IT’s 10 Scariest Forms That Aren’t Pennywise, Ranked (Including Three Cut From the Movies and Show)

When fans think about Stephen King’s IT, the book, the movies, the TV series, or even just the Lovecraftian nightmare monster itself, there’s literally one thing that comes to mind: The clown. This makes sense, of course, the narrative of the story has proven time and time again that Pennywise the Dancing Clown is the preferred form of IT across media, but also the one fans flock to. There’s a bit of a crutch here for the adaptations, as it means one actor can just keep playing the monster scene after scene, but one of the best things about IT as an entity is the widespread powers that it has at its disposal, including shapeshifting.

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As fans know well, Pennywise may be the most iconic face that IT wears, but it’s far from the only one. Across the novel and all the adaptations, IT has been a creepy librarian in the background, a decapitated and burned child’s body, a school of piranhas, a giant demon baby, and the decomposing corpses of its victims. What becomes clear when looking at the entire tableau of IT’s many faces is that Pennywise isn’t the only one that’s terrifying, and the best part is that some of these forms never even made it out of Stephen King’s novel.

10) The Head of Stan Uris

After the Loser’s Club gets their phone calls from Mike Hanlon that they need to fulfill their pact and return to Derry, all because IT has returned, only one decides not to make the trip. Reminded of the horrors of his youth, Stanley Uris takes his own life in the bathtub and writes a single word on the wall in his blood, “IT.” In wasting no time at all, IT uses the death of Stanley to its advantage, taking on the form of his severed head to taunt the other Losers about how they will no doubt join him in death very soon. This form is great for two reasons, as it shows the two sides of IT, the terrifying one that has a near omnipotent view of its victims and what scares them, but also the one that likes to have a laugh and make jokes.

9) Dobermann

When helping Henry Bowers escape from Juniper Hill Asylum as an adult, IT takes on a slew of unique forms. First, he appears to Henry as Victor Criss, using his dead former pal to brainwash him into doing at least some of his dirty work. As they leave, IT appears to another inmate, Jimmy Donlin, as his decapitated and rotting mother, but it’s the form he takes in the hall as they’re escaping that is the best. The biggest hurdle in the way of Bowers escaping is the guard, Koontz (perhaps named for King’s “rival,” Dean), who, it turns out, is terrified of Dobermann Pinschers. Maintaining his clown clothes and body, IT manages to kill Koontz by becoming an eight-foot-tall Dobermann in a clown suit.

8) Georgie

As we know, IT loves to taunt its victims, so taking on the form of the first victim we see in the book and the movies shouldn’t surprise anyone. What makes this one so distinct is how it doesn’t play into just the fears of the victim, but how IT uses Georgie as a means to hone in on Bill’s doubts and self. By becoming Georgie, IT can haunt Bill by making him believe that he’s the reason his brother died. It also helps that young actor Jackson Robert Scott has a powerful presence in the films, making his time spent as an illusion by Pennywise even more terrifying on the big screen.

7) Pickle Dad

A wholly original form of IT from the HBO series IT: Welcome to Derry, the “Pickle Dad” is easily the most disgusting and horrifying new version of IT that the show brought to life. Honing in on the rumors that Lilly Bainbridge’s father was sliced up by machinery at the pickle factory, IT takes the form of her deceased and dissected father inside the pickle jars of the grocery store. After being terrified by the initial look at her dad’s face inside the pickle jar, Lilly mistakenly knocks over more jars, causing his intestines, hands, and feet to coalesce into a giant, disgusting pile that was once her dad and now smells like vinegar. It’s one of the only instances in Welcome to Derry where the original ideas that the team created manage to match the creativity of King.

