Here's the deal, I'm about to drop some mad Things You Missed from the new movie IT, but
before I do, if you are interested in winning some free CZsWorld merch, in my free merch
giveaway, watch this entire video and you'll find out how.
Bill has some posters in his room, and I was able to identify a couple of them as Gremlins
and Beetlejuice.
Why is this significant?
Well, I think these posters both have double-meanings behind them.
The first, is a foreshadowing of Bill's future.
You'll find that after facing their fears in this movie, that none of losers are losers
anymore.
They all go on to have very successful careers, perhaps the most successful of all of them
though, is Bill Denborough, who grows up to be a horror writer.
Like me.
But without the stupid goatee.
But it's cool to see that Bill does have an interest in horror as a kid that leads into
his occupation as an adult.
On a side note, pretty much every Stephen King novel has a protagonist who is a writer,
a method he uses to project himself into his work.
Muschietti and his art department could have chosen any two horror movie posters to hang
on Bill's wall though, so why did he choose these?
For one, Bill's still a kid, and these are both more kid friendly horror movies that
came out in the 1980s.
But I think there's also a reason that these were chosen as opposed to say...
Ghostbusters.
First let's look at Gremlins.
It's a movie about these little things that change into other more scary looking things.
And in this movie, IT's shapeshifting abilities are on full display, one of which being the
transformation that IT does with it's teeth when feeding off the fear of the children.
It seemed like it took some big inspiration from Barbara's transformation in Beetlejuice,
how the face kind of peels back to reveal these rows and rows of razor sharp teeth.
Especially that scene where Pennywise is about to feed on Stan, I was getting major vibes
from the Tim Burton classic.
This next one is really only a Thing You Missed if you haven't read the book, or at least
if it's been a while.
During the beginning of the film, you may have heard Bill muttering the following phrase,
"He thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts."
It comes back again at the end of the film I believe.
What this is, is a coping mechanism that Bill uses to help with his stutter, and it's something
that helps him overcome Pennywise in the book, because his stutter is directly linked to
his fear of IT.
It's not that bad at first, but it gets worse when Georgie is killed and whenever his fear
of IT increases, the stutter gets worse.
Remember when he has the courage to go into the 29 Neibolt House after they discover that
it's the old well house and it's connected to the sewer?
He gives his friends a speech, and Richie even comments on him not having stuttered
through any of it.
That's his courage that allows him to stand up like that, so when you hear him say that
phrase, "he thrusts his fists against the posts and still insists he sees the ghosts,"
without stuttering, you know that he has grown in the face of fear in order to do so, and
that's what weakens IT.
I would expect to hear more of that phrase when his childhood stutter comes back in Chapter
2.
There were a lot of little nods to events and characters from the book that were touched
on in the movie, but didn't need to be fully expanded.
Some of these things had their own chapter in the book, but I think the film did a nice
job of only including what was necessary, as not to overwhelm the viewer.
Here are a few of those references.
Ben researches The Ironworks Explosion, a catastrophe caused by IT in the early 1900s.
He also looks up the Black Spot Fire, which was a nightclub in Derry, during...
I was to say the 1930s, that was a hangout for a lot of African-American men at the time.
It was burned down by a racist faction, with only only a few survivors, one of which being
Mike Hanlon's dad, who passes the story onto his son.
The relevancy of that in this movie is debatable, because Mike's parents actually do die in
a fire prior to the events of 1989, and the whole racism subplot is not really so applicable
with this taking place in the 80s.
One of the reasons Henry Bowers hates Mike so much, is that Henry's father held a great
deal of racism towards Mike's father and that racism carried down into Henry.
It's possible that some of that hatred is present in the movie, because we do see Henry
single out Mike a couple of times, the first being just before the rock fight, and the
second being when Henry catches up with Mike as the Losers are descending into the well
and nearly kills him.
I didn't notice any specifically racist remarks though.
Let me know if you felt any of that tension in the comments.
Back to some of the book references.
