It: Welcome to Derry (Season 1) - Post-Halloween Review

A long time ago, as you may remember, I talked about Stephen King’s It — the book, the movies, and the miniseries with Tim Curry. I have always had a soft spot for all of them and found each one distinct and memorable in its own way.

Among these different interpretations, however, I consider the two-part movie directed by Andy Muschietti the most faithful take on the classic story. With fleshed-out characterizations, gruesome effects, and a stellar performance from a good chunk of the cast, including a genuinely iconic turn by Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise the Dancing Clown, I saw It: Parts One and Two as the definitive take on a gargantuan classic story by good old Stephen King.

But here’s what I did not anticipate: the two It movies would eventually earn the honor of an HBO series extension. This series, however, covered far more of It’s story than just what the Losers Club encountered with Pennywise the Dancing Clown, whether as children or as adults.

The result is a TV show called It: Welcome to Derry.

It centered on the same issue: a group of characters encounters an unknowable, deadly force beyond their comprehension, investigates it further, discovers the monstrous force’s weaknesses, and tries to use them against it before it gets to them.

But of course, since this was a prequel, we all know that Pennywise the Dancing Clown would eventually come back. But the question is, what would the characters in this show and this timeline do to contain it?

Before we get there, let’s start with the story.

After Part One showed life in Derry, Maine, in the 1980s and Part Two the 2010s, this show jumped back to the early 1960s. Among the characters confronting the monstrous force in this show was a different group of kids. One of them was Lilly Bainbridge, a little girl ostracized after being declared insane for thinking she had a role in her father’s death. She had watched him die in a dill pickle factory accident while he tried to retrieve a toy she lost back there. Because of that, she was prone to lash out at anyone who dared to call her crazy.

Another girl who went through a lot of heavy-duty prejudice of her own was Ronnie Grogan, who was unfortunate enough to witness her father, Hank, being incarcerated after being wrongly accused of slaughtering a few kids who were killed at a local movie theater.

But that wasn’t necessarily what happened. I will explain later, but to start, let’s say Hank Grogan was framed for it.

While both Lilly and Ronnie were dealing with their struggles, they each confronted the monstrous force differently. Lilly heard the voice of a deceased boy she knew named Mattie, whom she knew when he was alive, down the sinkhole of the bathtub after learning of his tragic death. Ronnie faced it when it took the form of her late mother, spoke to her, and then turned vicious toward her.

After going through such tormenting experiences, as did some other kids they knew, Lilly and Ronnie decided to investigate further to see what the unknowable force was all about and what it tried to do.

On the other end of town, a family called the Hanlons moved in. And yes, this was the same family who’d later have Mike Hanlon as a descendant in the original It. Will, the boy in this family, tried to get used to the neighborhood and the town’s uncompromising, almost racist vibes. Meanwhile, his father, Leroy, was stationed at the nearby Derry Air Force base. There, he questioned some of the tasks and demands expected of him, especially as it became increasingly clear that he and his troops were also dealing with the unknowable force around Derry.

As Leroy investigated further, the investigation led him directly to a variety of sources: a local Native American woman named Rose – who knew about the mysteries behind what they dealt with in town – the infamous house on Neibolt Street, and the primary lead in helping Hanlon’s troops reach the source: Dick Hallorann. As any Stephen King fan will tell you, he was a central character from King’s other classic, The Shining. I swear, much like Hulu’s Castle Rock, it’s intriguing to see how characters from across Stephen King’s stories would interact with each other.

Of course, DIck Hallorann’s mere involvement in the story of It was nothing new. It turned out he also had a role in the original novel, specifically in its ‘Second Interlude’.

And while the general who ordered the investigation, Francis Shaw, had some unscrupulous reasons of his own to look further into the matter, part of it stemmed from his earlier confrontation with that force before he was saved by Rose, whom he befriended while his father fixed his car.

So, with this in mind, what would the kids discover about the sinister force lurking throughout Derry? What would the adults discover about the same force around Derry? Where exactly did it come from? And what connections would it have had with an icon like Pennywise the Dancing Clown?

When I first heard about the show, I was excited to see what it would explore in its extended narrative, since I was already a fan of the original It. On top of that, I became more excited, and intrigued, to hear of Dick Hallorann’s participation and what he would’ve dealt with long before his breakthrough participation in The Shining. I was also intrigued because one of the key aspects I remember from the original It novel was the interspersed newspaper clippings snuck between the chapters centered on the Losers’ Club.