6) Creature From the Black Lagoon

In the pages of King’s novel, one of the unfortunate souls who dies at the hands of IT in the summer of ’58 is Eddie Corcoran, a young boy terrorized at first by the visage of his dead brother. This isn’t how IT decides to kill Eddie, though, instead transforming into quite literally the titular beast from The Creature From the Black Lagoon. What makes this scene so terrifying isn’t just that IT’s version of the classic Universal monster is more violent and agile than the one seen on screen, but that he’s still able to kill a character who doesn’t believe what he’s seeing. With his dying breath, Eddie Corcoran makes it clear that he knows the Creature from the Black Lagoon isn’t real, meaning what he’s seeing isn’t real. In the end, it doesn’t matter, as the Creature rips his head from his body and feeds on his corpse. The fear that Eddie had was too powerful for his rational thoughts, and that’s even scarier than the violence of the sequence.

5) The Giant Bird

In the pages of IT, Mike Hanlon sees the monster as a giant bird, but not just any giant bird. IT becomes a giant bird that has the properties of not only a crow that once attacked him as a baby but also Rodan, the pteranodon-like kaiju from Toho’s Godzilla movies. As the bird, with a twenty-foot wingspan, IT terrorizes Mike at the ironworks, even grabbing him with its talons and beak, nipping at him, and trying to eat him. Though it seems likely that this form of IT was removed from the adaptations for budget reasons, or perhaps not wanting the humanoid monster to take on forms that were distinnctly not human, it’s one of the scariest encounters in the book because of how easily it becomes a giant creature with strength to match. In text, the encounter is also one of the longest, a truly terrifying moment where it’s unclear how Mike can even get away.

4) Dracula

Though IT begins this scene in the Derry library by taunting Ben as Pennywise, including some of his trademark jokes, IT quickly transforms into a horrifying version of Dracula. As the book notes, though, it’s not like anything from the movies, not a human Dracula, but more frightening than that. Furthermore, this vampire also doesn’t just have sharp, pointed teeth for lacerating its victims’ skin and drinking their blood; it literally has razor blades for teeth, which it uses to bite down on its own lips and face, throwing the slices of its own flesh at Ben as it screams at him in a bloody whir.

3) The Deadlights

Often noted as the “truest form” of IT, at least in how humans can comprehend it, the Deadlights are one of the most Lovecraftian creations by King. A hypnotizing beam of light, which in the feature films is housed within the terrifying, teeth-laden visage of Pennywise, simply looking at the Deadlights can not only render someone immobile, but also whiten their hair and, of course, drive them insane. Coupled with the tortured screams of all the victims that are slowly being digested by IT, and a horrifying extra “bwahm” noise to cement its place as the final boss of the monster, the Deadlights are a simple idea that is genuinely scary in execution.

2) The Leper

Playing on the fact that Eddie is a hypochondriac, IT takes the form of the diseased leper, whose skin and body are so rotten that it appears his nose has simply fallen off. This form is terrifying because of just how disgusting it really is, but as horrifying as it appears in the movie (where he’s played expertly by Javier Botet), the scene with the leper in the book goes even harder. Not only does the diseased-looking man crawl out from under the porch of the house on Neibolt Street, all while still wearing the Pennywise clown garb, but his tongue folds out to an excessive length. He chases Eddie down the road, offering him sexual favors. It’s disgusting and horrifying, with King putting the reader fully in Eddie’s shoes and his belief that the slightest error would render him sick for life.

1) Mrs. Kersh

Perhaps IT wouldn’t like us noting that its true form isn’t its scariest, but IT should know that Mrs. Kersh is clearly one of the most greatest elements of its repertoire. What makes this specific form so terrifying is how it proves that IT is playing the long game. Beginning the scene as a kind, gentle old woman, Mrs. Kersh lures Bev into her home and appears to not only be normal, but also genuine and nice. As the scene evolves, though, the facade begins to crack, with the book making a note of how her skin and teeth begin to shift and change, becoming more grotesque as the scene carries on.

There’s also, of course, the reveal that her father was none other than Bob Gray, none other than Pennywise the Dancing Clown. By the time Mrs. Kersh has transformed into The Witch, she has cemented her place as the scariest form of IT that isn’t Pennywise, not only because of the genuinely scary aesthetics but also the deep lore drops that come with her.