Welcome to Derry Just Uncovered a Figure from It That's Been Under Our Nose the Whole Time
The latest installment of It: Welcome to Derry is loaded with fresh details, offering the most vivid glimpse yet at Pennywise portrayed by Bill Skarsgård. Still, with such a dense narrative packed into a single episode, a understated disclosure might have been missed entirely, and it's a aspect that deserves attention.
After Leroy Hanlon uncovers that Derry is essentially a supernatural containment for an eldritch monster, he swiftly relocates his family to the military installation on the outskirts. It is also revealed that Stephen Rider's character bus to the state penitentiary was ambushed. Later, viewers find him in the back of Madeleine Stowe's character car. At first, it looks like he's taken her hostage as a means of getting out of town. However, once in the woods, the two embrace with a kiss.
Hank claims the bus was assaulted (presumably by the sinister clown), allowing him to break free. He then asks Ingrid to locate a person who can help him demonstrate his innocence for the murders at the movie theater.
At the end of the episode, Ingrid makes contact to meet with Mrs. Hanlon, who is already interested in Hank's situation. It is here that Ingrid addresses the audience and reveals her full name.
“Mrs. Hanlon, my name is Ingrid Kersh. You don’t know me, but we have a mutual friend,” she says.
If that surname is familiar, it’s because a character named the elderly Mrs. Kersh appears in the It novel, as well as both the It miniseries and It: Chapter 2 film. She’s the old woman that Beverly Marsh mistakenly visits, who is later revealed as one of Pennywise’s many forms. However, Welcome to Derry suggests that the character was a actual individual, not just a manifestation of Pennywise. Whether Ingrid is the offspring of this character or the character itself is unconfirmed, but it's quite plausible that Ingrid and Mrs. Kersh identical.
In It: Chapter 2, which exists in the same timeline as Welcome to Derry, Mrs. Kersh has a couple of clues: the way she pronounces the word “father” and the line “nobody in Derry ever really dies,” both of which Ingrid has uttered, in turn, throughout the season, in a similar cadence to the film.
If Mrs. Kersh is indeed an real human and not just a form of It, it will spell trouble for Ingrid, especially as she seeks to untangle the mystery behind the theater murders. Of course, we are aware that It is responsible for the killings. That means the likelihood is high that she — along with Hank and Charlotte — will probably encounter with the supernatural force.
In a previous interview, Stephen Rider noted how glad he is about the latest story developments and that Hank is being given more depth. "I play Black characters on screen, and a lot of times you aren't provided with substantial material, you just tell exposition," he says. "For him to have that internal secret --- as actors, we have to develop those nuances independently. [...] But he has that."
With only three episodes left, 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 really is Mrs. Kersh, Ingrid will join the extensive roster of doomed characters destined to become linked to the clown for years into the future.