Stephen King's IT: What The Ending Really Means

6. The Kids Overcome Their Issues

The act of stabbing and beating up Pennywise really isn't enough to vanquish the creature, even though it does seem to be hurt - the really effective method of dispatch is to remove It's food: fear.

With each of the Losers Club members, they're driven by a fundamental fear or a major issue that makes them susceptible to the creature and a good potential meal. For Stan and Richie, it's a simple phobia (a creepy painting and clowns respectively), but for each of the others, it's more substantial. Bill is driven by his brother's disappearance (and his part in it); Eddie by his over-bearing, molly-coddling mother who has convinced him he's an invalid; Mike by his parents' horrific death and racist bullies; Ben by bullies and Bev by her rapist piece of sh*t father.

As they come together with Pennywise at the end, each confronts their fears (either in direct conflict or leading up to it). Eddie tells his mother to back off, Mike kills Henry, Bill accepts Georgie is dead, Bev attacks her father and Stan and Richie fight their personified horrors. Even Ben overcomes his issues by kissing Bev to free her. In doing that, they're able to remove their fears, and Pennywise's grip on them.

Unfortunately, the problem for the kids is that in the novel, they grow up to forget everything about their encounter with It, and to even forget each other. It's part of the creature's supernatural pull (and no doubt a self-preservation technique to help It come back every 27 years without potential victims all being prepared or buggering off entirely).

So by the time they come back together - blood pact or not - they aren't going to remember It's power over them, and more importantly, they're likely to be struggling with the same fears and issues that made them such appealing victims in the first place. Good mental health clearly isn't going to last.