For example, I remember news reports from the novel about Edward L. Corcoran, who reportedly had a rough family life and was killed by the monster after it took on the form of his dead brother, Dorsey. Looking at what It: Welcome to Derry uncovered, I began to wonder whether it would have explored that angle of It the same way The Godfather Part II explored Vito Corleone’s childhood in New York City in the original novel.

While it would be a stretch to say that was the case in this series, what it uncovered of Derry’s history, as well as the Hanlon family’s local legacy, showed far more character in Derry and its citizens than I would have imagined.

And, while it did a great job exploring many key aspects of It that arguably went unexplored in the original two-part film, what it did pay attention to felt creative enough to jibe with Stephen King’s own creative hand, while also carrying enough social commentary to lend it unfiltered realism about what life in Maine was like in the early 1960s.

One of the key aspects of the show that made it such a strong expansion of It was the acting.

Now, first, I have some things to say about Clara Stack, the actress who played Lilly. Don’t get me wrong, I thought she was terrific and did right by her character. She captured Lilly’s vulnerability as a young child scorned for her claims and put in an asylum called Juniper Hill for what she had seen. She also captured her inner fierceness whenever she was provoked into reacting against someone because of what they said and how it triggered her. The more she discovered what she wanted to tell herself wasn’t true, the more she expressed an inner warrior that began to emerge and let her take charge of situations that called for her to lead the way.

But I am just going to say this. There were moments, about half the time throughout the show, when I thought she resembled Millie Bobby Brown and her character Eleven from Stranger Things a little too much. Much like Lilly, Eleven also suffered from extensive abuse and mustered the courage necessary to put her enemies at bay. But because that was achieved to such astounding effect in Stranger Things, I looked at Lilly just a little awkwardly throughout It: Welcome to Derry.

Whenever I thought of Stranger Things, I knew some of its biggest inspirations was E.T., The Goonies, and above all, It, and that it built its own world and characters around the homages it used throughout the show. But here, with Lilly, because she resembled Eleven too much to me, it suddenly felt like we went from seeing Stranger Things follow It’s lead to It following Stranger Things’ lead.

That kind of paradox just seemed a little weird to me as I watched Lilly do her thing throughout the show.

But even though I thought Lilly resembled Eleven too much at times, Stack still brought enough of her own acting talent to make her character and performance fully hers. The more normal Lilly was, the more vulnerable she could be. And the more vulnerable Lilly could be, the more staggering Stack’s performance became. So, I still stand by that she did a great job with what she was given in this show.

Amanda Christine, I thought, was terrific at capturing Ronnie’s sass-mouthed instincts and her willingness to speak her mind whenever things got intense. Yet, for all her tough talk, there were still times when she simply needed her daddy to have her back. She balanced both sides of her character well, delivering empathetic, striking performances on Ronnie’s behalf.

I also have a soft spot for the young boy who played Rich Santos, Arian Cartaya. What I admired about his character was that he had an innocent facade, but was also a wisecracker who engaged in weird banter and activities that set him apart from the other kids, even from his friends, in how he handled life.

Let’s not forget Matilda Lawler, who played Lilly’s best friend, Marge Truman. At first, I thought she would be one of the victims at school, just like Lilly. But surprisingly, Marge tried to get along with the snooty girls at school, the Pattycakes, not only to fit in but also out of frustration from being alienated by Lilly for so long. At times, Lawler captured so much of their likeness that I thought Marge would end up on the same page as them and become more like them instead of staying on Lilly’s side all the time. But as soon as she and Lilly came clean about their insecurities and why they did what they did, Marge began to reveal more of her character as she finally embraced who she really was and owned up to it. Just like Clara Stack, Lawler began to show an inner fierceness that would determine where she stood when facing the unimaginable.

The boy who played Will Hanlon, Blake Cameron James, was terrific in what he conveyed in his borderline humility. From what Will experienced in the show, he was a humble boy who had to move between places while also being under his parents’ watchful eye, as James also conveyed well. However, as soon as Will caught wind of some of the weirdness going on in town, right down to the unknowable sinister force that began to terrorize Derry, James began to unleash through him more curiosity about his surroundings and enough resolve to look into whatever went wrong in town so that he would help out other people, including the new friends that he began to make.

Jovan Adepo, who played Will’s father, Leroy, gave off vibes of being a proud general and soldier who would do anything for his country, and it looked to me like he was willing to do so even if it meant being ridiculed for being a person of color serving in the Air Force. I could tell that, because of his pride, it gave him a fierce priority in protecting his family, both his wife and his son, and he did whatever it took to arrange the best that he could afford for himself and his family. But the longer Leroy understood what he and his troops dealt with, Adepo conveyed a more gradual vulnerability and fear that Leroy didn’t think he’d feel, also as far as his family was concerned.

