Avengers Assemble: Blended with Gondor Calls for Aid. Almost everyone had moved on and forgotten their encounter with IT back in 1989, but when Mike calls the group, they all knew they had to return.
• Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: The Losers - Eddie and Richie, in particular - may bicker and call each other out on their bullshit, even in adulthood, but it's pretty obvious that they're Fire-Forged Friends who are completely willing to die for one another. True Companions, indeed.
• Ax-Crazy: Henry Bowers was already pretty psychopathic as a child. Years of being locked in a mental hospital and influenced by IT has driven him off the deep end, and by the time we see him as an adult, it's pretty clear that there's more than a couple of loose screws in his brain.
• Bad Samaritan: After Adrian Mellon is beaten and thrown into a river, IT saves him from drowning, only to viciously bite into his flesh while his horrified lover watches.
• Bait-and-Switch: When we are introduced to Ben's business, we see an overweight man resembling the younger Ben pitching a new building to the investors. We are then introduced to the real Ben, who looks completely different from his childhood self, speaking to this man and the investors on a video chat. For bonus points, the overweight man is played by Brandon Crane, who played young Ben in the miniseries.
• Bath Suicide: Stanley is driven to this.
• Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Early in the film, Beverly takes a pretty vicious beating from her husband, which results in nothing more than a barely visible small bruise on her cheek and one on her wrist. However, she does get Covered in Gunge as much as the guys are.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Before the climactic battle, Richie hopes that Pennywise's true form is a Pomeranian. Guess what he and Eddie come face-to-face with later on.
• Belligerent Sexual Tension: With The Reveal that Richie was in love with Eddie, their Vitriolic Best Buds relationship takes on shades of this trope as well.
• Betty and Veronica: Just like the Trope Namer, redheaded Beverly is the Archie for blonde Ben (Betty) and brunette Bill (Veronica). However, unlike most depictions of this trope, the movie doesn't really place much emphasis on this, seeing as Bill stays married to Audra.
• Bickering Couple, Peaceful Couple: Richie and Eddie are a platonic and one-sided version of the former, Ben and Beverly are the latter.
• The Big Damn Kiss: Ben and Beverly share a lovely underwater one after they defeat Pennywise.
• Big "NO!": Bill does this repeatedly when Pennywise impales Eddie in the finale. In an Inverted Trope, despite having been in love with him for most of his life, Richie is much too shocked to say anything, only mumbling Eddie's name repeatedly in a soft whisper.
• Bittersweet Ending: Pennywise is dead for good (along with Henry) and his evil has been vanquished from Derry, but Eddie dies in the process of killing him, to Richie's grief, and Stanley killed himself in order to ensure that their plan works. Even more bitter is that Eddie had no idea that Richie had feelings for him due to already being married and since he's dead, he never will. Also, Adrian, Victoria and Dean were killed by Pennywise adding three more people to his (presumably high) body count and Bill and Richie will still have to cope with losing Georgie and Eddie respectively. Ben and Beverly end up together (which Bill accepts), Mike moves on with his life and leaves town, Bill becomes a better writer, and everyone finds success and happiness now that the threat of IT is no longer hanging over them. Unlike in the book, the Losers remember each other after splitting ways, and it's implied that they'll still be friends.
• Blank White Eyes: Happens when one is caught in the Deadlights.
• Bleed 'Em and Weep: Richie throws up after killing Henry Bowers.
• Blind Without 'Em: Implied with Richie. At the end, when the remaining Losers go for a swim in the quarry and they give Richie a Cooldown Hug after his breakdown over Eddie's death, he mentions being touched by the gesture but doesn't know who exactly is hugging him, seeing as he had dropped his glasses in the water.
• Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Less pronounced in adulthood, but still obvious with Ben, Bill, and Beverly.
• Blood Bath: Pennywise gives Beverly one.
• Blood from the Mouth: Happens to Eddie twice: when Bowers stabs him in the cheek, and when IT impales him fatally during the battle.
• Bloodier and Gorier: The body count here is only a tad bit bigger than the first movie, but the deaths are way messier and rarely use Gory Discretion Shot.
• Bloody Horror: The entire film uses this quite liberally.
  • IT uses Adrian Mellon's blood to paint a message for Mike underneath the town bridge.
  • Pennywise murders Dean, the little boy Bill had been trying to protect the entire film, by biting his head so hard, blood explodes all over the glass wall separating him and Bill.
  • IT also traps Beverly in a bathroom rapidly filling with blood.
• Body Horror: One of the many forms IT takes is young Stanley's decapitated and decomposing head. As if that wasn't enough, the head then sprouts claws from various holes, and begins attacking the Losers.
• Book Ends: One of the first things the Losers all did together as a group was cliff jumping. The first thing they do after the battle is the same thing.
• Break Them by Talking: Pennywise does this to Ben, both as a child and as an adult.
• Brick Joke:
  • In the first film, Bill and Richie come across the infamous Not Scary/Scary/Very Scary doors in the Neibolt house. Behind the Not Scary Door, they find Betty Ripsom's upper torso, having been cut in half at the waist. In Chapter 2, Richie and Eddie find the same doors. Behind the Very Scary door, they find Betty Ripsom's legs, minus her torso.
  • Related to the above, Richie jokes hopefully that IT's true form is a harmless, little Pomeranian. One appears behind the Not Scary door, but is far from harmless.
  • In the first film, Richie freaks out when a missing child poster of him is found in the Neibolt house, with the same day's date written on it. In this film, one of the ways IT torments the now adult Richie is by having a reanimated corpse (Adrian Mellon's corpse, to boot) hand him a flyer for his own funeral.
  • In the beginning of the movie, Adrian insults one of the bullies by comparing his hair to Meg Ryan. Later on in the movie, when Richie goes to the abandoned movie theater, there is a poster of the Meg Ryan movie You've Got Mail in the background.
• Bring My Brown Pants: Richie, as a child, after being chased and scared half out of his mind by Pennywise in the form of the giant Paul Bunyan statue in the middle of the park.
  Richie: I think I just shit my pants. (faints)
• Broken Pedestal: Played for Laughs. After IT ruins the Losers' dinner with all sorts of horrible illusions, a boy named Dean walks aup to Richie and quotes "the fun is just beginning" from his show. Richie, not recognizing a line from his own show, thinks that this is another one of IT's games and starts spewing profanity and threats. When he realizes his mistake and asks Dean if he wants a picture, Dean calmly says "I think I'm good."
• Buried Alive: How Pennywise tries to kill Ben in the finale. Thankfully, Bev is able to save him before he's smothered.
• Bury Your Gays: Adrian still dies as in the book, but Richie is also gay in this continuity, allowing at least one LGBT character to be alive at the end.
• But Not Too Gay: The movie has received some criticism for this, despite giving Richie Adaptational Sexuality and canonizing the subtext between him and Eddie present in the book. It's never stated outright that Richie is gay and his feelings for Eddie are only revealed right at the very end, once Eddie is already dead and there's no hope for them to end up together. The movie also cuts a lot of the more overtly tender moments they share in the book - most notably Eddie caressing Richie's face and Richie kissing his cheek after he dies - with the result that The Reveal can come out of nowhere for those that weren't already paying close attention to the relationship. Admittedly, it's a horror movie with six main character arcs to juggle, but the difference when compared to the Ben/Beverly storyline is stark.
• Call-Back:
  • Immediately after Stan's suicide, the scene cuts to Beverly waking from a nightmare with blood dripping on her face, echoing the water splashing on Bill's drawing of her in Chapter One.
  • Pennywise taunting them just after the ritual of Chud.
  "Tell them why it didn't work, Mike. Tell them it's all a... what's the word, Eds? Gazebo?"
• Camp Gay: Adrian Mellon plays the trope quite straightly, pun not intended.
• The Cast Show Off: Bill Hader is known for his spot-on impressions, and he gets to show off at least two (Jabba the Hutt and Pennywise) in the film.
• Catapult Nightmare: Beverly's first scene is this.
• Celebrity Paradox: There is a reference to "Here's Johnny!" from The Shining, a movie based on another of Stephen King's novels... despite King himself playing a shop owner that Bill gets Silver.
• Character Tics:
  • Even in adulthood, Richie has a habit of adjusting his glasses.
