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DemiFiendRSA OP t1_j9pym6n wrote

Andy Muschietti will executive produce and direct multiple episodes.

>Set in the world of Stephen King’s IT universe, Welcome To Derry is based on King’s IT novel and expands on the story established by filmmaker Andy Muschietti in the feature films IT and IT Chapter Two.

>Jason Fuchs will write the teleplay for the first episode, based on a story by Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, and Fuchs. Fuchs and Brad Caleb Kane will serve as co-showrunners on the project. Andy Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti (through their Double Dream production company, which has an overall deal with WBTV), Fuchs, and Kane are executive producers. Andy Muschietti will direct multiple episodes of the series, including the first episode. The series is produced by HBO Max and Warner Bros. Television.

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Redeem123 t1_j9q2scy wrote

So it sounds like it’s treating the movies as canon which is nice. But I don’t see what the story’s going to be. It doesn’t really make narrative sense to fill in the gaps in the main cast’s stories. So will this instead be about an earlier Pennywise stint in Derry?

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GarlVinland4Astrea t1_j9q3jnf wrote

It’s a prequel to all the other times IT attacked Derry. In the books they have a periodic interludes to prior attacks in its 27 year cycle

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Papatheosis t1_j9q6ehq wrote

Really hoping they go back to ITs arrival.

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PaintByLetters t1_j9r2j9e wrote

Yes! This would also give them an opportunity to plant the seed for a proper Dark Tower series.

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Papatheosis t1_j9r9n6p wrote

It is strongly implied that IT may be the Crimson King, or maybe the Crimson Queen, or related in some way to the Crimson King, or IT and the Crimson King both come from “the Prim,” the chaotic primordial soup of the universe.

I wouldn’t mind them relating the two, but If I recall correctly, not much that happens in Dark Tower takes place before the Loser Club reigns in Derry, but they can die whatever to tie them together, that’d be cool.

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Carpenter_v_Walrus t1_j9rb7x0 wrote

No, Pennywise is small potatoes compared to the Crimson King. There is another being that Roland encounters during his travels that is much closer to Pennywise. But whereas Pennywise fed on fear the other (Dandelo) fed off of laughter.

While King does have a habit of having characters reappear in other stories, they stay more or less consistent in what they do. The Walking dude will tempt people, and travel and cause mischief, the Crimson King will try to destroy whatever he can, but Pennywise was just content to sit in Derry and feed. It doesn't fit the Crimson King's MO at all.

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GarlVinland4Astrea t1_j9ti9to wrote

King has also alluded to the idea that Pennywise or maybe one of his spawn is still alive. Tommyknockers has a scene where they drive through Derry and in one of the storm drains they see silver eyes. Which in the books are how Pennywise eyes are predominately described. Then in Dreamcatcher there is a scene where they are in Derry and there is a memorial commemorating the Losers Club that has "Pennywise Lives" spraypainted on it.

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Drkarcher22 t1_j9rcqfy wrote

Whether or not IT is the some facet of the Crimson King will probably never truly be definitively stated, however I would love to have confirmation that Dandelo is one of her offspring.

While in the book IT, while Pennywise obviously knows much about the macroverse and her relation to it and her form in the main world, but she just doesn’t seem to care much about it. She has her hunting grounds in Derry and is more or less content with the state of things until the Loser’s Club decide to fight back. Compare that to how she acts in her brief appearance in 11/22/63 where she almost uses her/Jakes knowledge of portals to different worlds as a honey trap to lure him in.

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horseren0ir t1_j9sobhe wrote

So IT is a girl? What’s she doing 11/22/63?

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Drkarcher22 t1_j9t7bo8 wrote

Well, it’s preferred form in its lair in the sewers under Derry is of a massive female pregnant spider, but it’s true form is the Deadlights, which don’t exist in our universe, plus Pennywise is inherently male. Assigning gender to a shapeshifter is always a tricky thing, especially when IT is actually a malevolent ball of pulsating light.

In 11/22/63 Jake goes back in time to stop the Kennedy assassination using a sorta portal in time a friend of his found years before, however the moment you get sent back to is fixed. It’s always August of 1958, so before committing 5 years of his life to save Kennedy he needs proof that you can truly alter time. He does this by saving a family in Derry that gets murdered by their father on Halloween. (except for one son who Jake knows in the present, which is how he knew of the event.)

Derry is a violent town even when Pennywise is “asleep” it’s a part of the symbiotic relationship that the town and creature have with each other, just every 27 years or so it skyrockets even further. The point being that Jake hates it there, he spends two months waiting in Derry for the event (meeting Richie and Bev at one point) with the cover story that he’s in real estate looking for a location for a hidden buyer. To put off any suspicion that he isn’t there for that job he drives out to the old Ironworks (where Mike had his first encounter with IT) while there he notices several animal bones at the base of a fallen smokestack and then hears a voice in his head beckoning him to walk inside and forget about his mission and the past, that maybe there’s another portal in here that’ll take him somewhere even newer. It’s worth noting that Jake is there only a short time after the Losers beat IT during the 57/58 cycle. So Pennywise is in its less active state.

Jake would later hear that voice again when he heads to Dallas while looking at the Texas book depository where Oswald would shoot the President in a few years time and several decades before for Jake.

King makes several allusions about Dallas and Derry being extremely similar in nature, with a malevolent nature about them. That’s not to say that there’s an IT in Dallas too, but Jake thinks at one point that he wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a portal in Dallas similar to whatever was in that smokestack.

