Man, this was a long movie, and I don't think it needed to be. Back in 2017, everyone went gaga over the first part, and I thought it was just okay. People seem to love that Stranger Things vibe and maybe it was somewhat charming, but it wasn't the be all end all of Stephen King adaptions, was it?

Two years later (or 27 years later) the grown-ups are in for the final act, and they're appropriately cast and all that, but so what? Something is off, but the high production values are trying to convince me otherwise.

As our adult protagonists return to Derry, they each have a few nightmares to work through, and the creepiness seems a bit forced. That old lady in the apartment? The gimp in the store cellar? The bully who gives the other bully the knife? It always ends up being some tall googly-eyed cgi monsters and they all made me laugh.

The whole time, I'm noticing a LOT of differences between this and the 1990 original. This adds a few things (bits I'm assuming are in the book) while omitting a few. There's a whole fairgrounds scene, Audra/Audrey is reduced to one scene, we're given some gratuitous violence toward homosexuals, random scattered backstory scenes to showcase more of the kids adventures again, and did I mention how long this movie is? By the time the final battle came on, I saw the runtime still had about an hour to go. Oh my...

Normally, I'm one to suck Stephen King's dick when he's got a new story out, but do I want to suck this movie's dick? Not really. While it was filled with that Hollywood gloss, I just couldn't get myself into it. Not bad, just nothing I'll feel compelled to watch again. Maybe it all felt forced to me. Maybe their friendship didn't seem authentic to me? I don't know, and I definitely don't know why this movie was such a big deal when it came out.