According to It, when humans got scared, "all the chemicals of fear flooded the body and salted the meat". This is why he prefers to feast on children -- their fears are simple, pure, and powerful compared to the complex, pathological fears of adults. Basically, children are delicious.
Basically, children are delicious. That hunger for tasty, tasty, beautiful fear is pretty much the sole reason It returns to Derry, Maine every 27 years to torment and feed on the townsfolk before retreating into a new cycle of slumber.
First we have to clarify that Pennywise doesn't kill, he is basically an illusion, It kills. It kills children because they are safer to kill then adults. Children are relatively powerless and most people (outside of friends and family) soon forget about them.
By taking the shape of the children's deepest fears and thus scaring them, IT has a great amount of power over them, and fear makes it difficult for a child to fight back.
However, despite all that, there's one thing IT doesn't feature, and that's Pennywise devouring a baby. King doesn't go quite that far, although babies aren't safe from violence in the book completely, thanks to Patrick Hockstetter.
Also in the 2017 film, Georgie's death is changed. As well as having his right arm bitten off, Georgie is trying to crawl away but he was dragged into the sewers and devoured by Pennywise, with an unnamed older woman and her cat being the sole witnesses of the horrific scene, including before Georgie lost his arm.
Stephen King's IT introduced readers to a one-of-a-kind creature that can take any form, the most common one being Pennywise the Dancing Clown, and as menacing as it is, this creature has one big enemy it's truly scared of: Maturin, the turtle.
In the novel, It's origins are nebulous. He took the form of a clown most frequently, Mr. Bob Gray or Pennywise, but his true form is an ancient eldritch entity from another universe who landed in the town that would become Derry by way of an asteroid and first awoke in 1715.
They reach the conclusion that Pennywise has all of the adults under some sort of spell that prohibits them from seeing him. The adults of Derry are shown to be villainous in their own right as well. The adults of Derry are shown to be true villains of the story in the same way as Pennywise.
In the novel, It claims that its true name is Robert "Bob" Gray, but decided to be named “It”. Throughout the book, It is generally referred to as male, usually appearing as Pennywise. The Losers come to believe It may be female after seeing it in the form of a monstrous giant spider that lays eggs.
The cinematic adaptation of Stephen King's It Chapter Two depicted the satisfying death of Pennywise while subtly hearkening back to Pennywise's first 1988 victim, Bill's brother Georgie.
IT arrived on Earth through an event similar to an asteroid impact, landing in what would later become Derry, Maine. Once there, IT adopted its usual pattern of hibernation that lasted between 27 and 30 years, awakening to kill and eat and then going back to sleep.
It was said on page 1361 that the Spider being both female and pregnant was a symbolic interperetation. Its not literal, but a representation of whatever equivalent but inconceivable reproductive capability It actually has. Pennywise didn't become pregnant.
However, It must surrender the the laws of whatever shape It takes. Pennywise's strength is also his weakness. For example, if he were to take the shape of a werewolf (as he does in the novel), silver bullets would harm him.
IT (also commonly known as Pennywise) is an ancient alien/eldritch monster and the title character and the overall secondary antagonist of the Stephen King multiverse, serving as the titular main antagonist of the It Miniseries and it's two film adaptations IT and IT: Chapter Two.
In the film, it is more than hinted that Richie, played as an adult by Bill Hader and as a youth by Finn Wolfhard, has a “secret” (something Pennywise threatens him with): that he has an attraction to Eddie Kaspbrak, played as an adult by James Ransone and as a youth by Jack Dylan Grazer.
This is one of the most interesting Hollywood couplings we learned about in quite some time. Apparently, Pennywise and the Babadook are dating. In fact, they're in a long term committed relationship.
Throughout Stephen King's It, Pennywise is referred to as a male, but author Stephen King pulled a fast one on readers in the It book ending by revealing the creature's true form was a pregnant spider, implying that it is, in fact, biologically female.
A neighbor witnesses his disappearance, but the fact his body is never found gives Bill hope Georgie somehow survived. Pennywise prays on this in the film, using that hope to lure Bill in the finale. Bill later finds the tatters of Georgie's coat and finally accepts his brother is gone.
Answer and Explanation: No, Stephen King's It is not based on a true story. King had the idea for It when looking at an old wooden walking bridge in 1978 near his home in Boulder, Colorado.
If you are talking about the science when Georgie dies, Pennywise was thinking about his first meal in 27 years, and in Pennywise's words, fear in a kid is like “salting the meat.” So, when Georgie was laughing, Pennywise knew Georgie was not scared so he stopped laughing to make sure he was still fearful.