In the first movie, Pennywise is mocking or performing the entire way up until the very end, which is the only time he seems vulnerable. His last line of the film is fear. There were many different versions of what that line would be and ultimately I found that to be the most telling ending for him.

You have an entity that’s been feeding off of fear itself for millenniums, then for the first time, he himself feels fear. The second movie is about how this creature is changed by that. If you’ve been around for a million years, or millions of millions of years, and then for the first time you’ve felt that sensation of fear, maybe you become a bit addicted to that fear, the way humans are.”

It Chapter Two shifts the dynamic of the first film with the 27-year chronological jump into the future, forcing the adult Losers to confront their papered-over traumas when a revenge-crazed Pennywise returns to terrorise them once more. Clocking in at a run time of almost three hours, it promises epic horror on a supersized scale, with intimidating stunts and a record-setting volume of fake blood.

Skarsgård, who was kept at a remove from the child actors during the making of the first film to preserve their authentic reactions of fear, was grateful for the new-found adult company, as well as for the bonds that formed between new and old cast members alike.

“A lot of the scenes I had to do were very demanding thanks to the make-up, so sometimes it created a bit of a distance between me and the other actors,” Skarsgård says. “I was doing a scene with Bill Hader and in between takes he was making me laugh non-stop, which is kind of a funny sight with Pennywise cracking up. It was round two for us and they were all fresh into it. It was bizarre having cast dinners with the kids and the adults—seeing the adult version and the child version sitting next to each other. It was surreal.”

Though the addition of acclaimed adult actors certainly raises the profile of It Chapter Two, Skarsgård never mourned the lack of adult co-stars during the making of the first film. In fact, he salutes the young cast for their maturity, professionalism and craft.

“I’ve been surrounded by kids most of my life,” Skarsgård says. “I’ve got a really big family and four younger siblings. The kids were so professional in terms of their acting credentials and how good they were. A lot of them have been doing it for years, but they also intuitively understood what acting is. It felt like more like working with inexperienced but talented actors as opposed to working with kids.”