From online discussion boards to quips in the 2019 film adaptation, It Chapter Two, there’s one truism Stephen King fans and critics alike have long accepted: King can’t stick a landing. But I’ve always found the ending of his massive coming-of-age horror classic, It, fitting and, dare I say, satisfying. Trying to tease out why the ending works for me—why I believe it rings true with the rest of the novel and is not simply the tacked-on excuse of a writer out of ideas—became a minor obsession that finally culminated in this essay.
The ending is as follows: In 1950’s America, seven children defeat It, the primordial shapeshifter that most often appears in the guise of Pennywise the Dancing Clown. Grown up, the protagonists realize that It survived, forcing them to face off against the monster once more. After an apocalyptic struggle, they finally destroy It through the power of their friendship. Fairly standard, but the reviews and articles claiming that the ending is pat, predictable, and void of complexity beg to differ. The headline of a review in Vulture more or less sums up these feelings with the claim that “A Sentimental It Chapter Two Needed More Pennywise.”[i]
The word “sentimental” became the center of my analysis of the dissatisfaction surrounding It’s ending. Sentimentality is rarely examined or accepted in criticism of the horror genre, but a deeper understanding of the way King uses sentimentality in It not only uncovers the thematic depth of what is often interpreted as a lazy ending; it also connects the novel to larger conversations concerning the use and power of sentimental literature.
Examining the history of the horror genre reveals why King’s sentimentality has been either overlooked or criticized. King’s creation of an interdimensional monster and a cosmic mythology to accompany It draws heavily from the work of H. P. Lovecraft, the twentieth-century writer largely credited with codifying the genre of cosmic horror. Lovecraft despised sentimentality and all stories that trafficked in it, sneering at the “naively insipid idealism” that allowed “smirking optimism” to triumph over nihilism and the all-powerful forces existing beyond the comprehension of mortal men. His 1936 novella The Shadow Over Innsmouth illustrates his view of the true horror tale, telling of the narrator’s encounter with monsters not unlike Pennywise in their bone-chilling wrongness: “Nothing that I could have imagined . . . would be in anyway comparable to the daemoniac, blasphemous reality that I saw.”
In Innsmouth, Lovecraft demonstrates a nihilistic view of power directly opposed to the bittersweet but positive philosophy contained in It. As Lovecraft scholar Vivian Ralickas notes, the narrator “suffers from a violation of [his] sense of self” and finds no “consolatory understanding of the human condition.” There is no sense of community or love to convince him of his essential humanity, and when the narrator realizes that he is a descendant of the monsters pursuing him, he discards his human upbringing for the power they offer him.
In contrast, King’s characters and their ability to fight It are grounded in qualities of friendship, affection, and loyalty that Lovecraft would label “smirking optimism.” Like Lovecraft’s narrator, King’s protagonists are thrust up against the incomprehensible, with It saying to Bill Denbrough during their final fight, “are you enjoying your grand tour of the nothingness that lies Outside? . . . you’ll look and you’ll go mad. . . but you’ll live.” Bill is presented with a choice similar to that of Lovecraft’s narrator: He can keep fighting against a seemingly insurmountable, alien evil, or he can succumb and gain immortality, albeit in a warped and torturous form. Bill’s decision not to give in only makes sense through the lens of sentimentality and emotion. Only in a world governed by the laws of sentimentality—the belief that emotion can overcome power, right can overcome might, and that the imperfect love between childhood friends is enough to defeat an immortal evil—is Its demise possible. The resolution flies in the face of Lovecraft’s view of a morally apathetic universe, and, in the process , it revises long-accepted horror conventions. It is this audacious sentimentality that strikes readers as disingenuous, not a flaw in the plotting or thematic focus of the text—even a cursory glance through the novel shows that the love between the Losers is a central focus from beginning to end.
In order to understand why King’s sentimentality has been overlooked, it’s helpful to take a look at some of the literary criticism that takes up the sentimental genre. About forty years ago, only a few years before It was published, literary critic Jane Tompkins argued that the great nineteenth-century sentimental novels are far from the “weak-minded pap” critics had been dismissing them as. In fact, these works are savvy and technically brilliant because of their “continual and obvious appeals to the reader’s emotions.” Instead of judging these novels by the standard of canonical literary fiction, Tompkins proposes that “the work of the sentimental writers is complex and significant in ways other than those which characterize the established masterpieces.”
While Tompkins’s work is far from new, it has, to my knowledge, never been applied to the horror genre before—perhaps because so much of that genre is dominated by the likes of Lovecraft, whose bleak cynicism has become synonymous with what makes a work of horror truly great. Attempts to introduce sentimentality to the genre are looked on with suspicion, and seen as cheap, like the work of the sentimental novelists. But, as pervasive as that view may be, it is not the whole story. As It shows, it is possible to terrify and move, to represent the world’s unimaginable cruelty and at the same time provide an antidote for it. This is what Stephen King attempts to do with the ending of It, and at least for this reader, it worked.
As I worked on this essay, one question kept circling in my head: So what? Why does it matter that It can be read as a work of sentimental horror? It’s a big question that is impossible to fully answer, so for now I’ll say this: We live in dark times. I am more aware now of nationalism, xenophobia, and racism than I have ever been before, especially the impossibility of fully disentangling myself from their influence. It’s comforting, then, to have an antidote—one that insists on the validity of love and sentimental emotion and its ability to power change. Change that can destroy a monster and transform a friend group. That is the change that the ending of It provides.
You can stream both It and It Chapter Two on Amazon:
[i] https://www.vulture.com/2019/09/it-chapter-two-review-we-need-more-pennywise.html
Ralickas, Vivian. “Cosmic Horror and the Question of the Sublime in Lovecraft,” Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, vol. 18, no. 3 (2007): pp. 364-89.
Claudia McCarron‘s fiction and nonfiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Lunch Ticket, Podcast Review and Avidly. A copywriter by day, she is fascinated by children’s literature and the Gothic, among other things. She lives in West Virginia.
