I don't know why, but I watched It: Chapter One and It: Chapter Two semi-recently. I've never read the book but saw the 90s miniseries in parts many years ago.
The movies were... okay, I guess. Unlike most people, I preferred Chapter Two over One. The adult actors were much better overall, though there are some standouts in the child cast. (And Finn Wolfhard is not among them...) And the characters were more built up by the second film so the very underwhelming, CGI horror scenes at least had more weight. There's some great cinematography and some interesting scenes. And the ending is pretty solid and fairly satisfying.
Still, the project is full of plot holes, weird choices, and definite mistakes. The pacing is far too snappy in Chapter One, leaving us with too little time to meaningfully establish the too-large cast (Mike is totally wasted as a character and never got enough development, and many of the others got too little as well), and the constant "scares" are terrible even when conceptually interesting. Bill Skarsgard is good as the creature but is almost entirely wasted with loud jump scares and annoying fast motion scenes that fail to frighten. The CGI is plentiful, and most of it is unconvincing. I was thinking, as Eddie's leper shambled around onscreen, how much better he would have looked as a practical effect, and that goes for a lot of the special effects and set pieces. I didn't think much of the score either. It felt far too "epic" and traditional for a story that's, at its heart, small and personal.
And the cast. The two film's worst performance goes to Finn Wolfhard, who is more annoying than anything and is always clearly reading a script. You never feel like he inhabits the character he plays. Bill Hader was fantastic as the adult version, though.
Yeah... it should have been a miniseries.
I also just got finished with the Netflix series Black Summer, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I started it because it was highly rated and I needed something to halfway-watch while I did other stuff, but I was pretty quickly riveted by it. I have found no info on a possible third season, but here's hoping.