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GarlVinland4Astrea t1_j9tiowq wrote

Yup the whole thing about Pennywise is that he's essentially an eldritch horror from beyond who is designed to destroy worlds that got lazy as shit and decided to shirk his duties by making a corporeal form and just setting up shop in a small town and feasting on it's children every few decades.

As bad as Derry was, the rest of the universe kinda got good deal with IT deciding to confine itself to Derry until the Losers wiped IT out.

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correcthorsestapler t1_j9svgre wrote

I thought Pennywise was another Dandelo like the creature Roland meets; that one fed off laughter rather than fear. Never heard of Pennywise being the Crimson King, though.

Would be cool to see this be the start of a cinematic King universe. Seems like Castle Rock was trying to do that on Hulu; shame it got cancelled.

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Papatheosis t1_j9tk2e4 wrote

Yeah after reading more I don’t think they’re the same, but maybe related.

Maybe they’d even be closer to something like gnostic æons, sharing power from one divine source but behaving totally independent of that source (and sometimes against that source).

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Ckck96 t1_j9vtu2v wrote

It’d be pretty cool to see IT in it’s other forms before the clown. With HBO production value I’m here for it.

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Redeem123 t1_j9q73zy wrote

Right I’m aware - that’s what I mentioned in my comment. I just don’t see much of a story there. The main story we hear of his past was the visit Mike’s grandad(?) witnessed. But in general, what we know about them all is that everyone died.

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Ooften t1_j9qfao3 wrote

Not necessarily. Every 27 years for thousands of years opens up a lot of story ideas depending on if each episode is standalone or the season follows one major event. We only know of, what, three major events (iron works explosion, gang shoot out, nightclub fire)?

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Redeem123 t1_j9qgft3 wrote

Sure, I'm not saying I'm not open to it. I'm just trying to figure out what we'll see based on what the story gives us.

I just feel like there needs to be something more than "people start dying, town freaks out, someone chases away the evil, evil goes into hibernation." It would feel like just an adaptation of the story we've already seen, but with new characters subbed in.

I'm fully ready to be proved wrong though. It's just my first impression.

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Tanagrabelle t1_j9qpit6 wrote

There was also a sort of malaise (probably the wrong word) in Derry, because of It. Any small issue affecting the negative behavior increased. I theorize low impulse-control, for one thing.

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ringobob t1_j9u2b6v wrote

It sounds like you're only familiar with the movies, the book gives a lot more historical material to work with that was just cut completely out of the movies. Some of it is more covered briefly, some of it is pretty detailed. But there's a lot to work with.

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Redeem123 t1_j9u47k1 wrote

I’ve read the book. That’s why I mentioned Mike’s family’s backstory … though maybe that was in the movie too, I don’t remember.

I know that there’s more backstory there, but at no point did I think “this would be an interesting TV show.” Like I said, I’ll be watching and I’d be happy to be proved wrong. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time. But apparently questioning the premise is a no-no on this one.

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ringobob t1_j9u5wzp wrote

Oh, you were referencing the Black Spot incident. I think they do make at least a small reference to it in the movies.

I guess the major difference is that I feel like all of those stories, actually getting into them as much as we do in the books, is a strength of the book and part of what makes it not entirely cumbersome at its page count, it really drives home that this is not a new problem, but it's entirely too much to fit into a movie, or even two movies.

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Redeem123 t1_j9u6urz wrote

Oh for sure. They’re great segments of the book. I’m just wary of how much they’ll stand on their own versus just being flashbacks.

I would’ve loved a full proper adaptation as a series. The first movie was great and the second was okay, but there’s just so much in the book that can’t fit. Now it feels like they’re going about it both ways. We’ll see though.

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LlewelynMoss1 t1_j9qmqd5 wrote

Damn Muschietti got carried by the cinematographer and great material in It Chapter 1. Everything else he has done is mediocre or worse. Wish they would let him go but oh well.

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TARSrobot t1_j9qv95k wrote

The Flash is receiving great feedback in test screenings, and WB will be screening it at CinemaCon two full months before it’s official release. Given the studio’s confidence in a film that’s had such a troubled production until Muschietti came along, I wouldn’t be surprised if they let him direct whatever he wants now.

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LlewelynMoss1 t1_j9rmlz0 wrote

I would love to be proven wrong. It chapter 2 was majorly bad and chapter 1 isn't as good as it could've been due to muschiettis impulses. But I have wanted a good flash movie forever and I like what I've seen so far. So i will happily (and hopefully) admit that I am wrong when flash comes out.

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GarlVinland4Astrea t1_j9tivs7 wrote

That has far less to do with Muschietti and more to do with how they split the material imo. The adult portion in the novels is meant to be mixed in and be complimented by the child person. It doesn't stand as well on it's own because it was never meant to.

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LlewelynMoss1 t1_j9tnzpq wrote

I'm talking about the film looking worse visually. And him getting bad performances out of good actors. And him using the trope he used from Mama for the attacks in chapter 1 one of "penny wise runs at characters quick then nothing happens". And him losing track of the tone of the film to the point it was a comedy. And going with an ending of bullying the clown into a baby. And then spending 1 hour on useless totems that felt unrelated to them and pointless in the plot. And him relegating the only black character to doing almost nothing in each film. And the letter for the suicide that is like "don't worry guys it was cool my husband completes suicide". And lastly that chapter 2 is one of the worst major horror films in a while

I know the material was hard, but they also spliced in kid stuff anyway in chapter 2 and it didn't help it.

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