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A review by miiasun
It by Stephen King
4.0
I'm not sure how I feel about It. At the same time I love it, but somehow it left me disappointed. I guess I loved the movie (the 2017 one, haven't seen the 1990 film) so much that I assumed I'd love the book as much, which I don't. I feel like this review is going to sound very contradictory, but that's how I feel, I guess.
At first I couldn't stop comparing the book with the movie. I got over that pretty quickly though, when it became blatantly apparent that the movie doesn't follow the book very strictly at all. In this case, I think that's a good thing; such a long book couldn't be fitted comfortably in two movies anyway. There were also some things I am infinitely glad didn't make it in the movie (the end of their trip to the sewers as kids, for example. Like what the hell was that? Completely unnecessary and disgusting on a whole other level, which is to say something, considering this is a horror book.) Also, Richie was borderline annoying with his Voices and weird jokes, which I was not expecting.
Almost all the other characters had been tweaked more or less for the movie too. I had grown so used to the way they were in the movie, so I felt like I had to get to know them all over again since they were whole different people in the book. A con of watching the movie for like 5 times since it came out, I guess, haha. But, eventually, I was able to read this as a book and not as an extension of the movie, as my mind apparently wanted it to be, and mostly I really enjoyed it.
Some have complained that this book is too long and stretched, but I didn't think so. I didn't get bored with all the ramblings of Derry's creepy history or the almost irrelevant snippets of horror happening to very minor characters, but I understand why someone could. After all, I did get bored with all the backstory in Cujo, so maybe I just got more into this story.
I don't know what else to say without accidentally spoiling anything. It was scary at times and touching at times and written in the typical style of Stephen King that I love. I adored the parts where the story was more about friendship and childhood shenanigans as much as I loved all the creepy stuff. The adult parts were also enjoyable, especially towards the end.
There's a river running through my home town and I caught myself one day imagining it as the canal from Derry. That's how immersed I was in this book. I can't wait for It: Chapter Two, to see how it turns out.
At first I couldn't stop comparing the book with the movie. I got over that pretty quickly though, when it became blatantly apparent that the movie doesn't follow the book very strictly at all. In this case, I think that's a good thing; such a long book couldn't be fitted comfortably in two movies anyway. There were also some things I am infinitely glad didn't make it in the movie (the end of their trip to the sewers as kids, for example. Like what the hell was that? Completely unnecessary and disgusting on a whole other level, which is to say something, considering this is a horror book.) Also, Richie was borderline annoying with his Voices and weird jokes, which I was not expecting.
Almost all the other characters had been tweaked more or less for the movie too. I had grown so used to the way they were in the movie, so I felt like I had to get to know them all over again since they were whole different people in the book. A con of watching the movie for like 5 times since it came out, I guess, haha. But, eventually, I was able to read this as a book and not as an extension of the movie, as my mind apparently wanted it to be, and mostly I really enjoyed it.
Some have complained that this book is too long and stretched, but I didn't think so. I didn't get bored with all the ramblings of Derry's creepy history or the almost irrelevant snippets of horror happening to very minor characters, but I understand why someone could. After all, I did get bored with all the backstory in Cujo, so maybe I just got more into this story.
I don't know what else to say without accidentally spoiling anything. It was scary at times and touching at times and written in the typical style of Stephen King that I love. I adored the parts where the story was more about friendship and childhood shenanigans as much as I loved all the creepy stuff. The adult parts were also enjoyable, especially towards the end.
There's a river running through my home town and I caught myself one day imagining it as the canal from Derry. That's how immersed I was in this book. I can't wait for It: Chapter Two, to see how it turns out.