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Indisputably the best thing on this website. I tip my hat to you, good sir-and-or-madam. I don't even mind that it's now full of orange jelly, slowly dripping down my face, and into my collar, and... hnh. That's how good this series is. ;)

-Lemony

So It: Chapter One did a good enough job of getting my mom emotionally invested in the main characters that she was willing to come see Chapter Two, despite the fact that she isn’t exactly a consumer of horror media. Most impressive! But I can’t believe it’s already been twenty-seven years . . .

Warnings
Spoilers: It the novel, It the 1990 miniseries, It: Chapter One and It: Chapter Two
Content: Not Safe for FourMoonsWatching to read. Warning for general warning for violence and maybe gore, I don’t think I really need to go too in depth about specifics, but mileage may very about how in depth “too in depth” is, so. A warning just in case. Also, a warning for discussion of bullying and its inevitable development into abusive behaviors, as well as discussion of suicide and the reasons behind it. Finally, warning for mentions of homophobic violence.

So I’m inevitably drawn to nitpick over all the details, but listing every difference between the new pair of films and their predecessors wouldn’t be very fun to read, and also start muscling in on YouTube’s territory. There are a couple of changes I do want to talk about in more detail, though. First, the Ritual of Chüd, which I very much thought was not going to be referenced in the film at all. In the novel, the ritual is a very abstract thing, where a human gets launched out into the Macroverse to fight It in a battle of wits. This film instead portrayed the ritual as gathering physical objects and burning them to seal It away inside of an . . . ancient Native American lampshade, basically. While I normally hate Hollywood’s tendency to dumb down plots to simplify things for the audience (Prince Caspian film, anyone?), in this case I actually agree with the change. It would be really difficult to adapt the novel’s Ritual into a visual medium. I also liked the subversion of how Native American culture and practices are often portrayed as “magical” in a lot of U.S. media. In this case, the Ritual of Chüd failed hard with deadly consequences for those ancient Native Americans; they weren’t any more equipped to handle a being like Pennywise than anyone else. (And total side note, I was hoping to see Its giant bird transformation, as that was my favorite form in the novel. We didn’t get it full CGI, but at least the bird appears in the weird sketch-animated fever dream. Makes sense that the ancient Native Americans would see It as more natural-looking forms as well, since clowns are from Europe-based cultures.)

Another change I liked was making Richie gay. The theme of homophobia that got introduced here in Ch. 2 was present in the novel, but not among the main protagonists. There’s a metaphorical element of Its nature where Its cycles of violence are only representational of the systemic injustice societies inflict against their minorities, and the blind eye the town turns on all the weird violence represents how biases allow such injustice to continue without being addressed. Pennywise’s massacres are self-inflicted by Derry on itself; the clown is only a face put on the town’s problems, and the apathy to solve those problems. Since a lot of this information was delivered through narration in the novel, it again would have been difficult to get it across in the movie. Making Richie a part of the same minority group that sees the film’s first on-screen victim (of both a traditional hate crime and It) ties the audience closer to those suffering in the town. It also adds a further element of tragedy to Eddie’s death. It felt a little arbitrary in the novel that the Loser’s Club sees one suicide, one hospitalization, and one direct death at Pennywise’s jaws. Having a closer emotional tie to one of the other Losers makes the loss of Eddie more meaningful and painful.

One change I was not on-board for was the idea that the Losers had been “infected” by . . . something . . . when encountering It in the 80s, and that it would eventually end up killing them all if they didn’t put the clown down for good this time. Aside from contradicting the novel, where Pennywise pulled cosmic strings to give the Losers who left Derry prosperous, comfortable lives to entice them not to return, this rather diminishes the bravery of the characters. With this revelation, they’re all obligated to stay, rather than choosing to stay to prevent further murders. The movie also contradicts itself a bit here regarding Stanley’s suicide. The suicide scene itself actually faked me out for a moment, with Stan reaffirming his promise to Bill to return and help fight It. I would have been completely down with all seven Losers returning! But the next shot is of the slit wrists. This at least could have been explained by the supposed infection making Stan’s body work against him unconsciously. However, at the end of the movie, the other Losers receive a suicide note where Stan admits that he chose to kill himself in order to break the power their unity gave them over It, hoping that would discourage his friends from risking their lives. These three plot threads just don’t fit together well at all, and it seems clear that everything would have been a lot smoother if at least one had been removed. It feels like multiple explanations for the suicide got drafted, and for some reason all of them were left in the final product.