Many of the victims were only called out by name, or at least had their names show up
on missing posters.
I noticed that a couple of these were actual characters from the book, like Betty Ripson
and Edward Corcoran.
I tried to read all of the missing posters to make connections, but I may have missed
some of them given that I have no way of pausing this movie in the theaters, so again, chime
in in the comments and let me know what you saw, I'm genuinely interested.
One location that is brought up, but I don't think we actually seen on screen is The Standpipe,
which is kind of a landmark in Derry which is connected to the stream in the Barrens
and the sewer system.
Only reason I bring it up, is that it's probably more than a throwaway reference, as it's something
that's likely to come into play in Chapter 2.
That's all I'll say for now.
At one point Pennywise encounters Richie and uses the line, "beep, beep Richie!" which
is a phrase that the Lucky 7 always uses in the book whenever Richie won't shut up.
It doesn't come up a whole lot in the movie, but Richie does still run his mouth a lot.
The reason I wanted to bring it up, was that I feel it kind of takes on a new meaning here,
with how much of a Pottymouth Richie is in this movie.
The beep beep could represent the redacted expletives.
Speaking of Richie, did anyone else catch that Nightmare on Elm Street was playing on
Derry's movie theater marquee?
That movie came out in 84, I don't know if it ever came back out into cinemas in '89,
but you would think there would be a good reason for putting that up there in the wrong
year.
I thought for sure Richie's fear was going to be Freddy Krueger and that IT was going
to take the form of Freddy, but it turns out he's just afraid of clowns.
One other note on Richie.
At the school, when Richie walks by the gang of bullies, Patrick Hockstetter, the one who
later goes after them with a makeshift flamethrower, gives him this creepy smile and licks his
lips.
One thing this movie was very good at is telling a lot of backstory visually.
Patrick is one messed up kid who gets off on hurting others and has weird violent homosexual
tendencies.
At one point in the book he actually molests Henry Bowers, which is why I think he's actually
the scariest human character.
He doesn't get that far in the movie, but that little lick of the lips at a boy who
is substantially younger than him tells us that something is not right about this character.
There were a couple of things that were different from the book, but I think actually added
to some of the character arcs in the movie.
For example, while Stan is Jewish in both the novel and motion picture, his religion
plays a much bigger part now.
Stan is studying for his bar-mitzvah, and his father is the Rabbi of the temple, but
we're given the idea that Stan isn't really a big believer because he hasn't been studying
his Torah portion.
In fact, the blessing that he's having trouble with is actually just the prayer you have
to recite before opening the Torah, so it's like the easiest one because it always comes
up.
But he can't even get through that.
The reason I think this is kind of a brilliant change from the book, is that the whole basis
of Stan's character is that he's the last one to truly believe in IT.
He even says that the things that they are all seeing aren't real.
Until the Neibolt House encounter.
And it hits him the hardest.
Once he believes in IT, he's probably the most scared of IT.
And right after that happens, we're led into the montage of the middle of that summer where
he actually has his bar-mitzvah.
His belief in IT, mirrors his faith in his religion.
In my Things You Missed videos on the trailers for this movie, I talked about the meaning
behind the graphics on some of the kids T-shirts and how Metal could now play the part that
Rock & Roll played in the original.
Upon seeing the movie, I have another example of that.
During the rock fight, Belch wears a t-shirt repping a demo CD that Metallica put out in
the 80s called Metal Up Your Ass.
The graphic features a hand holding a sword coming out of the toilet.
Perfect choice for a movie about a dangerous clown creature who also comes out of the sewers.
Let's talk more about that clown.
At the end of the basement scene, Pennywise's eyes roll back in his head before he sinks
back into the water.
Remember how I pointed out that in the teaser Pennywise's eyes didn't reflect in the water?
And then in the Official Trailer, they fixed it and some of us were kind of disappointed
because the eyeless void looked kind of cool?
Maybe this was kind of a redemption.
Also Bev's eyes do that same thing at the end, when Pennywise kidnaps her and she is
floating above the ground, her eye sockets are just white, so that may have been saying
that Pennywise was controlling her.
