‘It: Welcome to Derry’ review: Stephen King prequel is knuckle-gnawing, hair-raisingly scary – a terrifying tour de force

With a big stamp of approval from Stephen King, this horror is a proper Halloween spooky treat

The superb Bill Skarsgård returns as Pennywise the clown, the terrifying manifestation of an ancient evil entity, in the horror series ‘It: Welcome to Derry’. Photo: HBO

Stephen King has always been highly protective of his work and can be prickly about film and TV adaptations.

At this stage, the author’s dislike of Stanley Kubrick’s version of The Shining is the stuff of legend. If you’ve read the novel, you’ll know he has valid reasons for being unhappy, although he seems to have mellowed of late.

See Full Page