  • Adult Beverly smokes whenever she is scared or stressed.
  • Bill's stutter comes back as an adult to show that he is starting to remember Derry.
  • The more scared Eddie gets, the faster and higher his voice becomes as well. He also has a habit of waving his hands about in front of his face to emphasize his points.
  • As a child, Mike had a habit of clutching his left arm with his right.
• Check, Please!: Richie, to the waitress at the Chinese restaurant.
  Waitress: (walks in on Mike smashing the table) Is everything alright?
  (the Losers pause, having realized that the monsters were figments of their imagination)
  Richie: We'll take the check. (awkward smile)
• Chekhov's Gun: When the Losers first go into the library, the camera lingers on a tomahawk in a display case. In a later scene, that tomahawk gets put to use to kill Henry.
• Child Eater: Pennywise eats people, primarily children.
• Childhood Friend Romance:
  • Subverted with Bill and Beverly. The two dated for sometime after defeating IT for the first time, but went on their separate ways after leaving Derry. As adults, the two are married to different people and, barring one kiss, never become a couple again.
  • Ben remembers his love for Beverly, but not vice versa. Upon regaining her memories, however, she returns his feelings and the two become a couple in the end.
  • Tragically averted with Richie and Eddie, as Eddie dies without ever learning of Richie's feelings for him.
• Cigarette of Anxiety: Beverly lights one whenever she is scared or stressed (e.g.after finding out about Stanley's death.).
• Clap Your Hands If You Believe: The way to defeat Pennywise is to bind him with belief, to force him to take a vulnerable shape and kill him there. Mike's attempt to use the Ritual of Chüd revolves around this, giving the Losers something to make them believe that they can defeat IT, though this specific tactic fails. Eddie wounds Pennywise by believing that Bev's fence-post spear can kill monsters, just like she said it would. It works, though at the cost of angering Pennywise, which results in his death.
• Clipped-Wing Angel: When Pennywise assumes a monstrous spider-like form, the group realizes that he is forced to take on the form of what they think he is. They proceed to mock him with insults, which gradually withers him down into a helpless child-like clown form, where they are able to remove his heart and kill him for good.
• Closet Gay: The ending reveals that Richie has been gay the entire time and was in love with Ed, whom he unfortunately never told before Ed's death.
• Cluster F-Bomb: The Losers, both as kids and adults, are prone to this.
• Collapsing Lair: The house on 29 Neibolt Street completely collapses upon itself after Pennywise dies.
• Combat Tentacles: Pennywise has these in his final giant half-spider form.
• Composite Character: A variation, but IT here assumes the form of Patrick Hockstetter when freeing Henry, instead of Vic and Belch as in the book. Justified in that Pennywise killed Patrick, but not Vic and Belch in this continuity.
• Compressed Adaptation: Considering the source material is a 1000+ page book.
• Conditioned to Accept Horror: When a skateboard wheels itself down the stairs and the blood on it starts to float upwards, Beverly asks if they should run, to which Bill remarks that he's Seen It All by now.
  Beverly: Should we start running?
  Bill: No, this is Derry, I'm actually starting to get used to it.
• Cool Car: Both Richie and Eddie have pretty sweet rides as adults, highlighting their success. Belch's blue Trans Am also makes another appearance.
• Cooldown Hug: The Losers give Richie one when he has a breakdown over Eddie's death.
• Crazy Jealous Guy: Tom Rogan is this to Beverly.
• Creator Cameo:
  • Stephen King is the owner of the antique shop where Bill finds Silver.
  • Director Andy Muschietti also briefly cameos as a customer browsing the shelves of the pharmacy behind Eddie.
• Creepy Blue Eyes: Pennywise, when he tries to lure Victoria in to eat her. It works.
• Creepy Children Singing: Used to a horrifying degree in the film's soundtrack.
• Crush Blush: Meta-example: Ben's adult actor, Jay Ryan, tried to invoke this all throughout the film, having noticed that Jeremy Ray Taylor (Young Ben) could do this on cue in the first film whenever Beverly was around.
• Curse Cut Short:
  • Richie's awesome rant about Pennywise is cut short when IT traps him in the Deadlights.
    Richie: Yipee-ki-yay, mother- (goes limp as the Deadlights hit him)
  • Not a curse, but a racist comment Henry makes towards Mike is cut short when Richie axes him in the head.
• Cute Is Evil: The Pomeranian form IT takes to mess with Richie and Eddie.
• Cuteness Proximity: As mentioned above, Richie and Eddie both forget that the Pomeranian in front of them isn't actually an innocent puppy when it obeys their command to sit. Eddie takes it further by cooing over it, calling it a "good boy" repeatedly the way one would talk to an adorable pet.
• Darker and Edgier: While the original film wasn't exactly light-hearted, the sequel is much darker and meaner, focusing more on gore and the grotesque. That being said, a criticism leveled against it by critics is that it is less scary, with fewer moments played overtly for horror, and the story itself is more focused on the characters than the scares. There is also a massive amount of Black Comedy.
• Dead-Hand Shot: Stan gets a bloody one.
• Death by Adaptation: Minor example. Beverly's mother is said to have committed suicide while her daughter was still a child. In the book she did not, though she died of cancer before Beverly returned home.
• Death by Disfigurement: On top of his lifelong asthma, Eddie gets by far the worst injury (being stabbed in the face by a knife) before the climactic battle with Pennywise, in which he is the only casualty.
• Death of a Child: Both Dean and Victoria are shown getting killed by Pennywise.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: The arcade scene during Richie's flashback shows that he was only being friendly with Henry's cousin but is shunned instead when Henry's cousin accuses him of being a "fairy", a homophobic slur towards homosexual men.
• Denser and Wackier: This movie is much less of an overt horror movie than the first, with even more jokes and a lot of Black Comedy. Even some moments that would otherwise be horrifying are Played for Laughs.
• Description Cut:
  • An adult Bill, after re-buying his childhood bike, Silver, mentions to the owner of the antique store that it could "outrun the Devil." The music builds dramatically... and then cuts to Bill awkwardly pedaling his rusted-out bike that looks like it could fall apart any second.
  • Ben says he has one bit of good news: that he convinced Richie to stay. Cut to Richie bailing out the back entrance with a Precision F-Strike.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: The Losers kill IT the Eldritch Abomination by reducing IT to a quivering pathetic mess, ripping out IT's heart, and crushing the heart with their bare hands.
• Demoted to Extra: Audra (Bill’s wife) and Tom (Bev’s abusive husband) only appear in the opening scenes and do not head to Derry as in the book.
• Died in Your Arms Tonight: Subverted. It seems as though this is going to be the case as in the book, with Richie staying with a dying Eddie, but then he leaves to assist the others in delivering the killing blow to IT. By the time he returns, Eddie is already dead, and a heartbroken Richie is left cradling his corpse.
• Dies Wide Open: Eddie.
• Dirty Coward:
  • Subverted with Stan, who seems to have committed suicide rather than come back and fight IT again, but the ending reveals that he knew that he wouldn't be able to overcome his fear and that would have doomed the Loser's Club, and him killing himself was meant as a Heroic Sacrifice to give them a fighting chance.
  • Played straight with Pennywise, who is exactly the same cowardly bully at heart as he was in the first movie, only being his vicious self when he has the advantage, but turns into a pathetic baby-thing when the Losers essentially roast him.
• Divided for Adaptation: This is the second of two movies covering different cycles of the fight against IT, adapted from a single novel that incorporated both stories.
• Domestic Abuse: As an adult, Beverly is married to a man who might as well be a dead ringer for her father, physically and verbally abusing her when she does not bow to his wishes.
• Do Not Taunt Cthulhu: In the climax Richie starts throwing rocks and trash talking Pennywise... and gets cut off mid-sentence with a blast of the Deadlights.
• Don't Celebrate Just Yet: Eddie is completely ecstatic when he manages to land a direct hit on Pennywise in the finale. Too bad this means his back is turned, and he doesn't see the giant Combat Tentacle headed his way, resulting in his death.
• Double Tap: Ben does this multiple times to IT in the form of Stanley's severed head with a kitchen knife.
• Dramatic Irony: During the flashback scene in the beginning. Stan asks what he looks like when he's older.
