It Chapter Two Review: 5 Ups & 5 Downs
Downs...
5. The Ridiculously Excessive Runtime
By far the biggest issue facing It Chapter Two is its totally unreasonable 169-minute runtime. Though the enormity of King's novel speaks for itself, it's tough to accept that this film needed to be barely 10 minutes shorter than Avengers: Endgame.
More to the point, it isn't remotely a decision justified by the end product - this is a plodding, awkwardly structured film which features numerous extraneous scenes and even entire subplots which probably should've been saved for the inevitable Director's Cut.
The middle of the movie in particular grinds to a halt as the Losers are forced into a series of repetitive fetch quests, cross-cut with extensive flashbacks of additional run-ins they had with Pennywise 27 years prior.
That's to say nothing of a leaden subplot involving an older Henry Bowers (Teach Grant) that doesn't go anywhere interesting, and another dead weight detour following Dean (Luke Roessler), a young boy who now lives at Bill's (James McAvoy) old family home.
On one hand it's neat that Warner Bros. allowed Muschietti to release such a blatantly overstuffed movie, if also a testament to the fact that even talented filmmakers sometimes need their excesses reined-in.
With a solid half-hour shaved off its runtime, this movie would be a lot less of an exhausting slog.