I’m also really impressed by what Taylour Paige provided to Will’s mother, Charlotte.

She wasn’t just a feisty Black woman who wasn’t afraid to speak her mind like Ronnie; she was a fierce, protective, common-sensical, and outspoken young woman with experience protesting against other people and forces. Because of that, it shaped her into being the kind of mother who would know when to step outside her comfort zone or into those of other people to hand over the truth as she saw it on a silver platter. And when it became clear just what Leroy’s priorities began to show as far as his job or family were concerned, that’s when she began to express more uncertainty as to where her allegiances lay. Even when what they confronted leaned more into the fantastical side, it still didn’t deter her from sticking to her guns and standing by her family and friends, as Paige would demonstrate most effectively.

Madeleine Stowe, who played Ingrid Kersh, was clearly a woman of many different impressions. At first, she seemed like a normal, average-looking young lady in the neighborhood who had others’ best interests at heart, especially Lilly’s. Lilly even began to trust her after running into her during her visits to Juniper Hill. However, as soon as Lilly discovered her character’s horrifying past, she suddenly conveyed a twisted sense of appreciation for her father, Bob Gray, who carried likenesses to Pennywise the Dancing Clown. As that truth about Ingrid was revealed, Stowe took on a more sinister, morbid angle, which showed me how much Ingrid idolized the wrong people for the wrong reasons.

And finally, Chris Chalk as Dick Hallorann was just incredible. He may have outdone himself in capturing all the conflicted, pained aspects his character had to go through, part of which I’m convinced came from his telekinetic gifts. The fact that he was unfortunate enough to extend his psychic readings far beyond reading other people’s minds told me what aspects of his telekinesis he could tap into, and exactly what a vulnerable state he’d put himself in if he caught the monster’s attention. I may not know how Chris Chalk conveyed his character compared to Scatman Crothers, Melvin Van Peebles, or Carl Lumbly. Whatever the case may be, he put all Dick Halloran’s conflicting aspects on full display through his acting, and he helped him come alive in ways I never imagined.

James Remar clearly played Francis Shaw like an underhanded general with something else on his mind. But he played him so realistically, with so little overt malice, that he felt more like a real person with believable dilemmas. His inflections told me exactly what Shaw initiated the mission for, who he was doing it for, and whether it would have brought him and the town of Derry any semblance of peace, quiet, or satisfaction.

And need we forget Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise the Dancing Clown?

If you’ve seen Skarsgård in It: Parts One and Two, you know how masterful his performance was, and what a distinct take he brought to the notorious clown. With his jittery movements, extreme contortion, and threatening disposition, he unleashed a full-on fright-fest personified.

Well, in this show, he was no different.

On top of maintaining what made it so famous in the movies, Skarsgård also continued to set his character ablaze with its unhinged nature and even some borderline slyness to highlight how it was not all brawn and that it was also all brains, and that it could pinpoint exactly what its unsuspecting victims were afraid of and use it against them, however much some characters like Francis Shaw refused to admit it. So, Skarsgård continued to do no wrong with Pennywise the Dancing Clown, and because of that, he brought the show to life. He even executive produced the show, which helped a great deal.

He also portrayed Bob Gray, and for what he had going for him, he helped convey this performer as normal as can be, from his showman antics to his love for his daughter and even his drinking habits. So, when he was subjected to the terrifying monster that’d plague Derry, it was shown in an eye-opening but no less tragic light.

As for the characters themselves, I found them genuinely intriguing, despite my initial worries that they’d feel too familiar from the original It mythos or too on-the-nose in their representation of 1960s social cliques.

Lilly was a compelling character who faced dilemmas no child her age should ever have to face. Losing her father in a food factory accident and being sent to an insane asylum because no one believed her was more than enough for her to endure.

Yet those rough patches in her life tested her will and reserve, revealing what she could do, who she truly was, how crazy she was or was not, and how she could pull herself together before the sinister force struck her or anyone else down.

Ronnie was a pretty cool smart-mouth kid who knew enough about what went on around her not to buy into the lies she was told. But when it concerned Hank, who ended up a convicted murderer and was to be sent to Shawshank Prison, her inner vulnerability showed, reminding me that she was still a child carrying heavy baggage. That shift only made her willingness to confront the terrifying force, despite her fears, all the more impressive.

