The Derry Prequel Has Uncovered a Figure from Stephen King's It That's Been Hiding in Plain Sight the Whole Time
The latest installment of It: Welcome to Derry is loaded with fresh details, offering the clearest look yet at Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise. However, with so much baked into one episode, a understated disclosure might have been missed entirely, and it's a aspect that needs to be discussed.
After Leroy Hanlon discovers that Derry is essentially a mystical prison for an ancient evil, he swiftly relocates his family to the air force base on the outskirts. It is also revealed that Hank Grogan's bus to the state penitentiary was ambushed. Later, we see him in the back of Madeleine Stowe's character car. Initially, it looks like he's seized control as a means of getting out of town. However, once in the woods, the two embrace with a kiss.
Hank claims the bus was attacked (presumably by Pennywise), allowing him to escape. He then asks Ingrid to locate a person who can help him prove he was framed for the cinema killings.
At the end of the episode, Ingrid reaches out to meet with Mrs. Hanlon, who is already interested in Hank's situation. It is here that Ingrid looks directly into the camera and reveals her full name.
“Mrs. Hanlon, my name is Kersh, Ingrid. You aren't familiar with me, but we have a mutual friend,” she says.
If that surname is familiar, it’s because a character named Mrs. Kersh appears in the It novel, as well as both the It miniseries and It: Chapter 2 film. She’s the elderly lady that one of the Losers' Club mistakenly visits, who eventually turns out to be one of the clown's numerous disguises. However, Welcome to Derry suggests that the character was a real person, not just a manifestation of Pennywise. Whether Ingrid is the offspring of this character or the character itself is unconfirmed, but it's entirely possible that Ingrid and Mrs. Kersh identical.
In It: Chapter 2, which shares the same continuity as Welcome to Derry, the character portrayed by Joan Gregson has a couple of tells: the way she pronounces the word “father” and the line “no one truly perishes in Derry,” both of which Ingrid has said, in turn, throughout the season, in a similar cadence to the film.
If this pivotal character is indeed an actual person and not just a disguise of the entity, it will not bode well for Ingrid, especially as she seeks to untangle the conspiracy behind the theater murders. Of course, we are aware that the entity is to blame for the killings. That means the chances are pretty good that she — along with Hank and Charlotte — will likely cross paths with the otherworldly being.
In a earlier discussion, Stephen Rider noted how pleased he feels about the recent plot twists and that Hank is being given more depth. "I play roles as a Black actor on screen, and a lot of times you don’t get all the meat, you just deliver background information," he says. "For him to have that hidden truth --- as actors, we have to develop those nuances independently. [...] But Hank has that."
With only a trio of installments remaining, expect more narrative threads to intersect as the season barrels toward its finale. After the revelations in episode 5, the truth about who Ingrid is is likely imminent. And if she is indeed the same person, Ingrid will join the long list of fated individuals destined to become linked to the clown for generations to come.