• Dreaming of Things to Come: Beverly mentions seeing how all the adult Losers will die if they don't defeat IT this cycle. Averted, after Pennywise dies and they finally get the peace they deserve.
• Driven to Suicide: In addition to this becoming Stan's fate after he gets the call from Mike, it's revealed that Beverly's mother killed herself while Bev was still a child.
• *Drool* Hello: Happens during the fight with Stan's head. Richie goes to check on Eddie after the thing briefly disappears, and a long string of drool slowly drops down from the ceiling between them.
  Richie: (looking up) Oh, there he is.
• Drowning Pit: During the climax, Beverly is trapped in a bathroom stall that rapidly fills with blood as she's tormented by her childhood bullies and abusers.
• Dull Surprise: Upon seeing Mike smash the table, the waitress in the Chinese restaurant calmly asks him if everything is all right.
• Dying Alone: Ben's worst fear. Happens to Eddie.
• Dying Declaration of Love: Ben invokes this at the end, when he and Beverly are separated by Pennywise's traps - Bev in a bathroom rapidly filling with blood; and Ben slowly being buried alive in the Losers' childhood clubhouse. It's especially touching, seeing as he uses his final moments to comfort her, to show her that she isn't alone; and that even if she dies, she will die loved by him. Instead, The Power of Love saves them both.
• Eldritch Location: The place in Derry where Pennywise touched down on Earth, at the bottom of a preexisting cavern, connected to a network of caves. Droplets of black liquid float upwards from the almost organic-looking spikes protrtuding from the floor, and when Pennywise descends to the point of impact in the form of the deadlights, the cavern walls warp as they pass into the appearance of a fanged gullet — reminiscent of Pennywise's throat — that undulates like the lights are being swallowed down.
• Epilogue Letter: The film ends with one, as each surviving Losers Club member reads a copy of a note left by Stan before his suicide.
• Establishing Character Moment: The adult Losers all get one of these as the audience is reintroduced to their characters.
• Extremely Short Timespan: Disregarding the extensive flashbacks, the majority of the present day story is over the course of about three days (counting the prologue and epilogue, possibly a week). The Losers gather in Derry for dinner one night and have their final confrontation with IT the following evening.
• Evil Is Bigger: The final form Pennywise takes is that of a humongous spider that visibly towers over all the Losers.
• Evil Old Folks: The adult Beverly Marsh returns to her childhood home and encounters a seemingly kind old woman named Mrs. Kersh, who begins acting increasingly disturbing before revealing herself to be IT in disguise.
• Falling into His Arms: While searching the forest for their old clubhouse, Beverly trips over a root and Bill promptly catches her.
  Beverly: *laughs softly*
  Bill: What?
  Beverly: Nothing. It's just... you haven't changed.
• Fan Disservice: The audience is treated to several long, loving shots of Ben's chiseled abs... as Pennywise graphically carves the words HOME AT LAST into his stomach.
• The Fellowship Has Ended: After defeating IT for good, the Losers Club part ways, but unlike in the book, they retain their memories and promise to keep in touch.
• Fiery Redhead: In her adult years, Beverly, unless provoked, is a subdued version of this trope. Pennywise, however, is more of an Evil Redhead.
• The Film of the Book: The second part, specifically.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Twice over. Most of the group had forgotten their first encounter with IT, and had moved on with their lives. But when Mike calls them back, despite not fully understanding the reasons why they feel so much dread, they respond to the call. Rather notably, for everyone the caller ID from Mike showed the same Maine phone number, but when Mike calls Bill in the epilogue Caller ID showed Mike's name this time.
• First Love: Beverly is this to both Ben and Bill. Also Eddie to Richie.
• Flaming Hair: When Pennywise impersonates Beverly to taunt Ben, he sets her hair on fire, as a not-so-subtle jab at the poem Ben had written for Beverly.
  Pennywise: (impersonating Beverly) YOUR HAIR IS WINTER FIRE, JANUARY EMBERS, MY HEART BURNS THERE, TOO!!!
• Forced to Watch: Pennywise is a fan of this, seeing how IT does this three times throughout the entire film: the first time, IT waits until Adrian Mellon's boyfriend is watching before he kills the man, the second time IT murders a small child in front of Bill while they're in a hall of mirrors, and the last time being impaling Eddie with one of its Combat Tentacles right in front of the Losers, much to their horror.
• Foreshadowing:
  • The opening scene with Adrian Mellon foreshadows what later happens to Eddie; both are attacked by human bullies (the homophobic teens and Henry Bowers) before being brutally murdered by Pennywise while the man that loves them is forced to watch. Adrian is even shown reaching for his inhaler during the initial assault, and his comment about one of his attackers' hairstyles is echoed by Eddie mocking Henry's mullet.
  • Just before answering Mike's phone call, Stan is shown assembling a jigsaw puzzle, and being unable to complete it due to missing the final piece. This foreshadows his suicide a few minutes later, making him the Losers Club's "Missing Piece."
  • Richie gushing over how hot Ben is and ribbing Eddie about his marriage during the reunion dinner subtly foreshadows The Reveal that Richie is gay and in love with Eddie.
  • Mike's explanation of having to steal the artifact that would be the can for the sealing that is the Ritual of Chüd makes more sense at the climax where it's revealed that the ritual doesn't work and that the last group of people who tried it were all killed. Makes sense that the natives wouldn't want anyone else trying to perform it.
  • An elderly Mr. Keene (almost certainly IT assuming a disguise) pinches Eddie's cheek and rudely teases him that the "cancer" could be removed. Not long after, the escaped Henry Bowers stabs Eddie in the same spot.
  • Pennywise essentially gives Bill the artifact (the paper boat he made with Georgie) he supposedly needs to complete the Ritual to destroy IT. Later, it's revealed that the Ritual of Chüd is useless, and that all the prior events in the movie were part of Pennywise's plan to lure the Losers into its lair so he could kill them all at once.
  • Something that actually occurred in It: Chapter One that applies here. After the Losers made their blood pact to return to Derry if IT comes back, the first two to leave are Stan and Eddie, both of whom are the main casualties in this movie.
  • Right before Stan commits suicide, he says, "I swear, Bill", remembering the pact that the Losers made to return to Derry if IT were to come back. It's revealed at the end that Stan killed himself so he would be with the Losers in spirit, as he was too afraid to face Pennywise in person and thought this would give the rest of the Losers the best chance of success.
  • During the flashback scene of the Losers' Club hanging out in their hideout, Stan gives them all shower caps to prevent spiders from crawling into their hair, which Richie finds it ridiculous as nobody should be afraid of spiders (only to be proven wrong when he sees everyone else putting on those shower caps). Later, one of IT's forms is the head of child Stan with hairy spider legs that attacks the adult Losers at Neibolt House. And during Final Battle, IT assumes the form of a Giant Spider with Pennywise's head, which the Losers could only defeat by treating IT as something to not be afraid of.
• Gang of Bullies: A pack of homophobic teens attack a gay couple in the opening.
• Giant Spider: Downplayed. Pennywise transforms into a huge-sized version of himself with the lower half of a spider for a more personal confrontation with the Losers, but played straight in the flashback which shows IT as a gargantuan spider with lots of yellow eyes haunting Derry in ancient times.
• Gilligan Cut: Ben is relieved when he tells Beverly that he at least got Richie to stay. Cut to Richie carrying his suitcase and escaping from the townhouse.
• Glowing Eyes of Doom: When Pennywise's eyes revert to their haunting gold instead of the Innocent Blue Eyes he uses to lure people in, start running.
• Go-Karting with Bowser: When Richie meets Pennywise for the first time in 27 years, the latter jokingly suggests they should play Street Fighter.
• Good Is Not Soft: The Losers are a bunch of clever, kind, funny, and loving individuals. Try hurting one of their own, and you'll understand why this Badass Crew gave Pennywise - an actual Eldritch Abomination - the beating of IT's life before they even reached puberty.
• Good Smoking, Evil Smoking: Beverly smokes in order to calm her nerves from any Pennywise related news, and is very much on the side of good.
• Grand Finale: As the Tag Line says: “IT ENDS”.
• Groin Attack: Henry gives one to Mike in the library in order to incapacitate him.
