As we first reported on FearHQ.com, the review embargo has lifted for It: Welcome to Derry, and the response to this small-screen prequel has so far been very positive, though a few reviews are of the "love" or "hate" variety.
In fact, with 30 verdicts counted on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the HBO Max series has been officially "Certified Fresh" with 80%. 2017's It has 85%, while the sequel received 62%. The latter was considered a let-down by many fans, so this appears to be a return to form for the franchise created by author Stephen King.
Still, the critics that didn't like the show really didn't like it, so there's a chance the prequel won't be to everyone's liking when it premieres this weekend.
In Variety's review, it's said that It: Welcome to Derry is, "A masterfully woven and terrifying tale about the origins of the monstrous Pennywise the Clown. The show may be set in the past, but its themes have never echoed louder today."
GamesRadar+ notes, "This is Muschietti, Skarsgård and Co playing the hits -- and sometimes that's exactly what you want." IGN adds to that by stating, "It makes you feel right at home in America’s worst small town."
Over at io9, the site explains, "Even with a toothy clown waiting in the wings, Welcome to Derry’s most frightening aspects might be its moments of real-world anxiety—heightened by Pennywise’s ambient bad vibes, of course, but still taking place outside the realm of the supernatural."
IndieWire, however, was less enthused. "An engine fueled by filling in the blanks isn’t built to last, and these dots, once connected, prove tacky and sour," they shared, before The Daily Beast took it another step further by declaring It: Welcome to Derry, "The worst King adaptation in many moons."
Radio Times landed somewhere in the middle. "While Welcome to Derry perhaps isn't quite the nightmare I was hoping for, it's also far from disappointing. For horror fans, and those who consider themselves to be Constant Readers, it will likely satisfy."
Overall, it sounds like fans can expect a suitably scary return to Derry, even if the show touches on a lot of familiar ideas and themes. Critics only got to see the first five episodes, not the entire season, so expect the score above to float up and down like Pennywise's balloon in the coming weeks.
Set in the world of Stephen King's It universe, It: Welcome to Derry is based on King's It novel and expands the vision established by filmmaker Andy Muschietti in the feature films It and It Chapter Two.
The cast is led by Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, James Remar, Stephen Rider, Madeleine Stowe, Rudy Mancuso, and Bill Skarsgård.
The series, from Warner Bros. Television and developed for television by filmmakers Andy Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti (It, The Flash) and Jason Fuchs (Wonder Woman), will debut on HBO and also be available to stream on HBO Max. Muschietti will direct four episodes of the nine-episode series.
It: Welcome to Derry premieres on October 26, with new episodes released weekly leading up to the season finale on December 14.