The haunted character that Stephen King knows will outlive him

The 65 books that bear Stephen King's name, and the 200 short stories in between, are good, bad, and downright terrible characters that populate the worlds he creates, open to spill into others. With such a diverse range, everyone has a favorite that has more often than not jumped off the page and onto the screen to take on a second life. The chief, however, is one which, according to the author, will outlive them all, and become a name which will perhaps even outlive his name, long after he is gone, as long as there is fear to feast.

In an interview with The New York TimesKing predicted that Pennywise the Clown, the villainous child-eating monster from the movie “It,” would stand the test of time, even if he didn't. “When I was growing up, the great paperback writer was John D. MacDonald. When he died, his work pretty much disappeared,” King recalled. “I don't know what will happen to my stuff when I die, but one thing I'm pretty sure is that Pennywise will be around. The rest of the stuff may be gone, but in 200 years people will be saying, 'Pennywise is really scary.'” Beep, Beep, Kinga Mr.

There's no doubt that King's story of Derry's most terrifying resident was made even stronger by Tim Curry and Bill Skarsgård's notable efforts to take on the role of Pennywise in their 1990 and 2017 adaptations of It. Reaching the audience. with their balloon-bursting, child-devouring monsters, they no doubt increased the number of coulophobia sufferers (fear of clowns). But perhaps the secret to his still being terrifying is that, like the essence of King's beast, Pennywise's trauma, like the losers who fight him, grows with us.

Many of the beloved nightmares of literature, film, and television are to be feared because they have time. They are an evil that can only die by special means, and it takes a decrepit, flawed hero (or heroes) to defeat them. However, Pennywise is King's team of brave children, an incarnation of the past that they blocked. He's a button-nosed childhood trauma, tapping into the fears they've fought to forget, which makes him perhaps an even more appealing monster that will indeed outlast his creator. Regardless of the story's disappointing ending (which even Tim Curry wasn't happy about)Pennywise's presence lingers in the mind of anyone who's looked down a storm drain or seen a stray red balloon float across the sky, and given the killer clown's future plans, it's more likely to stay there.

Like any horror, if the fear and dread it conveys is strong enough to instill fear in its audience, it will stick around for years to come, and Pennywise is no exception. King's character can be brought to life by any brave soul who dares to step into those terrifying clown shoes, whether 27 years or more later, and join a limited legacy that has done an impressive job handling the creature.

While Tim Curry might be a favorite of /Film readersSkarsgård's performance as Pennywise was definitely commendable and enough to even guarantees his return in Max's yet-to-be-released anthology series, “Welcome to Derry.” This show will focus on the cool history that happened before the “It” movies and see what kind of antics Pennywise got up to before Bill Denborough and the rest of the losers club decided to kill this f***** clown. With that effort alone, there's no doubt that Pennywise will be sending chills down our spines for a few more years, proving that when in doubt, it's always time to send in the clown.