• Group Hug: Like in the first film, the Losers give one to a grieving member. This time, it's Richie and not Bill on the receiving end.
• Growing Up Sucks: What Stan's Bar Mitzvah speech basically consists of. The ceremony anticlimactically ends when Stan utters a Precision F-Strike, followed by getting out of the room.
• Guilt Complex: Even as an adult, Bill still has one, due to The Reveal that he had faked being sick on the day Georgie died, therefore leading him to believe that had he been there, he could've rescued his baby brother. This leads to Bill being quite protective of Dean, a young boy who resembles Georgie very much, and tries to prevent his death as much as he can. He fails.
• Hairstyle Inertia:
  • As adults Richie, Stan, and Eddie all have very similar hairstyles to the ones they sported as children. Beverly's has grown out a little but still resembles her shorter hairstyle from 1989.
  • Eddie mocks the adult Henry Bowers for still sporting a mullet.
  • Greta still has the same curly side ponytail that she did as a child.
• Has a Type: Bill certainly seems to have a thing for blue-eyed redheads with short hair, if Beverly and Audra, his wife are anything to go by.
• Hate Sink: IT aka Pennywise the Dancing Clown is still just as vile as he was 27 years ago. After awakening from hibernation, IT pretends to save a gay man from drowning only to devour his heart in front of his boyfriend. IT kills a young girl after promising to remove her embarrassing birthmark, and — to further taunt Bill over his inability to save Georgie — makes him relive it by killing another boy in front of him.
• Haunted House: Neibolt House.
• Headbutt of Love: Mike and Bill share a platonic one after the end of the battle with Pennywise.
• Heroic BSoD:
  • Mike briefly enters one when Pennywise reveals that the Ritual of Chüd is completely useless and the Losers are most likely going to die at IT's hand.
  • Eddie freezes up when Richie is attacked by Stan's head.
  • Richie also undergoes one after Eddie is killed by IT and the group is forced to leave his body behind in order to escape Pennywise's lair after IT's death. It's revealed that Richie had feelings for Eddie, so he naturally took his death the hardest.
• Heroic Suicide: Unlike in the book, Stan claims his suicide is this, as he felt his absence would be necessary to ensure the Losers presented a united front against Pennywise.
• His Heart Will Go On: A male on male version, seeing as Richie was in love with Eddie in this adaptation.
• Helpless Window Death: Bill tries to save a young boy from Pennywise in a hall of mirrors, but though Bill technically finds him first, they're on opposite sides of the glass. He ultimately fails as Pennywise gets on the kid's side first and chomps down on his head, splattering the other side of the mirror with blood.
• Homophobic Hate Crime: Three homophobic young thugs beat up a couple gay men then toss one from a bridge in the opener.
• Hopeless Suitor: Ben believes himself to be this to Beverly. Thankfully, he's wrong.
• Hope Spot:
  • Bill learns that the young boy who they met in the restaurant actually lives in his old house and hears Pennywise talking to him in the bathtub. He later realizes that IT is going to find the boy at the fairground's clown attraction. Bill catches up to the boy in the Hall of Mirrors to save him, only to slam face first into a glass wall that separates him from the kid. Despite Bill's best efforts, Pennywise manages to get to the kid first, and Bill is Forced to Watch as the boy's head literally explodes from the force of Pennywise chomping into him.
  • Pennywise is briefly disabled after Eddie throws the spear into IT's throat, and he excitedly tells Richie he thinks he's killed IT. Then he gets skewered from behind by one of IT's Combat Tentacles.
• House Fire: How Mike's parents died. IT taunts him repeatedly about this.
• Hunk: Adult Ben. Richie compares him to three Brazilian soccer players rolled up into one. We later get a look at his abs when IT carves "HOME AT LAST" on his abdomen (though this qualifies more of Fan Disservice, given how much pain Ben seems to be).
• I Banged Your Mom: Eddie's final words to Richie, as a Callback to their childhood insults for one another.
• I Didn't Tell You Because You'd Be Unhappy: Mike lies to the rest of the Losers about the efficiency of the Ritual, knowing fully well that if he told them the truth about the natives, none of them would even bother returning to Derry anymore.
• Imagination-Based Superpower: How the Losers manage to get IT in a weak enough form that they are able to rip out IT's heart with ease.
• I'm Not Afraid of You: Richie does this to Dean when he mistakes the child for one of IT's many disguises, complete with a lot of foul cursing and shoulder-shaking.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Eddie gets impaled by Pennywise's sharp spider talons during the climax.
• I Need a Freaking Drink: The Losers after their disastrous dinner at the Chinese restaurant. Upon arriving at the townhouse, Bev heads to the bar right away and begins pouring herself a drink. The boys follow suit not long after.
• Inelegant Blubbering: Pennywise is reduced to this after they make IT believe that IT is small and weak.
• Innocent Blue Eyes: Dean, the child Bill grows somewhat attached to, has these.
• In-Series Nickname: Most of the Losers still call each other by their childhood nicknames throughout the film.
  • Mike is frequently called "Mikey", most often by Bill.
  • All of the boys call Beverly "Bev".
  • Eddie is "Eds".
  • Richie is "Trashmouth".
  • Mike calls Stan "Stan the Man" during their phone call.
• Insult of Endearment: Richie's constant teasing towards the others is this. Eddie in particular is often singled out, which was probably Richie's way of getting his attention, due to having feelings for Eddie.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: Despite having loved Beverly since they were kids, Ben never corrects her when she assumes that the postcard poem serving as her token was from Bill, especially when he sees how happy she is. It's then played straight when Bill steps aside and stays with his wife Audra, allowing Ben and Beverly to be together.
• Karma Houdini:
  • Unlike the book, where they are all sent to prison, there is absolutely no indication that Adrian Mellon's murderers are punished in any way after fleeing. Unfortunately in the book, it is implied that the older ones remain free as their case is tied up in legal proceedings. The only one to feel any remorse is the younger boy who moves away from Derry and IT's influence.
  • Besides getting clubbed with a vase and Beverly leaving him, Tom Rogan gets away with his physical and sexual abuse towards Beverly in this adaptation.
• Kid Hero All Grown-Up: All of the Losers.
• Killed Mid-Sentence: Henry and Eddie.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: Most of the Losers don't directly recall their battle with IT as kids, but immediately find themselves panicking and feeling immense fear when Mike calls them to regroup. Mike explains they can't remember because they left Derry, but because he stayed he remembers more, if not everything. Their memory of what happened slowly returns the longer they stay in town.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Bill's various books, and subsequent movie adaptations, are repeatedly said to have horrible endings. This not only reflects frequent complaints about Stephen King's novels in general, but also leaning into this specific source material and having an ending that has been described as "unfilmable."
• Leave the Two Lovebirds Alone: When Bill sees that Ben and Bev have disappeared underwater, he smiles instead of feeling sad over Beverly not choosing him, and gives the two some much-needed privacy.
• Leeroy Jenkins: After being Forced to Watch Pennywise devour Dean, Bill heads straight to the Neibolt house intending to take on IT himself until the other Losers join him.
• Lesser of Two Evils: When confronted with one of IT's Combat Tentacles and the Not Scary At All/Scary/Very Scary doors, Richie and Eddie take their chances with the latter.
• Let's Split Up, Gang!: Mike tasks the Losers Club to split up and find their relics by themselves. Being the Wrong Genre Savvy, Eddie and Richie protest that it's a bad idea, but Mike tells them that they don't have much time and have to start working on the ritual by night.
• Light Is Not Good: A relevant plot detail, as more than any other adaptation it is stressed how the deadlights are IT's true form and how the Losers must "turn light into dark" though this fails.
• Like Brother and Sister: Beverly with all the male Losers bar Bill and Ben, and vice-versa.
• Like Parent, Like Spouse: Bev and Eddie both married a carbon copy of their abusive parent.
• Load-Bearing Boss: After Pennywise's demise, his lair, the cistern, and the house on Neibolt Street collapse and implode into the ground.
• Logo Joke: The deadlights circle around the rusty Warner Bros. Pictures and New Line Cinema logos, with the same creepy children laughing and singing as the last time.
• Lonely at the Top: Almost all of the adult Losers are shown to be extremely financially successful but utterly miserable in their personal lives.
