5 Things We Learned About: Welcome to Derry (New York City)

when HBO first announced its intention to move forward with an “It” prequel series. Based on the last two films, the collective reaction can be summed up as excitement… and slight confusion. What was there for the audience to learn about the ancient existential evil that takes the form of a clown and terrorizes young children with its red balloons? As it turns out – a lot.

Led by producers Andy and Barbara Muschietti, along with showrunners Jason Foxx and Brad Caleb Kane, the project received a star-studded event at this year’s New York Comic Con festivities. The convention rolled out the red carpet for a series that, judging by the atmosphere in the room, is set to be one of the biggest blockbusters when it’s released later this year. During the big panel attended by the Muschiettis, showrunners, and cast members Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, James Remar, Steven Ryder, Taylor Paige, and Kimberly Guerrero, the cast and crew revealed many goodies to those in attendance. The exclusives and trailers received the most hype, but it’s the on-stage conversations between the creative team that should hold the most interest with fans.

Here are the most fascinating insights viewers need to know before watching “It: Welcome to Derry,” which is set decades before the original 1962 “It” film.

In the year of our master, 2025, it’s worth asking a crucial question whenever the latest movie or show based on a popular IP is released: Does this actually have a reason to exist? When it comes “It: Welcome to Derry” (watch the trailer here)This urgent concern can be answered strongly in the affirmative. The upcoming Prequel series could have easily fallen victim to the company’s studio-oriented mentality of churning out franchise fodder for the sake of it. Fortunately, it seems that Stephen King fans can breathe a sigh of relief when it comes to what those behind the series have in store for us.

For Andy Muschietti, director of It and It: Chapter Two, the idea for the series came very quickly after the completion of the second film. After convincing Bill Skarsgard to reprise his role as Pennywise, the rest fell into place. To hear Muschietti tell it, this was little more than an excuse to reveal the origin story of the Killer Clown and his Eldritch-like reign of terror in the small (fictional) town of Derry, Maine every 27 years. There will be a lot of connections to the original characters from the films. (Looming especially large is Mike Hanlon, the Loser’s Club member who chose to stay in his childhood town rather than leave.) But both Muschietti and the series’ creators have emphasized that others, like Chris Chalk’s Dick Hallorann, come straight from the pages of King’s novel in a way the films can’t quite match.

With that in mind, it’s easy to imagine how the series will fill in the blanks from both blockbuster films.

At this point, “It: Welcome to Derry” has not been confirmed for more than one season… but the writing team clearly has higher hopes than that. During the panel, Andy Muschietti talked about how each season was directly inspired by Pennywise himself. As fans are well aware, the inter-dimensional entity manifests itself physically at regular intervals, only appearing in the “flesh” every 27 years. According to Muschietti, they made an early design call for this first season (and hopefully any subsequent season to come) by having the episodes span one of their courses on Earth. If there is more to come, later seasons will change time periods and focus on another 27-year cycle.

This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the unusual structure that occurs in Welcome to Derry. For those wondering what kind of material the writers will adapt, Muschietti commented on how much of the film was untouched by King’s original novel and left, in his words, “more questions than answers.” The director continued, explaining the following:

“For me, what’s interesting here is a kind of outline for a different story, a hidden story, a story that’s not told forward, but a story that’s told backwards. And from the epilogue, the events in which he becomes Pennywise. There’s more than that, there’s a reason and a secret behind why this story is told backwards. We can’t tell you now, but maybe after you watch the show.”

Welcome to Derry may serve as a prequel and origin story, but that doesn’t mean fans can know exactly how those connections will develop with both films. We already know From a previous trailer That the series will at least tangentially touch on Pennywise’s book-based, space-related backstory. As it turns out, this broader approach to adapting the source material of Stephen King’s acclaimed novel will guide much of the season’s direction.

As mentioned earlier, fans will no doubt discover the ancestral personalities of the original characters. Jovan Adepo’s Leroy Hanlon and Taylor Paige’s Charlotte Hanlon need no introduction, as the grandparents of future Mike in the Loser’s Club in both “It” films. Other characters come with built-in aspects that will likely fly over the heads of casual viewers, while die-hards will be able to discover one Easter egg after another.

Perhaps the most interesting Easter egg revolves around Rose, a newly introduced character played by Kimberly Guerrero. As an Indigenous character in the 1960s timeline, she immediately adds a new (and as she emphasized unexplored) layer to the story that we haven’t seen before. According to Guerrero, “Welcome to Derry” will take us back to the original Losers Club and all the ways Rose’s ancestors help in the fight against evil. In fact, her character has something to do with Stephen King’s appearance in “Chapter Two.” As she explained:

“Rose knows everything that happened before Derry became Derry. There was the first Losers’ Club, and the Losers’ Club was a group of Aboriginal kids. And my character is a direct descendant of those kids.”

“Who remembers in Chapter Two when Stephen King showed up? It’s one of my favorite moments in the It movies, and he shows up at this store called Secondhand Rose. I’m Rose. And it’s so perfect, because Rose is the keeper of memories.”

All the footage shown during the NYCC panel had one thing in common: You never see him in clown form like Pennywise. As it turns out, there’s a very good reason for that. In various scenes, the ancient terrors of the miserable characters appear as characters taken directly from their nightmares or memories. Strangers in the grocery store, family and other loved ones, and many more, are all fair game when it comes to the antagonist most of the audience knows as the Clown from Hell. But forcing us to wait until later in the season to see him fully unleashed like he was in the movies is simply part of the game in Welcome to Derry.

He is described as playing the game “Jaws” with Pennywise (Steven Spielberg’s world-famous shark is not seen for most of the film), this strategy may eventually lead to profits for the chain. As Barbara Muschietti put it, “So, Pennywise. He’s our shark. And we firmly believe that we can’t let the audience get comfortable. We have to hide the ball.” Andy then chimed in, saying: “There was an intention to make Pennywise’s appearance fun, and create a sense of anticipation, this build-up, this suspense that I think people won’t know when – the importance of his ability is, ‘When is the clown going to show up?’ We can’t tell you, but he will.”

“It: Welcome to Derry” will premiere on HBO and HBO Max on October 26, 2025.