Looking at Lilly and Ronnie’s backgrounds, it was fascinating how much conflict they had to work through to get to the bottom of the mysteries surrounding the monster. Lilly was locked up in Juniper Hill asylum for indirectly causing her father’s death in the pickle factory accident, and after what she endured there, she’d do anything to stay away from it. Ronnie wanted Lilly to be straight-up and tell the truth about what they saw at the Capitol Theatre, but Lilly knew that saying a monster killed the three kids would make everyone think she was crazy and possibly send her back to Juniper Hill. That’s what led to Hank Grogan’s arrest in the first place. So, even though they were on the same side, it created a prickly relationship when it came to doing the right thing and added some fascinating drama around their motivations.

I admired Marge and what she stood for in the group dynamics. She had mannerisms like a goofy girlfriend, but she was smart enough to know when to devote her attention to someone else or get someone else’s attention, even if she wasn’t sure she would fit in well alongside them. She was tested on where her allegiances lay, what she thought of Lilly, and what she feared about Lilly’s issues. The longer she kept going, the more she showed a willingness to stand by her friends through thick and thin, even after the people she thought were her friends started to pick on her.

Rich was interesting because of his sense of humor and how he tried to get a firm grasp on what he saw, especially when he reflected on the kids who were slaughtered at the theater.

For example, he often shared wild stories with his friends about his relatives in Cuba. One of the most notable instances was when he told them a story he remembered from Cuba where he would have to summon the spirits through a specific incantation, and that, once they went through with it, they would draw the monster out as it would take on the form of their ancestors, such as Lilly with her father and Ronnie with her mother. But all it took was Richie saying he had to go pee to break the spell, so to speak, as he admitted that what he’d heard from his uncle was really nothing, and that he’d heard it from his cousins.

Will Hanlon was a humble kid who tried to fit into society. Yet he was observant enough to notice the little things that went wrong in Derry, so he knew when to look into them more and pick them apart until he understood what was going on in town that nobody was telling him. That made him intriguing, as did his determination to do the right thing even when it differed from what his parents told him was right. His bookishness, especially his interest in science textbooks, hinted at a high level of knowledge and at what his future son would later become.

His father, Leroy, was a respectable officer who did whatever it took to make himself, his family, and others proud as a fellow soldier in the U.S. Air Force. But when he was confronted with things he was not very familiar with, like the sinister force in town, the reason for the missing persons, or what his own family had to deal with, it tested how scared he really was and whether he was willing to face that unknowable force in the eye.

Speaking of confronting evil and looking it dead in the eye, Francis Shaw was an interesting case. For most of the show, I would have thought he was just a conceited, blank-eyed racist who wanted to give the orders and think nothing of whatever weirdness went on in town.

But the longer the show dwelt on his priorities, ideas, and visions, the more I understood what he was fighting for and what kept him going. By the time his traumatic past as a young boy was revealed — when the sinister monster took on the shape of an older man who lunged at him, begging for mercy — I understood how severe this was, even to people like him and to Rose. So Shaw had compelling dynamics going on.

Will’s mother, Charlotte, was a truly impressive case. I knew she would be fierce as Will’s mother, but her fierce independence and background in activism showed what she had done before and what she could do whenever things got too hectic, overbearing, or one-sided for her. In the opening, when she noticed a group of boys picking on someone else, she immediately lunged out to break up the fight. That moment showed which fights she was willing to pick and which she had to leave alone, even if others would have gotten hurt without her stepping in. From there, her growing understanding of the strange things going on in town became more intriguing.

You know, much like Lilly and Ronnie, the difference in motivations and stances between Leroy and Charlotte was fascinating to look at as well. Leroy, who had just come back home from serving in the Korean War, wanted to do everything in his power not just to make his family proud, but also to do his country proud, since he became motivated to do so after hearing stories from his father and Will’s grandfather about his service in the Army. Charlotte, however, being a former activist, became savvy enough to know when things looked off, who may have been guilty, and why she believed that any wrongs that can be made right should be righted when they had a chance, which Leroy was uncomfortable with. That difference led to some fascinating fallouts between them over doing the right thing, especially as far as Will was concerned.

