Like Pennywise himself, director Andy Muschietti knows how to make an entrance. Across both *IT* (2017) and *IT: Chapter Two* (2019), Bill Skarsgård’s demonic entity occasionally slithers into frame, slowly and eerily, through the cracks of what’s polite and what’s plausible, before bursting like a hideous geyser to terrify some helpless child. Muschietti’s edge as a director shined in his Pennywise setpieces — the lesser quality of *Chapter Two* notwithstanding. (Even still: the scene between Jessica Chastain and Joan Gregson as Mrs. Kersh? Paralyzing.)
Because maximizing shareholder value is paramount these days, nothing stays in the dark forever. And so, we return to Muschietti’s interpretation of Stephen King’s literary tome with *IT: Welcome to Derry*, a new HBO series helmed by Muschietti along with his producing partner and sister Barbara Muschietti, and screenwriter Jason Fuchs.
Cynical as we ought to be about *Welcome to Derry* as yet another instance of a big studio leveraging its IP library for quarterly growth, it feels right that Muschietti still sits in control. It’s for the better that this prequel feels like an extension of the duology rather than a prolonged prologue.
This is still Derry, Maine as seen in those movies, where nostalgic Americana hides all of its cruelty beneath a veneer of politeness. Handsome production design and muscular sequences of trauma-inducing terror were the markers of Muschietti’s films, and it’s thrilling to see more of that in the first episode of *Welcome to Derry*.
*Welcome to Derry? Welcome to hell, actually.* And it’s great to be back.
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### Here’s What Went Down in “The Pilot” of *IT: Welcome to Derry*, Directed by Andy Muschietti
In the first episode, we meet the main kids of *IT: Welcome to Derry*. But not all of them survive the premiere.
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### Welcome (Back) to Derry
It’s simply not *IT* if the plot isn’t also a coming-of-age tale. Adolescents, caught between childhood and adulthood, are at an age where quite literally no one understands them. They don’t even really know themselves. It’s no wonder Pennywise likes to feed on them. They reek of fear — fresh meat to a hungry lion.
We open with Matty (Miles Eckhardt), a stunted adolescent boy who, as far as we can infer, is just trying to escape a bad home environment. Picked up on the road by another family on their way to Portland (or so they claim), Matty soon realizes whose clutches he’s actually trapped in.
The violent, gruesome “birth” of a demonic baby (The Crimson King, is that you?) is just the beginning of a long, long nightmare for poor Matty. And yet, more for HBO Sunday nights, but alas. As far as everyone else in Derry knows, Matty is dead. But his “friends”—associates, really—suspect otherwise.
At school, nerdy outcasts Teddy (Mikkal Karim-Fidler), who in another life might froth at the mouth over chemtrails, and Fred (Jack Molloy Legault), a realist who gets all his fanciful fixes from comic books, struggle to fit in. Meanwhile, Lilly (Clara Stack), a social pariah haunted by her father’s freakish death at a pickle factory, struggles to forgive herself for hurting Matty’s feelings right before his disappearance.
It isn’t long before Lilly hears from Matty—out of her bathroom pipes (a recurring motif in this saga). Teddy and Fred aren’t convinced until Teddy gets a bizarre late-night visit from Pennywise, in the form of lampshades made of screaming human flesh.
This is all preceded by a scene depicting Shabbat, where Teddy’s frustrated father lectures him on the horrors Jews suffered in the Holocaust, and ends his point by tossing out his copy of *The Flash #123* — an issue that introduced the multiverse to comic books. Is Muschietti foreshadowing a Stephen King multiverse? Or is this a playful nod to Muschietti’s colossal 2023 bomb for Warner-owned DC? (By the way, a pristine copy of that comic might net you about $13,000.)
The kids soon link up with Ronnie (Amanda Christine), another neighborhood kid whose father works at the local movie theater and is one of the few people to last see Matty alive. Putting on *The Music Man* (the movie Matty saw, from which Lilly heard the music coming through her pipes), the kids find Matty in the movie.
But is it really Matty?
Remember, Pennywise feeds on fear. In taking the form of Matty and reminding them all how they collectively treated him, Pennywise instills fear for him to feed from. Basically, he’s preparing dinner, and the theater has become his kitchen.
After Matty digs his face into a mysterious baby wrapped in a yellow blanket, his grin turns sinister — as sharp as a knife. It’s then that *IT* veterans should recall this isn’t the first time they’ve seen Pennywise on a screen before.
Thus begins several minutes of pure, pants-shitting terror.
With diegetic lighting turning the whole place blood red, the demon baby that killed (or did it?) Matty now comes after the kids, sending them screaming and running with no place to hide. Just when you think the action lulls, Muschietti snaps things into focus.
Pennywise straight-up rips apart Teddy, his blood and guts spilling over the popcorn on the floor, before making mincemeat of the other kids off-screen. The only survivors are Ronnie and Lilly, who unknowingly holds the severed hand of Teddy’s little sister.
If *Welcome to Derry* seemed confused about who its main character is at first, it makes it clear by the bitter end whose story it’s really telling. But Lilly isn’t the only one whose story matters.
Jovan Adepo (right) seems to be the “main” adult in *IT: Welcome to Derry*.
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### “A Little Taste of Normal”
*IT* might be a story preoccupied with youth, but it isn’t exclusively about kids. Standing in contrast to the show’s small and already dwindling ensemble of children is its other major character: Major Leroy Hanlon, played by Jovan Adepo.
Fresh from the Korean War, Major Hanlon is assigned to a base in Derry, Maine — the “tip of the spear” against Russia in a war that’s definitely going to happen.
But despite his accolades abroad, not everyone in the Air Force is keen to salute a Black man in 1962.
In our interview with Adepo, the actor told us that *Welcome to Derry* isn’t shying away from the brutal realities of life in a racist America. For now, we’re only seeing the surface — the small indignities and gestures of disrespect, like a refusal to salute in the presence of superior command.
It surely won’t be long before we see worse, like the true colors of Hanlon’s new neighbors. As the major himself said, he’s moving his family into town, which means more Black folk living in a mostly white Maine town.
(If there’s anything we learned from this season of *Peacemaker*, it’s to look closely at the extras.)
It’s 1962, remember. Not everyone will be so welcoming.
To say nothing of Hanlon’s own fears about his newly important position.
Early in the episode, Major Hanlon passes by Special Projects — a closed-off section of the base shrouded in secrecy. Later that night, Hanlon is visited by masked men who beat him for classified specs on experimental weapons.
My first impression was that this was a test; the men would unmask to reveal Hanlon’s own superiors, testing his loyalty. But the men run off to who knows where, leaving the story unresolved. For now.
https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/tv/a69111709/it-welcome-to-derry-episode-1-recap/
