Something I really appreciate about IT: Welcome To Derry is that Andy Muschietti did not hold back on portraying how racist Derry is.
Every episode of Welcome To Derry has blatant racism showcased. Episode 7 was absolutely terrifying. The whole show has been terrifying because it's showing just how deadly racism is. How the monster isn't just the monster itself, but also the environment the monster amplifies. The racism is already there, has been there since the colonizers first stepped foot into this country and saw Native Americans as savages.
IT's influence fans the flames. IT not only intensifies fear, hatred, and violence, but IT also creates an environment where that shit is normalized to the point no one helps a literal child being beaten up in the middle of the street by multiple assailants.
Charlotte Hanlon is the only one to actually do something and stop the teens assaulting a much smaller teen while everyone else watches and looks at her like she's crazy. Some look at her like what she is doing is pointless because well, it's Derry. Some even look upset, like she has no business interfering, like she is in the wrong. And some just ignore the scene entirely.
Whether the person is Native American, black, or Hispanic, no matter how dark or how light their skin tone is, if they aren't white, they are targets. Even people of color who can pass as white are targets because even if their skin is a paler shade, they are still not white in the eyes of racist white people and therefore inferior.
I love this show because it shows the audience that like in the book, IT is not just the clown. It's so much more than the clown. IT brings your fears to life, shape shifts, terrorizes you, gives you false hope, and isolates you.
I know many people weren't happy that Pennywise didn't come in until later, but honestly, that was the right call. IT appears as so many different things in the book like a mummy, a werewolf, the creature from the black lagoon, Dracula, a giant bird, a swarm of winged leeches, Frankenstein's monster, and so much more. IT's true physical form looked like a giant pregnant spider. Well, that's the best way they could describe it considering it's a being the human mind can't really comprehend.
Andy did an amazing job with showing the audience the blatant racism and bringing it front and center to where people can't ignore it. People could watch the IT movies and miss the subtleties of racism if they didn't want to acknowledge it. In fact, the homophobia ended up being the main issue in the movies, which isn't bad, that shit needs to be in your face as well since again, people like to pretend it never happened.
But the book, which Stephen King based the stuff that wasn't the evil entity on his own childhood and his own childhood friends, has the racism in your face where you can't ignore it, just like IT: Welcome To Derry has done.
Andy also cast real Native American actors to play the Native American characters which is seriously so rare. He's not holding back, the show is even more violent and gorey. I know a lot of us like to joke how the IT movies are our gay rom com coming of age movies, but he has made the show where we even do that and I for one, applaud it. I love how he made sure this horror show could only be seen as true horror.
I really gotta hand it to the guy, he did not sugarcoat the racism, he made it visible and unable to be hidden to show that racism does not have empathy, does not care what gender you are, does not care if you're a child, and does not care if you can maybe pass as white.
Andy literally said, See this racism? Look at it, look at it, look at it, I want all of you to LOOK AT IT!
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