Rose seemed like a respectable, modest, but strong-willed woman who knew what was going on in Derry and the different means necessary to contain the sinister force terrorizing it – she and her people referred to it as ‘Kollu’ – even if others, when they did catch on, had different ideas for how to challenge it. But she knew what had to be done to keep it at bay and prevent it from wreaking more havoc, especially after Dick Hallorann tapped into her nephew’s consciousness and revealed the monster’s location. What happened was, the monster resisted the powerful energy stemming from shards of the meteor it came to Earth from. So, after fearing the intrusion of the force into their lives, the tribe found a way to break off shards of the meteor, bury them across patches of land, and make an energetic cage out of them with which to entrap the monstrous force.

As for Dick Hallorann… I’ll be frank. I haven’t read or watched The Shining yet, so this was my first look at his character and what he was capable of. But I like how the show kept his psychic powers under wraps. As much as we’d want to know how they came about, it would probably ruin the mystery. But in Hallorann’s case, he knew how to harness his powers to reveal details most others either never knew or would have kept to themselves. That made him vulnerable every time the sinister force tried to take him over, and it revealed how traumatized he was by his psychic powers and what that would do to other people if he used them for his own ends or those of others.

As for Ingrid Kirsch, I found her fascinating because of how she usually lived her life and what she thought she truly saw in her father, Bob Gray, who performed as a clown back in the 1900s. At first, she seemed like a good friend who came from the last place Lilly expected to run into her. But her history as Bob Gray’s daughter, as well as a possible sidekick to Pennywise the Dancing Clown called Periwinkle, gave her a creepy background that may or may not have shaped her unhealthy desires.

While the story was a slight departure from what I was used to in Stephen King’s original It, it explored ideas that felt creative and in tune with how King would have expanded the world of Derry and the story of It. We already know he expanded on The Stand, in a way, with The End of the World as We Know It, and in some cases, Derry was even the setting for some of King’s other stories, such as ’11/22/63’ and even ‘Autopsy Room Four’. But It: Welcome to Derry felt like the closest we’d ever get to seeing Stephen King elaborate further on the story of It altogether.

But that’s another thing I want to address about the show and actually salute it for.

In the original It, the story was mostly about a group of kids who discovered the monster and did whatever they could either to avoid it or put it in its place, only to reunite 27 years later to take it on once more and do the monster in once and for all. But my point is, with It: Welcome to Derry, it didn’t show just a group of kids trying to understand the source behind the monster, but also the local adults who were initially not aware that they were being entangled in scenarios and situations tied to what they didn’t understand, which, in this case, would be the monster that the kids confronted. Even Francis Shaw, who initiated the hunt for the mysterious force, seemed unafraid as he hunted it down and planned to use it for his own ends. In this case, it showed the dark, twisted side of confronting what you don’t understand without fear.

So, when you piece that all together, you could tell that there’s more of a widespread involvement going on between more than just the children of Derry, but also some of the adults who understood that there’s something not right going on with Derry, or, for that matter, near its Air Force.

Now that I think about it, let’s talk about one such technique the kids attempted to use against the monster. At one point, Lilly, Ronnie, Rich, and Will got their cameras ready to take pictures of the monster, and because Will, a science bookworm, knew how to process photos, he had them do exactly that at the Derry school at night. The next day, they handed the pictures to police chief Clint Bowers, only to realize they showed random things rather than the monster itself, so Bowers dismissed them and threatened to send Lilly back to Juniper Hill.

Normally, it’d drive me nuts when people turned in proof of something they found, only for it to be tampered with before they could show it or for the adults not to believe them. But in this case, the adults didn’t believe them mainly because the pictures the kids showed them looked completely different from how the kids passed them off, and mostly from how they looked after they processed and sealed them.

At first, I thought the pictures were sealed and ready to show the police chief before the monster snuck into the enclosed manila envelope and changed the pictures into something else. But apparently, the pictures turned out different because of the monster’s subjective nature. The forms the monster could take in the eyes of those who saw it and took pictures of it were what only they could see, not the pictures.

Ultimately, while I would’ve found it more refreshing if the pictures still captured what the kids saw of the monster, only for it to change the pictures into something else even after they were sealed up, I still found this a solid twist because it reaffirmed the terrifying, chilling nature of the monster. You never know where it could be, how it could be perceived by those who witnessed it, or how it could tamper with other people just as it had with Lilly and her friends.

I’m also taken aback by the show’s intro. It started as a series of postcard-like illustrations showing the kids and families doing their own fun things. But then, it took on more sinister angles when it showed more people getting assaulted, shot, getting bloody wounds, or being about to be operated on in an insane asylum, not to mention being scorched alive. And finally, once it was all finished, it shifted out of the illustrated facade to reveal ‘Welcome to Derry’ in the style of those usual ‘Greetings from…’ postcards. And that was after we’d seen all the horrifying imagery presented in an otherwise pleasant 1950s illustration facade, all set to the song ‘A Smile and a Ribbon’ by Patience and Prudence.

