What the hell happened here? I quite enjoyed Chapter 1 as it didn't hold back on moments of gore and, for the most part, showed Pennywise as a predator that used their own fears against the kids. It looked good enough and didn't go crazy with the visual effects.

Chapter 2 is completely different tonally and the difference between the 2 chapters is jarring. Where Chapter 1 had moments of tension, every moment of tension in Chapter 2 is undermined immediately by stupid jokes that take you out of the scene right away. Seriously, every time something "scary" happens, one of the characters says something to completely destroy any believability or sense of immersion. Example: [spoiler]After Eddie gets stabbed in the face by an insane Henry Bowers, pulls the knife out of his own face and stabs Henry in the chest, before leaving the bathroom he makes a remark about his mullet. So getting stabbed in the face apparently isn't a big deal..?[/spoiler]
The Richie and Eddie characters are the biggest offenders and halfway during the movie become absolutely obnoxious.

The CG in this movie is such a mixed bag. The effects applied to Pennywise are okay for the most part but there are a couple of scenes [spoiler]The old lady that attacks Beverly at her old home, the monster that attacks Eddie at the pharmacy, Pennywise in the entire end sequence[/spoiler] that look absolutely horrible. For some reason Hollywood has a tradition of making the CGI worse as the budget for the movie goes up and this is definitely one of them. The budget was more than twice as much as the first movie ($35m to $79m) so I guess the more famous names in this 2nd chapter got paid very well.

They could have had a really nice remake on their hands with these two movies but Chapter 2 simply falls short.