I have more on that floating thing, so I'll get back to that.
I noticed a couple things when Bill goes into Georgie's room.
In a previous video, I pointed out the circus animals on the wallpaper behind Bill.
As it turns out, that is part of Georgie's room, but it's not just the wallpaper, the
whole thing is themed like a circus.
That's kind of creepy when you take into account the fact that IT is using Georgie's image
as a puppet to trick Bill throughout the entire thing.
You almost wonder if Pennywise attacked Georgie first for a reason.
The other thing I noticed was the LEGO turtle that Bill finds in his brother's old room,
which was one of a few references to a celestial being known as the Turtle who is an opposing
force against IT.
The Turtle is kind of slyly written into the book.
Characters will find themselves thinking about The Turtle without really knowing why.
In the movie, one of the characters brings up the fact that they think see a turtle during
the swimming scene.
And I'm not entirely sure because, again, I can't pause yet, but I'm pretty sure I saw
a turtle sticker on one of Beverly's books.
These references are nothing more than Easter Eggs though, because the primary scene in
which The Turtle gives advice to Bill, known as the Ritual of Chud, is not a scene in this
movie.
The Turtle's rival, who the kids refer to as IT, but whose true form is known as The
Deadlights, does make a brief appearance.
When Pennywise tries to eat Beverly, and it's face peels back, she looks down it's throat
and sees three bright lights.
This is somewhat different than the form that we're used to seeing The Deadlights in.
They appear to be more of a force within Pennywise as opposed to their own powerful entity.
Nobody in the movie ever uses the word "deadlights", so they make their way onto the silver screen
in a much more subtle way.
This next one I didn't notice until the last scene of the movie.
In a previous Things You Missed I pointed out that Beverly wears a key around her neck
and speculated what it might be for.
Many, and I mean a lot, like 666 billion of you pointed out that they key is uncut so
it couldn't actually be used for unlocking anything.
After seeing the movie, I still have no idea what the significance of the key is, but I
noticed another piece of jewelry that Bev has: it's a ring with an anchor on it.
What do anchors do?
They sink.
And after countless cases of "you'll float too, you'll float to, you'll float too, you'll
float too," the group eventually finds that Beverly "floats" as well after being abducted
by Pennywise.
But because the love and dedication of her friends, they're able to find her, and pull
her back down and out of harm's way.
In a world where all the victims float, she's the one who sinks.
She's the anchor.
In that final scene, after the promise, Bev tells what she remembers from when she was
afloat and says she had a vision of them when they were all much older, in their 30s.
This is a foreshadowing of the sequel.
Chapter 2.
When, after a 27 year rest, Pennywise reemerges and the losers are called back to Derry to
fulfill their promise and vanquish IT.
And that ties into the last thing you missed, which is really only a thing you would miss
if you didn't stay for the credits, because Pennywise's laughter can be heard at the end
of them, signalling that this fight isn't over yet.
But the fact that there was a title that said Chapter 1 should have given it away already,
if you didn't catch on from that I don't know what's wrong with you.
One thing I liked about this movie was the look of it.
It looks very sharp, and now you too can look sharp in this dashing CZsWorld t-shirt.
That's right, I'm giving away a free T-shirt to one lucky winner to celebrate my 100th
video.
All you have to do is follow @CZsWorld_Horror on Twitter and retweet my post containing
this video.
There will be link in the description, and I'll pin the tweet for a while too.
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Void where prohibited.
Robert Austin did the music for this video.
He's got a whole array of creepy clown music on his channel, go check it out and subscribe
if you're interested.
As for me, I've done six videos about this movie here on the channel and when the trailer
for Chapter 2 drops, you can count on a Things You Missed episode from me.
Until then, I've got plenty of great content planned.
You don't want to miss it so remember to subscribe to CZsWorld for new horrors every week.
Ring that death-bell for notifications, and I'll see you in the next one.
Assuming... we both survive.