The intro’s cheery morbidity made it surprisingly funny yet unnerving to watch and listen to. That, of course, fit nicely with the show’s aesthetic: childlike innocence paired with horrifying explorations of the macabre.

Of course, while it did show some imagery resembling what we’d see in this season, with Juniper Hill and the Duck-and-Cover class practices, it also showed scenarios we haven’t seen in the show. While I initially thought of that imagery as just setting the mood for the show, a few clues told me what the intro really hinted at, and I’ll explain more later.

Besides ‘A Smile and a Ribbon’, I was impressed by how the show used its songs. They helped hone the general atmosphere of the 1960s, while most of the songs in the end credits indirectly tied into what the characters dealt with.

But three aspects of the show stood out to me, and each one deserves attention.

The first was what the pilot episode kicked off the show with.

The episode introduced Mattie, a young boy trying to flee Derry, especially his family, as he hitched a ride with a family claiming they were headed to Portland. The longer it went on, however, the clearer it became that Mattie felt lured into a trap, with the monster revealing itself as a demonic baby devil with wings before attacking and killing Mattie. And that was four months before the events of this season. From there, it introduced Lilly and Ronnie, along with a few local kids who knew Mattie: a Jewish boy named Teddy, his friend Phil, and his sister, Susie. The episode established them well, with enough backstory to interest me as they banded together to find the source of Mattie’s disappearance before running into the monstrous force. That felt very in line with Stephen King’s work.

But what really shocked me was what the episode ended on.

As you may remember from my review of Dune: Prophecy, Reverend Mother Dorotea’s death signaled how Dune: Prophecy showed its true colors as an HBO show. From that review, I also elaborated on how The Penguin and Lanterns, despite being TV extensions of the DC Universe, were not shy about the usual techniques that make an HBO show, and how much that separated them from the movies they expanded from, The Batman and Superman, all of which were PG-13. Dune: Part One and Part Two were also PG-13, yet Dune: Prophecy leaned into what was clearly R-rated territory.

So, what was so shocking about It: Welcome to Derry compared to what the already dark ‘It’ had going for it? The pilot opened with Mattie fleeing the Capitol Theatre, and later Lily, Teddy, Phil, and Susie sat down to watch The Music Man and identify what Lilly heard Mattie sing to her from the movie, from her bathtub’s sinkhole. Then they saw Mattie himself in the movie, and when Mattie recognized them, he crept forward and suddenly mutated into the demonic baby devil that had attacked him earlier. After that came an unanticipated bloodbath as the episode ended on a clearly petrified Lilly and Ronnie reflecting on what they had experienced in the movie theater, down to the deaths of poor Teddy, Phil, and Susie after they were instantly slaughtered like game. That, to me, was when the HBO side of the show kicked in.

It’s like it took Georgie Denbrough’s death and pushed it to a whole new level. But as shocking as it was, it worked on another level.

Phil happened to be Jewish, for he was shown celebrating his bar mitzvah. Normally, that would suggest this character would be the show version of Stanley Uris, who was Jewish himself. However, as soon as I saw him, Teddy, and Susie massacred, that’s the show’s way of telling me that just because this is the same universe as It doesn’t mean the kids it would focus on would be the same as the Losers’ Club. These were just a different group of kids with different fortunes with the monster than the Losers’ Club would eventually have.

What’s more, because no one would’ve believed the story of a monster attacking people, that was how Hank Grogan was framed for their murder. Since he was the theater manager, they suspected him of the kids’ murders.

In fact, this reminds me to address one other thing about Hank Grogan. While he was clearly innocent and was not at the theater when the kids died, he didn’t stay back home, either, as he insisted to whoever asked him. It turned out that he had an affair with a married white woman, which, as he explained to Charlotte when she asked him, he was too terrified to tell anyone. Later, the show would reveal that the white woman Grogan hung out with was Ingrid Kirsch. This made him seem more human and less innocent than he appeared.

The second was the origin of Pennywise the Dancing Clown. It was previously elaborated during Mike Hanlon’s hallucinations in the original novel when he engaged in a smoking ritual with a native tribe, and also as Mike explained in Part Two. In the show, it went into even greater detail on the origins of the monstrous force that famously took on the form of Pennywise the Dancing Clown and terrorized the town of Derry. Only, it wasn’t presented to us in a hallucinatory stage. It expanded on what Mike saw until it felt fully believable and tangible within Stephen King’s mythology.

