‘It’ Trailer Breakdown: Pennywise Terrorizes The Losers’ Club

Warner Bros. has unleashed a new trailer for Andy Muschietti‘s upcoming movie adaptation of Stephen King‘s classic horror novel It, and it’s even scarier than the frightening trailer that preceded it. A good portion of the new trailer consists of moments we’ve seen in other marketing materials, but there’s plenty of new footage that’s worth digging into, so check out our latest It trailer breakdown below to find out what some of these moments mean for the story as a whole.

We start off with the protagonists of this story, a group of kids known as The Losers Club. They’re Derry, Maine’s resident bunch of outcasts and bullied rejects, and they’re led by Bill Denbrough (Jaeden Lieberher), whose younger brother Georgie is killed by It. (We’ll get to that in a moment.) There are a few shots of them laughing and playing in the water, and there’s a special nervous glance shared between Bill and Beverly Marsh (Sophia Lillis), the only girl in the group.

It’s also worth pointing out all the rocks on the shore where they’re playing, because at one point the group finds themselves in a massive rock-throwing war with a bunch of bullies (WB showed that scene at Comic-Con, and Ethan Anderton wrote about it here). This location may be near where that fight happens.

Speaking of those bullies, here are the kids who make the The Losers Club’s lives a living hell. They’re led by Henry Bowers (Nicholas Hamilton, in the faded yellow shirt), a sadistic punk who’s abused by his father and takes out his rage and frustration on kids smaller than him. The other primary Bowers Gang members include Belch Huggins and Victor Criss, and while a few others appear in the book, I assume the other member here is Patrick Hockstetter, the same kid who appears on the “Missing” poster in the film.

This one’s a little blurry because it’s in motion, but it’s a POV shot from a couple adults who happen to be driving by while the Bowers gang terrorizes Losers Club member Ben Hanscom (Jeremy Ray Taylor). This is one of the more disturbing aspects of the book: Derry has a rotten history, and it’s infected the community to the point where basic indignities are ignored in favor of keeping the status quo.

The adults in the town have a “look the other way” mentality that doesn’t bode well for our protagonists, who often find themselves in dire situations where a bit of help would be appreciated. And that red balloon that pops up in the backseat of the passing vehicle is a sign that there’s something supernatural and evil going on in this section of small town America.

This moment with Georgie’s boat falling into the sewer is the first time we hear It speak, taking the form of Pennywise the Dancing Clown (Bill Skarsgard). That chilling laugh echoing through the sewer pipes is likely to haunt many a dream after this film comes out.

“My grandfather thinks this town is cursed,” says Losers Club member Mike Hanlon (Chosen Jacobs). “That all the bad things that happened in this town are because of one thing…an evil thing.” We see Ben Hanscom (who loves spending time at the library) researching the town’s checkered past, including an old explosion at the Kitchener Ironworks just outside of town. This is an event that’s referenced numerous times in the book, and it’s eventually revealed that It was responsible for the blast; the evil entity consumed some of the children and then began a hibernation period that lasted between 25-27 years, after which the killing cycle begins again.

But as our own Jacob Hall learned in his set visit, there’s another instance in Derry’s past that has a more immediate and lasting impact on the character of Mike. You can read all about that here.