Aside from being invested in the characters, the other facet of these films that Mom has latched onto is the theme of bullying. Stephen king is no fan of bullies, and a lot of his novels find a way to fit them in, even if no young “school-age” characters are present to do it in a traditional way. It is among his stories that employ the theme most strongly, and the people behind this film really put it to use. Pennywise heavily relies on bullying and teasing to torment his victims, to the point where a lot of his lines could be swapped with Henry’s without feeling out of character. This helps to strongly get across the earlier mentioned metaphor where Pennywise is only an imitation of what Derry’s residents do to each other. What Mom particularly appreciated, though, was the difference between the finales of Ch. 1 and Ch. 2. In the first film, the Losers’ Club tried to fight off their bully with physical violence, which failed to get rid of It; It returned right on schedule, business as usual. But in the second film, after more physical confrontation only serves to get Eddie killed, the remaining Losers turn to teasing the bully right back, insulting Its appearance and abilities, and as Mom was delighted to point out, literally belittling It until It shrunk down to baby size. The key to stopping Pennywise was to make It feel the same hurt It was making Its victims feel all those centuries.

—doctorlit, by contrast, goats down here

“For twenty-seven years, I’ve dreamt of spoilers. I craaaaved spoilers. I’ve missed spoilers!” “For twenty-seven years, I’ve dreamt of spoilers. I craaaaved spoilers. I’ve missed spoilers!”
“For twenty-seven years, I’ve dreamt of spoilers. I craaaaved spoilers. I’ve missed spoilers!”

Yep, doctorlit consumed a fiction again, so it's time for another thread for him to reply to probably once with his own review and maybe other people will tack stuff on as well? We'll see.

—doctorlit, gazing into the deadposts

Forme, it's Thud!, though I also like Jingo, Hogfather, and Nightwatch. That reminds me, I need to read through them again...

WHat a good love story! I cnaoht wait to se e the sMira and Edrward fall in love!! About time Eddcard openined up to some1!

with all the other things I might like to get up to.

Thanks for the pointers to more.

- Tomash

It took me a bit to get into it, though that might've just been the effects of partly reading on a plane, but I quite liked it.

(and I read Unseen Academicals way way back - the climax was glorious, I still remember)

- Tomash

Of all the ones I have read so far, I think Mort is my favourite.

Also Monstrous Regiment, Unseen Academicals, Going Postal, Making Money...

So far, I've only read up to Reaper Man, but it was a great read. I also enjoyed Sourcery.

The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents.

Less so Equal Rites and Wyrd Sisters, but the ones that come after are works of genius. My favourites are probably Lords And Ladies and Maskerade.

I've been intermittently reading Discworld over the last long while, and I'm curious which Prachett books people were particular fans of. If nothing else, it'll give me a sense of what to get next.

(I'll try and get my opinions together later so I can actually contribute to this thread, but for now I figured I'd start it.)

- Tomash

I'll try to message him to let him know there's a warning.

I recall that he mentioned having an anxiety disorder, so by the time he comes back, the warning may be bumped off the page and he might just make another topic without going back to this one. I don't know for sure.

What would be done if that's the case?

I luve the random capitalization for emphaziz and the parenthesis reealy clears things up!

Write more plz!!!

I want to know if Mweula (sounds spanish) turns Chinille good!

Crazy Minh

Following discussions and suggestions, this is a formal and final warning against your behaviour on this the PPC Posting Board.

You have broken or ignored Articles 2, 3 and 11 of the PPC Constitution and have questionably broken Article 21 of the same Constitution.

Following Article 12 of the Constitution, this is a final warning to detail to you that you have broken the Constitution on multiple occasions and a request for you to cease to do so lest any other measures need to be put into place.

Please take the time to read the Constitution fully. If you do not understand why this warning has been given to you, please speak up and we can and will talk. My email is clickable if you want to talk to me directly (please note that there may be some delay in me responding to an email as I am not the quickest to pick up new emails in that account).

Novastorme
On behalf of all who have commented in this thread and the above one agreeing that a warning should be put into place.

Yeah, I wasn't sure. But I think in the past the majority of people who bring this sort of thing up are PG's (I might be wrong given I'm going off of memory) so I thought I'd better check. I know PG's aren't mods I just didn't want to trip any unwritten rules I was unaware of.

Thanks. Like above this was mostly me just wanting to check (and also to record something at least semi-formally so that if (for whatever reason) something like this happens again, we've got proof of the warning).

I like the fourth wall humor in this installment, adds another layer to the whole setup. Also, mad props to the Doktor for convincing a married couple to join his harem XD

I luv the relationship and the chemistry and the descriptiveness like "soft bells spreading over buttered toast".