And of course, it made sense that this would be revealed through Native American means, because Mike discovered the origins of the monstrous force through the collaborative efforts of Native American tribes, who had him smoke a peace pipe so he could learn more about what they faced.

As the show delved further into Ingrid Kirsch’s parental background, it showed that she idolized her father, whose role, Pennywise the Dancing Clown, was a famous clown in the early 20th century. As a little girl, she even dressed up as Periwinkle, possibly to star alongside her father as a duo. The original actor who played Pennywise the Dancing Clown, Bob Gray, was a terrific performer but harbored no ill will, aside from his constant drinking. But it was not until he tried to help who he thought was a lost kid out of the goodness of his heart that he tragically became subjected to the monstrous force, with poor Ingrid being left all alone.

That’s how it took the form of Pennywise the Dancing Clown and terrorized others in that form. It revealed several intriguing aspects of the monstrous force: how it came to Derry, how it took on the forms it could, and what a negative impact this had on the characters who ran into it or on Derry.

The third part of the show that stood out to me took place in a little spot mentioned in the original novel called the Black Spot. This was where Dick Hallorann’s primary involvement in It’s Second Interlude became more prominent in this show.

Ronnie was reunited with Hank after escaping an accident that totaled the Shawshank prison bus. From there, they, along with Will and Rich, joined Dick Hallorann and his troops and spent time with the rest of the Black community. This came after Hallorann requested that he and his friends move there for better shelter during their army service. From there, they fixed it up and turned it into a nice hangout with a bar.

But then, Clint Bowers, who was just laid off for not keeping Hank Grogan incapacitated, rallied a group of outraged rioters against him, thinking he was still guilty of the murders of Phil, Teddy, and Susie. As they reached the Black Spot, they flung Molotov cocktails into the hut in the hopes of slaughtering everyone inside, especially Hank Grogan. After Rich and Marge tried and failed to find a way out, Rich shoved her into a treasure chest, then lay on top of it, keeping it shut so Marge would be okay. Unfortunately, by keeping the chest shut, Rich would have died from smoke inhalation.

I remember the deaths of the first three kids from the pilot episode for how shockingly violent and graphic it was, especially since it was done to children. But this was more tragic because we got to know Rich pretty well, even by comparison. Also, during that time, Rich admitted to Marge that he had a crush on her. The show hinted at it throughout the season, with Rich’s extended gazes at her, especially when she hung out with the Pattycakes. But this was where he ultimately admitted his true feelings for her, making his death at such a young age feel more gut-wrenching.

What’s more, it turned out that Ingrid Kirsch tipped Bowers off about Hank Grogan’s whereabouts, but it was less out of infidelity and more out of something else. As she delusionally explained to Lilly, she knew the monster they confronted would feed off someone else’s fear, and that once it came forth, Bob Gray could be brought back to her. So she started the riot and heightened everyone’s fears throughout the Black Spot for that reason.

It hit hard because this time, it revolved not just around a monstrous force, but also an angry mob. The episode it came from, also called ‘The Black Spot’, may have done the best job of blurring the lines between supernatural evil, realistic evil, and even the pursuit of justice at its most unhinged. It hit home the ugliness of vigilantism and borderline racism, and the harm that would do to those who were caught in the crossfire.

And the visuals applied to this show, what can I say? Because HBO already outdid itself with the visuals in Game of Thrones, I knew they’d do right by something like It in the form of It: Welcome to Derry. What was unleashed throughout the show may have been no Game of Thrones visuals. However, they were still remarkable, closely mirroring how the visuals were pulled off in the two-part movie, with the sinister force’s sense of trickery victimizing the children further and making them more vulnerable than they already were.

But probably the most gruesome example is when the monster caught Marge by surprise and tampered with her so it would have looked like her eyes were bulging out. This happened after Marge was already grossed out by watching a snail in an educational video. Thinking her eyes were affected the same way, Marge tried to cut them off with a buzzsaw, only for Lilly, who was trying to help snap her out of it, to be mistaken for assaulting her when she was caught with a chisel in her hand. But because of what the pose and imagery implied, I was surprised Lilly wasn’t thrown into jail or expelled. However, Marge reassured the school that it was an accident and that Lilly was trying to help, which helped soften the blow and showed what shreds of friendship they still shared. That was a little weird to see. I thought they would have automatically pointed to Lilly as the culprit, so-called.

