It Chapter Two Review: 5 Ups & 5 Downs

3. The Tone Is All Over The Place

While the first film did a mostly excellent job of balancing horror with outrageous laughs, the sequel struggles to strike a similarly winning two-hander of light and dark.

It doesn't help that It Chapter Two's narrative is decidedly sillier than its predecessor, yet the film stubbornly takes itself deathly seriously during many of these daft moments.

And though much of the humour does land, there are also too many instances of pithy one-liners undercutting a potentially scary, even horrifying moment.

But the worst offender? An extremely random, bizarre moment mid-way through a set-piece where Muschietti makes the misguided choice to blare out a certain pop hit used in a certain recent Deadpool movie.

Quite what the intent was is difficult to discern, but it's jarring in a bad way and totally takes the audience out of the scene.