  • Bill is a successful horror writer with several movie adaptations, but it's widely agreed that his endings suck and his marriage appears to be strained (he asks why she can't be what he wants, she replies "fuck you," he backspaces and says he meant for the movie; this implies a long history of arguments about who has what roles in their marriage).
  • Beverly is a fashion designer living in a beautiful house, but she's still trapped in the same cycle of abuse as her childhood and is married to a man who beats and rapes her. Adding insult to injury, thanks to being the only one of the group who was exposed to the Deadlights, she is plagued by nightmares every time she sleeps.
  • Ben is implied to be the most successful of the whole group but is utterly lonely despite his money and good looks. He has yet to marry, seeing as the woman he loves — Beverly — is married to someone else.
  • Eddie is a risk analyst with a fancy car who married a carbon copy of his overbearing mother (played by the same actress, even!) and remains as neurotic and angry as ever.
  • Richie is a famous comedian who can't write his own jokes and is still deeply closeted at the age of forty.
  • Downplayed with Mike, who became Derry's librarian and in general having little-no-issues with his private life, though he did have to postpone his dream of moving to Florida, dedicating his life to find a way to defeat IT instead. Though it's implied he's about two steps away from being seen as "the town crazy."
  • The one clear aversion is Stan, who seems to have been both Happily Married and reasonably well-off which only serves to make his eventual suicide all the more tragic.
• Lonely Rich Kid: Lonely rich adult paired with Lonely Bachelor Pad, in Ben's case. His unrequited love with Beverly initially stays unrequited, seeing as how she is married to someone else and only remembers her crush on Bill among her memories in Derry. Dying alone is outright stated to be one of his worst fears.
• The Lost Lenore: Eddie to Richie, when the former gets killed by Pennywise.
• Lovable Coward: Eddie, very much so.
• Love Confession: Ben does this for the second time for Beverly, along with Dying Declaration of Love.
• Love Letter:
  • In a platonic way, Stan's letter for the remaining Losers. He assures them that his suicide was very much his final act of love for all of them, and that he truly believes that they can defeat Pennywise, even with him only being there in spirit.
  • Played Straight with Ben's iconic postcard poem for Beverly. Reciting it together proves to be the way for Ben and Beverly to survive Pennywise's death traps.
• Love Triangle: A minor one with Ben, Beverly, and Bill forming the triad. Unlike most examples, this never ruins their friendship, and it is extremely obvious that the three of them respect each other very much, to the point that Bill calmly accepts Ben and Beverly getting together by the end, giving his best friends a fond smile instead.
• Man Hug: The adult Losers are quite fond of doing this to one another, especially after reuniting once more.
  • During the Chinese restaurant scene, Bill is the first to arrive, and the minute Mike spots him, he grins widely and pulls Bill into a particularly tight one. Although Bill is confused, due to not remembering who Mike is exactly, he hugs Mike back. Later on, after the fight with Pennywise, he is the one to initiate a hug with Mike, and even gives him a platonic Headbutt of Love.
  • Richie and Ben share one after seeing each other for the first time in twenty-seven years in front of the Chinese restaurant.
  • In a more tragic version of this trope, Richie hugs Eddie's corpse lovingly after the battle with IT, stroking Eddie's hair and firmly disbelieving that the love of his life is dead.
• Manly Tears: Richie sheds this in the end for Eddie. Watching him break down, Bill and the other boys look pretty close as well.
• Man of a Thousand Voices: One of Richie's abilities.
  • He mimics Jabba the Hutt in the Chinese restaurant, albeit as an insult because of the character's resemblance to Eddie's mother.
  • He also does a pretty passable impression of Pennywise in the Losers' childhood clubhouse, enough so that the others are quite freaked until he reveals himself.
• Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: Played straight with Ben and Beverly in childhood but averted in adulthood, seeing as how Beverly is a Broken Bird who works in the fashion industry, while Ben is a Hunk who works as an architect.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Eddie's fence-post spear glows green right before he conjures up enough belief to impale and injure Pennywise with it. A Shout-Out to Maturin the Turtle, perhaps? Or simply the light in the cavern turning the metal green?
• Meet Cute: When Beverly and Ben see each other again in front of the Chinese restaurant, Ben greets her with "You gonna let me by, or is there a password?" It also serves as a Callback to the first time they ever spoke to each other on their school's steps.
• Memento MacGuffin: Part of the plot behind the Ritual of Chüd is for the Losers Club to gather these.
• Mind-Control Eyes: When people are caught in the Deadlights, their eyes turn completely white and their jaws go slack.
• Mirror Scare: When grown-up Henry attacks Eddie in his bathroom. Also plenty occour in the Funhouse scene.
• The Mirror Shows Your True Self: While exploring Neibolt, Ben suddenly collapses to the ground in pain, with words seemingly being carved into his skin by nothing. When he, Bev, and Mike look into the mirror opposite them, it reveals Pennywise to be behind them, doing the carving with an expression that clearly relays how much he's enjoying the deed. Realizing that Pennywise only shows up in the mirror, she opts to destroy the mirror with a fence-post spear, which reveals that the whole thing is a hallucination.
• MockGuffin: The above items and the ritual turn out to be of little use in stopping IT, but they do allow the Losers to regain their memories.
• Monster Clown: Pennywise definitely picks up the slack after his twenty-seven year hibernation, feeding off the fear of and killing children while also gunning after the Losers' Club as revenge for defeating him in 1989. His final form amplifies this by virtue of being a giant version of his clown facade combined with a Giant Spider.
• Mood Whiplash: Quite a bit of it.
  • The Losers' reunion dinner is largely a mixture of hilarity and heartwarming as the True Companions reunite. This switches to horror when the Misfortune Cookies come out. Which bounces back to comedy when the waitress walks into a perfectly normal room to see Mike smashing a table screaming "It's not real!"
  • Right after fighting off Henry Bowers' attempt to kill him, Eddie cracks a joke about how he should cut his horribly outdated mullet while slinking away.
    Eddie: You should cut that fucking mullet. It's been, like, thirty years, man.
  • In the middle of the dramatic final confrontation with Pennywise, a mortally wounded Eddie's last words to Richie are "I fucked your mom".
  • When Eddie is struggling with the diseased leper form IT takes, IT vomits all over him while five seconds of "Angel in the Morning" plays.
  • After killing Pennywise for real, the Losers happily reminisce about Stan and Eddie until Richie suddenly breaks down crying, causing the others to join together in a Group Hug.
• Mundanger: Adrian Mellon's attackers aren't directly shown or even implied to be under IT's influence when they brutalize and throw him off a bridge.
• Motor Mouth: Eddie, even in adulthood. It's especially obvious whenever he's scared, anxious, or nervous. Considering how stressful of a situation he's in, you can expect most of the scenes involving him invoking this trope.
• Mythology Gag:
  • An attraction at the amusement park has clown-pendulums that resemble Tim Curry's Pennywise.
  • Pennywise once again impersonates Bev and says "Kiss me, fat boy!" to Ben.
  • Bill and Mike's vision of It's arrival shows him first taking the form of a giant bird, which was how IT appeared to Mike in the novel.
  • The "root" used to cause the visions in the first place is referred to by the natives as "holy maturin". Maturin is the name later given to the Turtle in The Dark Tower.
  • The running gag of Bill's books having terrible endings is a likely a joke about Stephen King's books not always having good endings. (Indeed, King himself mentions Bill's terrible endings during his cameo.)
  • Stan is introduced completing a jigsaw puzzle of a painting depicting several birds, alluding to his interest in them in the book and miniseries.
  • One of the fortune cookie abominations is a tentacled eye that crawls after Richie, reminiscent of a form IT assumed that terrified his book counterpart.
  • The scene where Ben goes to his old school shows a turtle on the desk. This is a clear reference to Maturin who in the book helped the Losers fight against IT. The metal spike that Eddie throws at Pennywise glows green, and once IT is killed a green light casts into IT's collapsing lair, possibly suggesting Maturin's presence.
  • While Bev is trapped in the bathroom stall, Pennywise, in the form of young Henry Bowers, shouts "Here's Johnny!" through the slightly open door.
