THEORY: Pennywise is a Metaphor For Mental Illness

Stephen King's terrifying novel It follows a group of misfit preteens affectionately called the "Losers Club" who are terrorized by a supernatural creature known as "It" or "Pennywise the Dancing Clown." Primordial, shapeshifting, and hungry, Pennywise feeds primarily on children and "seasons" them by scaring them and taking the shape of their greatest fears. It also comes out of a dormant state every 27 years to feed in Derry, Maine.

What's particularly interesting about this creature, though, is its resemblance to mental illness. It seems more than coincidence, for instance, that Pennywise first threatens the Losers Club as they enter adolescence, an undeniable turning point in everyone's lives. But for the characters of It, this is an even more traumatic time.

For Bill, specifically, the main character, Pennywise taunts him with the figure of his own deceased little brother, who It eats at the beginning of the story. What this symbolizes, however, is Bill's inability to accept the death of his little brother Georgie and his blaming of himself. These feelings would likely only begin to surface, at least as serious psychological pain, as he matures into his teenage years. This is supported in the 2017 film, where Pennywise tries to trick Bill again in the form of Georgie near the end of the movie, and Bill formally acknowledges out loud that his brother is dead and shoots Pennywise. It is also interesting to note that the clown mocks Bill's characteristic stutter at some points, which could represent the bullying he faces because of it.

For Eddie, Pennywise takes the form of a leper and attacks him, knowing that disease would instill fear in a pathological hypochondriac like him.

For Mike, Pennywise takes advantage of his family's death in a housefire, which he survived. Definitely a time to develop survivor's guilt, Mike's adolescence would be rife with self-hatred for being unable to save his family. What's more, the novel takes place in the late 1950s, so part of Mike's trauma probably also involves the racism and discrimination he would have experienced.

For Beverly, Pennywise disturbs and torments her with blood, which, in the 2017 movie, springs up from her bathroom sink and soaks the entire room. This could be a reference to Beverly's attempt to deal with her menstrual cycle as she matures sexually. The same movie also suggests that she is being sexually abused by her father, so it doesn't seem entirely out of the question that Pennywise is literally manifesting itself as her trauma, especially when one of It's forms in the 2019 sequel asks an adult Beverly, "Are you still his little girl?" This line directly echoes what her father asked her in the first movie, making Pennywise and her father ideologically one and the same.

For Ben, Pennywise mocks his weight, once more reflecting the jeers he likely endured from his peers as he entered high school.

Finally, for Henry Bowers, one of the main antagonists and bullies of the Losers Club, Pennywise encourages him to kill his father and the central characters, which isn't unlike rare and extreme forms of psychosis and schizoaffective disorders. Also clearly facing intense physical abuse from his father, Henry represents the dark side that is giving in to Pennywise and fear. He was fully overcome by his violent sociopathy.

Pennywise's reemergence after 27 years still fits into the mental illness metaphor because the Losers have all reached another world-shattering climacteric -- middle age. While the first time around, they were reckoning with their entrance into adulthood, they are now coming to terms with their proximity to old age. Both times, in a sense, Pennywise is a stand-in for their interactions with their own mortality.

Even during the creature's dormancy, the Losers are not bereft of the emotional damage Pennywise (or their abusers) caused. Stanley, another character from the Losers Club, commits suicide in the interim, eternally plagued by Pennywise's impending return. Henry, to give further credence to this theory, is institutionalized during this time. And in the 2019 sequel film, upon seeing Pennywise's trademark red balloon, he and those institutionalized with him react by laughing and screaming. There seems to be a relationship between Pennywise and the mentally disturbed here. Finally, both movies end in Pennywise's defeat, which was only possible when the Losers banded together to circumvent the interdimensional clown -- and their own afflictions. By having the courage to face their inner demons together, which is represented by a single entity, they could vanquish them, unlike Henry.

Stephen King's choice to call the monster "It" is noteworthy too because the creature doesn't really have a definite form. It is abstract and manifests itself differently for each person -- it's appearance informed only by the fears and traumas of each character. This sounds eerily familiar to psychosis. Pennywise's shapeshifting abilities also describe the nature of mental illness, which is malleable and adaptive, changing according to what might make one suffer the most. Pennywise embodies any indication of mental anguish, making It ever-present and unkillable, but only becoming life-threatening at some of life's slipperiest steppingstones. Just like sicknesses in the mind, It is dark, It is scary, and It is life-negating. But It is only overcome with supportive loved ones.

Even if this theory is untrue and Pennywise is not a manifestation of mental illness, It clearly chooses deeply traumatized preteens to hunt, maybe because It assumed they'd be weakened by abuse and easier to break psychologically. But boy was It wrong.