Let’s compare the events in the opening sequence of the books Steven King’s ‘IT’ and Michael Crichton’s ‘Jurassic Park’. These openings have much more in common than I thought they would. Let’s start with Jurassic Park, the novel.
Jurassic Park introduces us to a different world of science than ours where genetic engineers create entertainment for a profit with small automated labs. There are no thoughts of restraint on their genetic experiments.
Then in the opening sequence, we meet Dr. Roberta “Bobbie” Carter, a visiting doctor in a Costa Rican village. During a raging storm, a helicopter makes a dangerous landing, and the passengers ask for medical assistance for a coworker injured in a construction accident. Dr. Carter is suspicious because the man’s defensive wounds indicate he was attacked. Probably by an animal. Dr. Carter takes photos of the wounds and the man mumbles, “raptor.” Her orderly, Manuel, explains that raptors are dangerous local ghosts. The patient then vomits, convulses, and dies. The workers take the body and steal Carter’s camera, leaving her no evidence about the encounter. Dr. Carter looks up “raptor” in the dictionary. It means “bird of prey.”
Now let’s do the opening of Steven King’s IT.
In 1957 George Denbrough, a six-year-old, floats a waxed paper boat down a rainy street. His ten-year-old brother Bill helped him make the boat, but Bill has the flu, so George floats the boat himself. The boat speeds up, and George tries to catch it but falls and scrapes his knees. The waxed paper boat goes down a storm drain. George looks in the storm drain, and a yellow-eyed clown pops up, holding his paper boat and some balloons. They talk, and when George reaches for his boat, the clown’s face changes and it rips George’s arm out of its socket. Neighbor Dave Gardner runs out to help Georgie, but is 45 seconds too late. George dies of blood loss, and his family mourns his death in the hospital.
Now let’s do a brutally short summary for each.
In a rain storm, a raptor attacks a construction worker at Jurassic Park, disemboweling him, and the crew life-flight him to Costa Rica. He dies in the hospital.
In a rain storm, a monster clown rips off a six-year-old’s arm, and he dies of blood loss in the hospital.
While I am nudging these summaries to be as similar as I can, the events are eerily alike. Both stories take place during historical rain storms. The monsters attack the victims but do not kill them immediately. Both victims live long enough to die under medical care.
But even if the events are similar, these stories feel so different! Michael Crichton focuses on science, medical terminology, and corporate secrets. He views the story mostly through the eyes of doctors and specialists. There is a mystery around the construction worker’s death.
But Steven King focuses on the young victim. We get to know his family, his love for his brother, and his fears. We meet the monster, and while initially its smell and yellow eyes scare George, the clown creature is friendly and charming. It even makes George laugh. Until George gets too close and the clown’s face changes, breaking George’s mind before it rips off his arm.
So while the events might be similar, the feel, the perspective, the focus, and the characters are quite different. The events of Georgie’s death could be viewed through the eye of a doctor trying to save George. Jurassic Park could start from the perspective of the construction worker attacked by a raptor.
This difference in perspective might indicate why Jurassic Park is a thriller, but IT is a horror novel. The events are equally gruesome in both books. If anything, the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park claim many more victims than the shape-shifting spider monster in IT. But the difference in perspective dramatically changes the experience. Horror puts us close enough to the monster for it to introduce itself. Sci-Fi thrillers include mysteries to solve and scientific questions.
The events may be similar, but the experience is different. We mentally become the characters to some extent when we read. So while in Jurassic Park we start as a visiting medical doctor in a small town who suspects something is off, in IT we are a six-year-old child who meets a monster.
Daniel N. Blair 