  • In the book, Eddie dies after IT tears his arm off. In this film, a vengeful Richie angrily tears off one of the depowered monster's arms after it mortally impales Eddie.
  • During the epilogue, we see Bill working on his new book. The words on the page are lifted verbatim from the novel.
  • In Audra's only scene, we see that she has a similar hairstyle to Beverly as an adult, and she takes offense when Bill asks her why she can't be "the woman I want you to be" (although he is referring to her character in the film). This references that in the book Audra is something of a Replacement Goldfish for Beverly.
  • Before the final battle, IT takes the form of a young Stanley's decapitated head and morphs into a creature straight from The Thing (1982), which itself is a reference to IT taking the form of movie monsters in the book.
• Near-Death Experience: All the Losers experience this at least once in the hours leading up to the climactic fight with Pennywise.
  • Bev is almost drowned by Mrs. Kersh in the sewers.
  • Bill is almost dragged into the storm drain by the many-handed apparition that IT takes to taunt him about Georgie.
  • Eddie is stabbed in the cheek by a deranged Henry Bowers and is bleeding heavily by the time Ben and Bev find him.
  • Richie comes face-to-face with IT itself in the park.
  • Ben has the words 'HOME AT LAST' carved into his stomach and almost has his throat slashed by Pennywise, though the wounds disappear the minute Beverly smashes the mirror.
  • Mike is nearly stabbed by Henry Bowers in the library before Richie saves him.
• Nerd Glasses: Richie sports a pair throughout his life.
• Nerdy Inhaler: Eddie has one as a child. Even after it's proven that most of his medicines are placebos, adult Eddie still has an inhaler for his token, and even uses it repeatedly after he panics several times.
• Never Got to Say Goodbye: By the time the Losers return to Eddie's side after defeating IT, Eddie has died.
• Never Recycle a Building: When Bev goes back to her old apartment, she is able to retrieve her totem from behind the baseboard in her old room. After being attacked by IT in its "Mrs. Kersh" form, she escapes out to the street. Turning back, she sees that the whole building is now a dilapidated old mess, with all the windows boarded up.
• Nice Jewish Boy: Stan, definitely.
• Not Afraid of You Anymore: The Losers in the climactic fight when they start throwing back their worst fears in IT's face, making him out to be nothing more but a big bully.
• Not His Sled:
  • The Ritual of Chüd is nothing more than ancient superstition in this continuity. The first natives that tried it were killed by IT almost immediately.
  • Henry Bower's escape from the mental institute, bent on killing the Losers under IT's command, seems to set up Mike being critically injured and is thus unable to join the rest of the Losers to confront IT in its lair just like in the novel. While Henry did get close to achieve that, Richie is able to kill him before he could do any lasting injuries to Mike, thus allowing Mike to join his friends to personally defeat IT once and for all.
• Nothing Is Scarier: The fact that we never find out what's behind the door between "Very Scary" and "Not Scary At All" leaves it up to your interpretation on what kind of twisted thing Pennywise had hiding in there.
• Oblivious to Love:
  • For some reason, Bev can't seem to see all the loving looks Ben throws her way. She wises up by the end of the film.
  • In a more tragic example of the trope, Eddie never seemed to catch on that Richie had been in love with him since childhood.
• Old-Timey Bathing Suit: In a more lighthearted scene between Ben and Bev, Beverly makes fun of the boys for swimming in their briefs when they were kids. Ben sheepishly asks her if she can leave that memory in the past.
• One of the Boys: Beverly, even in adulthood. Justified in that the film has an incredibly short time span.
• The One That Got Away:
  • Beverly is this to Bill, who is married to an actress. Upon returning to Derry, the two share a kiss but she ends up with Ben at the end, with Bill deciding to go back to his wife.
  • In a more painful version of this trope, Eddie is this to Richie.
• One True Love: Beverly is this to Ben. Unknown to her, he is this to her as well, as her memory of discovering Ben's authorship of the love letter was muddled after she left Derry, causing her to believe that Bill wrote it instead. Rediscovering the memory leads them to hook up.
• One-Winged Angel: IT's preferred form for battle is a Giant Spider, but with Pennywise's upper body and legs that can also function as tentacles/lamprey eels. In the vision that Bill has after being drugged by Mike, IT is shown assuming a spider-like form without the clown upper-half.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: When IT mortally impales Eddie with one of IT's Combat Tentacles, Richie is visibly stunned into silence and cannot seem to speak. Later, he rips off the same arm angrily without so much as a wisecrack. When the Losers are reminiscing about Eddie after the final battle, Richie is the only one not smiling or joking.
• Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: Averted. Jay Ryan's and James McAvoy's accents barely slip throughout the entire film.
• Overly-Long Tongue: Whenever IT is in IT's Leper form.
• Performance Anxiety: Due to finding out that Pennywise has returned, Richie vomits before his show and is shown to be quite unsettled all throughout.
• Plucky Comic Relief: Richie and Eddie are this throughout the film, thanks to their Snark-to-Snark Combat interactions.
• Posthumous Character: Stanley killed himself shortly after being asked to return to Derry, but he still carries a presence after his death as the Losers recall fond memories of their friend. He sent everyone a letter they only received after they confronted and defeated IT, explaining he knew his death was needed to bring everyone else together.
• The Power of Love: How Ben and Beverly overcome the death traps Pennywise has put them in.
• Pragmatic Adaptation:
  • Eddie's death is changed from getting his arm ripped off to getting impaled from behind, possibly to avoid potential Narm.
  • In IT's final form, it still has Pennywise's head instead of becoming a complete Giant Spider to allow for a more personal confrontation between IT and the Losers.
• Precious Photo: It's revealed at the end that the bookmark Mike uses for his journal is a strip of photos the Losers took when they were younger.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner: Pennywise uses his iconic one during the final fight.
  "Time to float!"
• Pre Ass Kicking One Liner: Eddie has one in the final fight against Pennywise, right before he saves Richie from the Deadlights.
  Eddie: (hurling the fence post at IT) BEEP-BEEP, MOTHERFUCKER!
• Profane Last Words: I fucked your mom.
• Psychotic Smirk: Henry Bowers and Pennywise.
• Puppy-Dog Eyes:
  • Adult Ben is a master of this, especially when it's directed at Beverly.
  • Eddie does this quite well, too, especially whenever he's upset or scared.
• Putting the Band Back Together: Mike gathers the Losers Club for one final showdown with Pennywise the moment he discovers that IT has returned.
• Rasputinian Death: An innocent gay man, Adrian Mellon, is brutally beaten up by homophobes, unable to reach his inhaler, which is kicked away by them, and thrown over the bridge into a river, where he almost drowns, until Pennywise saves him, only to viciously bite his heart out of his chest while his horrified lover watches. All of that happens in about three minutes and it is said to be one of the most disturbing scenes in the entire film.
• Redemption in the Rain: Once Beverly decides to leave her abusive husband and return to Derry, she walks down the streets as it rains a lot.
• Relationship Upgrade: By the end of the film, Ben and Beverly have finally rekindled their childhood romance, and are shown living together happily.
• Reunion Kiss: Bill and Beverly share one, despite both of them being married. However, it doesn't lead to anything.
• Returning the Wedding Ring: After escaping her abusive husband, Beverly leaves her wedding ring on the front porch.
• The Reveal:
  • A minor one but Bill, during his battle with IT, sees an illusion IT created wherein Georgie blames Bill for his death because he lied about being sick that fateful day. Bill admits he did lie about being sick which is the big reason he blamed himself so much about Georgie's death.
  • Richie is gay and was secretly in love with Eddie.
  • The Ritual of Chüd doesn't work, and the last people who tried it were killed by IT. Mike knew all of this, and essentially recruited the Losers for a Suicide Mission, in the desperate hope that they might succeed where the natives failed.
• Rising Water, Rising Tension: Pennywise's death trap for Bev. Instead of water, however, it's blood.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Even though Pennywise was going to emerge again due to his hibernation being over, he's especially nasty once he learns the Losers, the only non-supernatural beings able to resist his influence and actually go on the offensive against him, have also returned.
  • After watching Pennywise kill Dean right in front of him in the funhouse, Bill is seriously pissed off and intends to go on a one man rampage. Luckily for him, the rest of the Losers arrive at the 29 Neibolt Street house and stop Bill before he goes on a (very likely) suicide mission to kill Pennywise.
