Reviews
IT: Welcome to Derry - Episode 1 - The Pilot
As a lifelong, dedicated Stephen King fan, someone who even mentioned King in the dedication of my own debut novel, my anticipation for IT: Welcome to Derry was sky-high. The chance to return to that cursed town, to explore the lore that bubbles beneath its surface, felt like a gift. However, after watching the premiere, I’m left with a conflicting mix of deep familiarity and cautious curiosity.
My core issue with this first episode is that it feels less like a new chapter and more like a retread. At its heart, "Welcome to Derry" appears to be setting up more of the same. We are once again following a group of kids who discover a malevolent presence in their town, a discovery spurred by the search for a missing child. The parallels to the Losers' Club and the inciting incident of Georgie's death are impossible to ignore.
This is why I struggle with reviews I've seen calling the show "fresh." How can this premise be considered fresh when we have seen this exact plot structure in every major adaptation of IT?
Frankly, I couldn't help but feel that if we were going to walk this path again, I would have preferred to do it with the original kids from the book, the characters I already know and love.
What truly frustrates me is the missed opportunity. The novel IT is rich with untapped potential for a prequel series. I would have been infinitely more interested if the show had chosen to adapt the harrowing stories and historical interludes from Norbert Keene's sections of the book. Imagine a series that truly delved into the Black Spot fire, the Bradley Gang shootout, or the kitchen full of lumberjacks. That would have been fresh.
That all being said, I’m not checking out just yet. The episode's ending genuinely threw me for a loop, providing a jolt of originality that the preceding 40 minutes lacked. It was a single, compelling hook that was strong enough to pique my interest. I am curious enough to see where it goes, but my initial excitement has been tempered. Welcome to Derry has one more episode to prove it's not just a shadow of the original.
IT: Welcome to Derry - Episode 2 - The Thing in the Dark
After the premiere’s genuinely shocking and brutal finale, I was buckled in. The show had made a violent promise that it wasn't going to be a simple retread. Episode 2, "The Thing in the Dark," immediately takes the show in a very different direction, but it does so by pumping the brakes.
This is a much, much slower and more methodical hour of television than the premiere. It's almost entirely dedicated to setup, moving the new chess pieces into place after the last episode violently knocked the board over. While I appreciate this pivot—moving the focus to the adult-driven mystery, the town's history, and the military's strange involvement—the episode struggles significantly with its pacing.
A lot of the setup felt dragged out. This is the kind of episode where you can feel the writers stretching the plot to fill the runtime. In my opinion, "The Thing in the Dark" could have easily lost 10 minutes and been just as, if not more, effective. The narrative housekeeping is necessary, but it felt bloated.
That said, the patient build-up does pay off. The final supermarket sequence was fantastic. It was a classic, well-crafted horror set piece, building tension with eerie background details before unleashing the scare. It was a strong reminder of what this series is capable of when it finally lets the horror loose.
Ultimately, this feels like a transitional episode, the necessary, slow-burning connective tissue between the premiere's bold statement and the real story. It was a bit of a cinematic exhale, and while I wish it had been tighter, the ending was strong enough to keep me on the hook.