Spooky clown scare me! Again!
That was fun; light viewing with entertaining visuals and some good laughs. The adult cast all did fine (honestly I don't think I remember the first one well enough to feel able to judge their similarity to their kid counterparts, but from the flashbacks they seemed pretty good).
I like how they all turned out psychologically effected by their childhoods, like the continuity is there and I could see myself at a reunion with them all being like "oh shit, yeah I'm not surprised that's what so-and-so ended up doing". Though most of them did turn out irritatingly wealthy.
I'm also glad that they're leaning into the goofiness because I never really found the first one scary (not a flex, I just think creepy clowns are best when they're not played straight). I wanted more of the dancing though, I really liked that shot. With the first one I couldn't tell if it was being intentionally funny, but a lot of the scary stuff in this one is more blatantly geared towards laughs, and I approve.
What I don't approve of is all the weird (native) American stuff, the pandering spiritual journey is at least a few decades old at this point, surely? I guess it fits with the 80s aesthetic though, and at least it turned out to be bull shit (also, I was just thinking about the Simpson's movie during that scene where he was tripping out).
I kind of wished the bully who came back and got stabbed would just immediately die, I have the vague notion that he played a bigger part in the show, and I'd have found him being a bit of a Boba Fett kind of funny. Oh yeah, and I liked him hanging out with his zombie buddies in their old car, it reminded me of that episode of Buffy that focused on Xander.
Scene-wise it was Highly structured, just like the first one. The protagonists split up, scary thing happens to each of them, they meet back up, and then they have a group scary thing. The big picture was predictable, but there were a good few little twists thrown in amongst that too so I forgive it.
Oh! And I liked the bit where Bill Hader was shown the lights and he just goes floppy. His body language was hilarious and I liked the bass and the cuts to the alien's vagina mouth thing. It reminded me of Annihilation, mainly, and I enjoyed (the sequence was just a few seconds long but it's one of the things I found memorable).
It Chapter Two: 43.0