  • A minor one, but after IT impales Eddie and is subsequently de-powered, Richie makes sure to rip the exact same arm off and practically hurls it in Pennywise's face, all while wearing a furious expression.
• Room Full of Crazy: Mike converted the library attic into both his living space and where he catalogs the entire history of IT. Since the other characters fully acknowledge that IT exists, it's not seen as all that strange to them, but it's implied that Mike is not viewed well by the town's other inhabitants.
• Running Gag: Bill hearing that his books have terrible endings.
• Running into the Window: More like a bunch of glass mirrors inside the funhouse, but the effect on Bill is otherwise the same. Played for Drama when he keeps running into them, and can't save Dean in time.
• Sacrificial Lamb: Stanley Uris kills himself before the Losers Club even return to Derry.
• Sacrificial Lion: Unlike Stanley's, Eddie's death in the third act is this, as a reminder that the Losers Club are not invincible and motivating them to continue the fight.
• Sanity Has Advantages: During Henry's first attack on the Losers, he's noticeably confused about what happened to Eddie when the latter hides behind a shower curtain. This gives Eddie time to pull the knife out of his cheek and stab Henry with it.
• Say My Name:
  • Eddie mutters Richie's name softly when he is mortally wounded by IT.
  • Ben screams Beverly's name repeatedly when he thinks he's about to die, using his last moments to declare his love with the poem he'd written for her when they were children.
  • The other Losers repeatedly yell Mike's name after the latter enters a Heroic BSoD right before the fight with Pennywise. Bill saves him at at the absolute last second, just before he is almost impaled by Pennywise.
    Pennywise: TIME TO FLOAT!
    Mike: (staring blankly) I'm so sorry, you guys.
    Bill: Mike! MIKEY! Time to move, Mikey! (shoves him out of harm's way)
• Scare Chord: Benjamin Wallfisch's score incorporates a lot of this.
• Scars Are Forever:
  • The slashes on the Losers' palms from when they made their Blood Oath haven't faded, even in adulthood.
  • Subverted at the end when the scars disappear after they defeat IT once and for all.
  • Ben still has the 'H' scar from when Henry Bowers tried to carve his name onto his stomach. Averted when Pennywise carves "HOME AT LAST" onto his stomach. After Beverly destroys the mirror showing the clown, the scar disappears.
• Scenery Dissonance: A downplayed example because the scenery still comes across as a bit surreal and unsettling but Pennywise scares Richie in a bright and sunny park.
• Schoolyard Bully All Grown Up:
  • Henry Bowers has gone unhinged since he was arrested after his father's death and had to spend 27 years in a mental hospital. He initiates an escape to Derry to resume terrorizing the Losers Club.
  • Downplayed with Greta Keene, who is still a condescending individual but non-threatening.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Most of the Losers do not fully remember their original fight with IT, and mostly responded to Mike's call as a bunch of old friends getting back together. But the longer they are in Derry, the more they remember, and when IT starts messing with them again, it really doesn't settle well with any of them. Eddie and Richie in particular come extremely close to actually leaving, while Ben and Bev also express interest in the idea. Bill is the only one who doesn't think about bolting, although he has his reservations.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: The Losers attempt to do this to IT with the Ritual. It doesn't work and they end up having to put him down for good.
• Security Cling:
  • Even as adults, Eddie still has a tendency to hang onto Richie whenever he gets scared.
  • Ben also holds onto Eddie when IT attacks them in the restaurant, though it's more of a protective gesture.
• Self-Deprecation: Stephen King's cameo where he tells Bill he did not like the ending of his book is a meta joke about King and the criticism he sometimes gets over his book endings.
• Setting Update: 27 years have passed since they defeated IT at the end of the previous movie, just as in all previous versions, meaning the setting update of the previous film means the equivalent update happens here as well.
• The Shadow Knows: In Ben's flashback to when the Losers split up as children, he's sitting in a classroom with a projector light shining behind him when Pennywise's silhouette suddenly appears on the screen. He wheels around only to see Beverly... or rather, Pennywise impersonating Beverly.
• Shapeshifter Mode Lock: The Losers do this to IT in the finale, making him believe that he is small, and therefore weak enough for them to attack.
• She's All Grown Up: Ben, known for being short and Formerly Fat, ends up being the tallest and most muscular of the adult Losers, with Richie even describing him as "three Brazilian soccer players rolled into one." Deconstructed when Pennywise's taunts reveal that Ben worked hard to achieve his present looks, as his ultimate fears included afraid of dying alone and being unloved.
• Shout-Out: Several in fact, such as:
  • One of Pennywise's many forms that appear in the movie (Stanley's rotting head with numerous spider-like legs) is very similar to The Thing's human head form from The Thing (1982). As a bonus, this also references actor Richard Masur, who played adult Stan in the miniseries and Clark in The Thing (1982). The reference is made explicit with this line from Richie:
    Richie: You gotta be fucking kidding!
  • Pennywise performs a not-so-subtle reference of "Here's Johnny!" to Beverly in the climax.
  • The finale, including skipping destroying the town in favour of the house collapsing, is a Shout-Out to Carrie (1976).
  • So is the aforementioned scene with Beverly, who looks a lot like Carrie at the prom after almost drowning in blood.
  • The reading of the letter by each of the cast in turn is reminiscent of The Breakfast Club.
• Ship Tease: Richie and Eddie have a lot of these. Upon The Reveal that Richie was gay and in love with Eddie, re-watching the first film and seeing all their moments together becomes this as well.
• Shoo Out the Clowns: Richie and Eddie provide a lot of the comic relief in both movies through their banter and bickering. Then Eddie dies during the climax, and Richie stops being quite so funny.
• Shut Up, Kirk!: During the final battle, Richie throws rocks at Pennywise, then starts verbally laying into him. Almost immediately Pennywise traps him in his Deadlights form mid-taunt.
  Richie: You wanna play Truth or Dare? Okay, here's a truth: you're a sloppy bitch! Yeah, that's right, let's dance! Yipee-ki-yay, mother- (immediately gets assaulted by the Deadlights)
• Shutting Up Now: After scaring the Losers with his surprisingly spot-on Pennywise impression and being reprimanded by Eddie, Richie does this.
  Eddie: Are you gonna be like this the entire time we're home?
  Richie: (beat) Alright. Just trying to add some levity to this shit. I'll go fuck myself.
• Sickening "Crunch!": There are multiple squelching sounds when Pennywise tosses Eddie about after impaling him mortally.
• Single Tear: Beverly does this multiple times throughout the film. She does it upon finding out that Stanley has killed himself, and right before they crush Pennywise's heart.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Beverly is drawn to both Ben and Bill, who are both inherently good people.
• Slasher Smile: Pennywise is constantly sporting one of these, especially when he's about to kill someone.
• The Smurfette Principle: Beverly is the only girl in the Losers' Club.
• Snark-to-Snark Combat: Richie and Eddie's perpetual dynamic.
• Spanner in the Works: Eddie. After he's impaled in the chest and slowly dying, he starts to comment on how weak The Leper felt when he tried to fight back with him in the pharmacy basement. Though he seems to be trying to stay positive by talking up his bravery, it helps the others start to piece together clues they can use to kill Pennywise for good.
• Spared by the Adaptation:
  • The town of Derry itself manages to survive the final battle instead of being destroyed in a flood, with only the 29 Neibolt Street house serving as a casualty.
  • To a lesser extent, Tom Rogan, since he has only has one scene and does not follow Bev to Derry like he did in the book.
  • To an even lesser extent, Mike manages to avoid getting hospitalized by Henry Bowers like he did in the book and miniseries, and is even involved in the final battle with IT/Pennywise.
  • Greta Keene's book counterpart was killed in a car crash at the age of eighteen. Here, she's still alive and working in her father's pharmacy to the present day.
• Speech Impediment: Bill's stutter comes back when he starts to remember the summer of 1989.
• Spider People: IT's final form is half-giant spider, half-Monster Clown.
• Spikes of Doom: IT's Combat Tentacles are appropriately sharp, and one of them leads to Eddie's death.
• Splatter Horror: Eddie's blood splatters onto Richie when IT impales him from behind.