Write moar plz

... the 'whoever it is that should do this' is usually considered to be the person who brought it up. Permission Givers are solely responsible for Permission; we're not mods, and don't have any more authority over people's behaviour than anyone else.

I would say that at this point, 12 people wanting a warning is probably enough to just pass it, rather than making a third thread about this. I would also say that just putting a warning in here, or perhaps in reply to Minh's post that sparked this, would be sufficient for issuing it.

(I mean, you'd think that the fact that there's been a whole thread about it would be taken as a major warning, but people can miss things sometimes, so it's probably best to make it explicit.)

hS

Think I'll swap Larkus' desire to please people with Curff's intense curiosity.

So, starting with Curff, lacking that burning drive to understand things would change his history quite a bit. His need to understand his own powers became his obsession, and his failure to find an answer ground him down into the cynical, paranoid hermit he is today. Absent that quality, and with the added desire to please others, I could easily see him just staying with his tribe his whole life. That's kinda boring, though, so let's assume he still leaves. After all, he's still a sorcerer, he's still a bit dismissive of his people's traditions, and he probably still enjoys the intellectual challenge of magical academia.
So, off to the Ashen Hill. His added desire to please would mean he'd get along much better with the other students and teachers. With less focus on understanding his powers and a lot more on figuring out what he could do with them, maybe he'd become a teacher himself, even build a life for himself in the city near the school. After a time he might still become an adventurer, but this time he'd be in it for the stories and the teamwork. After retiring from adventuring he'd either return home to his tribe or stay in the city. Either way I have the adorable mental image of Curff making magical fireworks in the air to entertain small children stuck in my head and it's entirely your fault.

But yeah, if Curff even makes it to the PPC he'd be lacking much of the trauma of his life, and so a much kinder (if potentially less powerful) sorcerer more interested in experiencing the Multiverse than understanding it. Probably much less of a headache for his partner, too.

Now, over to Larkus. His desire to make people happy is a pretty integral part of his character, but I don't know if it changes his history as much as Curff. His added curiosity might bleed into some of his other passions like his love of the outdoors, but at the end of the day Larkus was born to be a cop. Fits his sense of duty, desire to protect people, and frankly, what other job might actually involve bar brawls outside of bouncer or bounty hunter?
So, off to the Academy it is. With a greater sense of curiosity and less focus on his social life he'd be a much more disciplined person, and a much better student, possibly earning a more prestigious posting out the gate. Things really start to change after that, though. Larkus is a smart fella, and more than dedicated enough to rise through the ranks, but his desire for a personal, on the ground connection to his community overrode his ambition, and his tendency to somewhat bend the rules did not endear him to the higher ups, so he never made it past Officer. With a more intellectual bent and less hijinks and community focus, he'd make detective for sure. Not entirely sure how that affects his service during the war, but he wouldn't be on the lower levels, which removes a pretty solid chunk of unresolved trauma. Of course that doesn't remove the even larger chunk of unresolved trauma that is Order 66, in fact it probably makes it worse since being a detective in the Temple District means he'd likely coordinate with Jedi on many more occasions.

So, assuming he again fell through a plothole instead of being shot as a traitor, he'd arrive a much less gregarious individual more focused on understanding the Multiverse and protecting the plot continuum, and quite possibly trying to lose himself in the work to avoid facing the realities of his entire life basically imploding. I mean he kinda does that anyway, just with more card games and alcohol, but in this version it's worse.

Huh. Just realized these two kinda flipped a little bit. Didn't see that one coming. This was a lot of fun, though. It was a fascinating character examination. Thanks muchly for posting it, Cal!

Also, please forgive any typos. Is very late at time of writing so at this point it's either post the darn thing or wait until tomorrow, which risks procrastination delaying it who knows how long.

...this time for anyone familiar with the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise:

5 Years of Missing Clone (https://www.fanfiction.net/s/5635966/1/5-Years-of-Missing-Clone)
Summary: 5 Years ago, Amy was kidnapped and cloned. The clone was sent to kill Sonic and Shadow. Real Amy escaped, killed Eggman, became a warrior godling, theif, and assassin. Where does love fit in? IDK what pairing. MY guess, ShadamySon...For now. LOL!

Severe Misery (https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9897679/1/Severe-Misery)
Summary: Sally Acorn and three of her friends are sorority girls with a hazing plan. Their initiation to their newest member is really a prank they won't want to forget. However, as the ritual goes on, things didn't turn out as they expected. Something malevolent is lurking around them and it can meet their demises.