The visuals were not always consistently fluid, though. Whenever the monster bled from being struck, the blood usually levitated and flew from it. But there’s just something about the levitation that seemed a little cheesy.

But beyond that, everything else about the series, from the period details to the performances, to the characterizations, to its instincts as an expansion, demonstrated just what a powerhouse the story of It had. This show had so much more to tell than the already massive 1,000-page doorstopper of a book started with.

What’s even more remarkable was that the ending implied there are more explorations of Derry on the horizon, as it ended with a banner saying this season of It: Welcome to Derry was Chapter One. Fortunately, the show was picked for a second season, or, in this case, a second chapter, and it was said that the show would continually go back another 27 years to show the different times when the monster would try to take care of the ancestors of the descendants who would eventually stop it.

Here’s what happened. In the season finale, ‘Winter Fire’, Pennywise confronted Marge as she tried to escape it and told her it was going to kill her because of what her son Richie would do to it 27 years later. That’s right, Marge would eventually be the mother of Richie Tozier from the original story. As Pennywise continued, it told her that whichever time it ended up in - the past, the present, or the future - they were all concurrent to it. Because of this, it became aware of its future demise at the hands of the Losers’ Club, so it would do anything it took to stop those who tried to stop it, particularly through the ancestors of those who would intervene against it. As Marge and Lilly talked about that, they wondered if this monster would try to hop back in time to axe off the ancestors before their descendants stopped it, much like how it tried to stop Marge from giving birth to the boy who would stop it. What are the odds it would go back even further in time to stop the ancestors of Marge, Lilly, or any of this season’s main characters from stopping it?

Because 27 years was all it’d take for the monster to be forced to rest, it would explain why the monster lunged out and attacked those resistant enough to defy it and gain the upper hand. The Losers Club would defeat the monster as kids in 1988. They’d do it in for good as adults 27 years later in 2016. The main characters of this season would defeat the monster 27 years before the Losers’ Club would. And judging by where the show is going, the monster will try to hop through the many different 27-year intervals to avert its demise.

As for the next season, it’s supposed to take place in 1935, and the focus would be on a rogue gang of criminals, called the Bradley Gang, who would try to seize power only to run into the monster along the way. Maybe that explains the mob-like massacre in the intro, like it foreshadowed what to expect throughout the show, not just its first season.

When I looked back in the original novel, Mike Hanlon elaborated on certain historical events that he suspected were instigated by Pennywise the Dancing Clown. Not just the Bradley Gang massacre of the Depression, but also the Kitchen Ironworks fire of 1908. That may have been what I saw throughout the intro besides what it hinted at throughout this season.

What’s more, the showrunners stated that they planned for It: Welcome to Derry to last three seasons. If anything, that means we might have just seen the intro lay the groundwork for what the show plans to dig deep into. So, it makes me hopeful to see more of the story of It done right, and in a way that honors Stephen King’s original craftsmanship.

One more thing I want to point out. This season ended with Ingrid Kirsch being institutionalized at Juniper Hill, as it jumped forward into the late 1980s. She walked into another room after hearing wailing over a woman who committed suicide. There, she saw a father and her daughter hunkering down in sorrow as the daughter turned around to see Ingrid. And who was that daughter?

Beverly Marsh, played once again by Sophia Lillis.

I tell you, every time the show made connections to the original story of It, as it did earlier with the house on Neibolt Street, it did a good job of throwing in some fan service without going over the top with it, and also to remind us of what would eventually happen in Derry beyond this season.

Until then, this first season was a tremendous first effort by HBO to expand the world of It. The characters were all fleshed out, the performances were very strong, the period details were accurate, its blending of fantastical elements and realistic horrors was smoothly tied together, its expansions were creative, its references to Stephen King’s other work were ingenious, and for what it had going for it, it did open the door for further explorations of Derry that would put even the newspaper clippings from the original It to shame.

I hope you’re ready for a little fright fest, because if you’re familiar with It, then this will do you and It proud.

You’ll float, too, with this show.

My Rating

A low A-

Additional Thoughts

On Halloween last week, as of this writing, a new special aired, entitled ‘A Story of Derry’, that detailed how Rose’s ancestors – specifically Necani, her friends, and their tribe – dealt with the monstrous force before finding the shards of the meteor to keep it at bay with. It was labeled as the one part of the story that the natives willingly left out, so expect some shocking revelations about some of the native’s motivations. Nonetheless, this special did a terrific job of going deeper into the story and showing other sides of the already eye-opening story, the likes of which Rose’s ancestors passed down through generations.