• Spoiler Cover: A minor example, but BluRay covert art for the film clearly shows that only six adult Losers make it back to Derry. Even someone unfamiliar with the source novel could probably work out that Stan dies very early on as a result.
• Strong Family Resemblance: Beverly's mother is shown to have looked just like her, partly explaining why her father lusts after her.
• Subverted Catchphrase: When attempting to drown Beverly, It shouts "Time to SINK!" instead of its usual, more infamous catchphrase of "Time to float!".
• Supernatural Gold Eyes: Pennywise has these.
• Sweetie Graffiti: In a flashback, a young Richie is shown carving his affections for someone into the kissing bridge, though we don't see who the other initial belongs to. At the end of the movie, adult Richie goes back to re-etch it and we get the whole thing: R + E, for Richie + Eddie.
• Symbolic Baptism: The first thing the Losers do after killing IT for good is going to the quarry and jumping into the river below, to clean themselves literally and spiritually.
• Talking the Monster to Death: How the Losers defeat Pennywise, taunting Pennywise and invoking Not Afraid of You Anymore to weaken him to the point that they can crush his heart.
• Tall, Dark, and Handsome: Ben Hanscom as an adult.
• Tall, Dark, and Snarky: Richie Tozier, seeing as how he became a comedian as an adult.
• Tampering with Food and Drink: Mike conveys the history of Pennywise's relationship with the local Native American tribe and the Ritual of Chüd by slipping a microdose of the hallucinogenic root they gave him into a glass of water Bill asked for.
• Team Mom: Eddie, thanks to his Properly Paranoid tendencies. The Losers themselves lampshade this in the finale, when they reminisce about him after his death.
  Ben: He would've loved this.
  Bill: What, splashing around in dirty water?
  Beverly: Yeah, but he would've made us laugh. He'd be looking out for us.
  Bill: (sadly, but fondly) He always was.
• Tearful Smile: Richie does one of these after re-carving the R+E etching he'd left on the Kissing Bridge twenty-seven years ago.
• Teens Are Monsters: The movie begins with a group of homophobic teenage thugs insulting a happy gay couple minding their own business, then moments later beating them up. They eventually throw one of them off a bridge into a creek, allowing him to get captured and killed by Pennywise. Henry's gang are varying levels of this also, though Henry is by far the worst.
• Thanatos Gambit: It's revealed that Stanley realized that the Losers' Club have to be reunited to defeat It, but he was too afraid to come back to Derry. So, by committing suicide, he takes himself off the board, making him 'not count' thus he didn't have to be there for the others to succeed..
• This Is Gonna Suck: Eddie and Ben's reaction when they suspect that Mike and Bev are going to confirm that yes, they're going to need to go back to Neibolt House to kill IT.
  Eddie: Oh, we're not gonna like this, are we?
  Ben: (sigh)...fuck.
• Time-Shifted Actor: The Losers are adults 27 years later, and portrayed by adult actors accordingly. To show off Separated-at-Birth-Casting, there are a number of Match Cuts to highlight it. Eddie even gets a literal, direct overlay.
• Tragic Bromance: Eddie and Richie. In Richie's case, it's actually straight-up romance, seeing as how he loves Eddie romantically.
• Trailers Always Spoil: The teaser trailer contains a scene that plays near the end of the movie, namely when the surviving Losers Club see a reflection of their younger selves in a building's glass. For those who didn't read the book or watch the miniseries, it also kind of spoils who is dead by the end: Stanley's and Eddie's adult selves are not present.
• Underwater Kiss: Ben and Beverly kiss in the quarry at the end while looking for Richie's glasses.
• Unrequited Love Lasts Forever: Two cases:
  • Ben never got over his childhood crush on Bev, and despite his adulthood success and good looks, he's completely lonely. She eventually reciprocates.
  • Richie loves Eddie since they were boys and still carries a torch for him. This is a tragic example as not only is Eddie by all accounts straight, he dies before ever learning about Richie's feelings.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: As in their childhood, Eddie and Richie as adults constantly rib each other but clearly care for one another. Richie is absolutely heartbroken when Eddie dies, and has to be physically held back and restrained to stop him from going back for Eddie’s body when Neibolt collapses.
• Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Twice with Richie. Once after receiving Mike’s call (with the added bonus of the camera being right under the flow) and again after killing Henry Bowers. Pennywise gets one himself as the Leper and vomits on Eddie as a power move when Eddie nearly strangles It to death.
• Walking Spoiler: Stanley Uris' suicide happens not even thirty minutes into the film.
• Wedding Ring Removal: Beverly does this after she leaves Tom Rogan behind.
• What Happened to the Mouse?:
  • Beverly's abusive husband is never seen again after she escapes him. This is especially weird considering that she starts a relationship with Ben at the end of the movie, so she needs to divorce him at some point, though the film makes a point to show her leaving her wedding ring before going back to Derry. In the book, Bev's husband actually follows her to Derry, where he is killed by Pennywise.
  • The gang that attacked Adrian Mellon also just disappears. Despite being set up as a threat much similar to Henry Bowers' gang, they just flee the scene and are not shown to have faced any comeuppance.
  • For that matter, Adrian's partner also just disappears. Despite possibly being the only other adult character to see IT, he never shows up again or is even questioned by Mike.
  • Though it's revealed in the Deleted Scenes for It Chapter One that Henry did indeed kill Victor and Belch, no mention is made of them in the last part of the theatrical release. They also appear in flashbacks in Chapter Two, but unless you've seen the Chapter One Deleted Scenes, it's unclear what might have happened to them.
• What the Hell, Hero?: The Losers give Mike this treatment after he admits he scratched out the part on the artifact that showed the native tribesmen who attempted the Ritual of Chüd were all horribly killed because it didn't work. He explains that the natives failed because they still doubted that IT could be defeated, and he was hoping the Losers would succeed where they failed.
• Where It All Began: Derry, Maine, obviously.
• Would Hit a Girl: Pennywise. He harms Victoria and repeatedly establishes that he doesn't really care how banged-up Beverly gets, just as long as he can eat her in the end.
• Would Hurt a Child: Pennywise — who the previous film establishes likes to eat children — corners a little boy in a glass maze and tauntingly prepares to eat him in front of Bill, who's stuck behind a glass wall and powerless to stop Pennywise when the Monster Clown stops goofing around, bares his fangs, and starts smashing through the glass to get to the kid. Bill doesn't save him in time.
• X Called; They Want Their Y Back: How Adrian Mellon insults his attackers at the beginning of the film.
  Adrian Mellon: Meg Ryan called. She wants her wig back.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Richie gives a speech like this to Eddie when he's freaking out in the sewers, which ends in this almost word-for-word.
  Richie: Who killed a psychotic clown before he was fourteen?
  Eddie: Me.
  Richie: Who stabbed Bowers with a knife he pulled out of his own face?
  Eddie: Also me.
  Richie: Who married a woman ten times his own body mass?
  Eddie: ...Me.
  • Ultimately it ends up being a bit of a tragic zigzag, though: Richie's pep talk is implied to be at least partly the reason Eddie is able to overcome his fear and confront It when Richie's life is in danger, succeeding but getting himself fatally injured in the process. Considering that Richie's unspoken love for Eddie is the reason why he's so quick to build up his self-esteem in the first place, it's an absolutely brutal outcome.
• You Are Not Alone: Beverly reminds Bill of this fact when he attempts to launch a One-Man Army on Pennywise out of anger for killing Dean.
• You Can't Fight Fate: Upon remembering that Pennywise only emerges every 27 years, Richie suggests just waiting another few decades and dealing with IT then. He's reminded by Eddie that they'd be in their seventies by that point, while Beverly says that, in her visions, they'll all be dead anyway before another twenty years pass if they don't end the fight now.
• Your Head A-Splode: How Pennywise kills Dean.
• Your Mind Makes It Real: Once the Losers realize that belief binds IT, they set about calling IT demeaning names, which results in Pennywise shrinking smaller and smaller, until they can tear IT's heart out.
• Zombie Puke Attack: The rotting Leper form Pennywise takes to scare Eddie does this in order to get away after Eddie almost strangles it to death.

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"And don't ever forget... we're Losers. And we always will be."

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