Spoilers for It: Welcome to Derry Episodes 1-7.
The Augery is upon us: cover your children, cover your spouse.
Each Pennywise cycle ends in a horrible mass casualty occasion and, of all of them, the burning of the Black Spot might be essentially the most well-known to followers due to its connection to the Hanlon household and distinguished mentions in Andy Muschietti’s It: Chapter One. Muschietti returns to the administrators’ chair this week at a vital juncture for the present and, befitting the weird alchemy of the present’s horror, drama, and King fan service, the stuff that works finest in regards to the first season’s penultimate episode would possibly shock you.
Although “The Black Spot” has final week’s cliffhanger ending to get to, the episode prologues with one other substantial flashback to 1908 and the touring circus that visited Derry, the place the native children are delighting within the stylings of 1 Pennywise the Dancing Clown (Invoice Skarsgård). However this isn’t your grandpappy’s shapeshifting monster: after a really temporary look final week, Welcome to Derry lastly offers It followers their first actual have a look at Bob Grey, the performer whose entire vibe It determined to co-opt all these years in the past. And what a vibe it’s.
Invoice Skarsgård’s efficiency of the human Pennywise is a rousing high-wire balancing act unto itself, one which not solely evokes the scary depth the character’s well-known for however, extra impressively, modulates the type of the demonic dancing clown right into a believably human, turn-of-the-century performer whose glory days are long gone. Skarsgård cavorts round with Pennywise’s signature ragdoll fluidity however tones the throaty voice down, preserving the aesthetic form of Pennywise and but filling it with a sensibility that will nonetheless really feel off-kilter, however most likely no extra off-kilter than among the different clowns operating round in 1908. Particular point out has to go to the costume design and make-up departments, as nicely: Bob Grey’s Pennywise appears nice. Whereas the outfit is cleaner, it’s the ill-fitting hairpiece and lighter make-up that basically promote what a reality-based Pennywise could be like.
This complete dynamic is captured as Pennywise performs an Up-style pantomime for the group of assembled kids, which hints on the early dying of his spouse and performing associate, who glided by, say it with me now, Periwinkle. Younger Ingrid (Emma-Leigh Cullum) helps her dad by pulling strings behind the scenes, giving Pennywise/Bob the prospect to grab at rising flowers (some good, clear thematic imagery proper there) earlier than tearfully saying goodbye to a floating marionette costume and collapsing in tears at his spouse’s grave. You understand, child stuff! Whereas the kids are fascinated by Pennywise’s efficiency, they nonetheless bum rush him and attempt to beat the snot out of him, which does reveal Bob’s resentment in direction of his present circumstances.
However in maybe essentially the most surprising twist of the entire season… Bob Grey appears to be a genuinely loving father to Ingrid, even when he hits the bottle a little bit too usually. Bob delights within the painted face and costume with which Ingrid presents him, awkwardly passing his late spouse’s Periwinkle moniker on to her earlier than realizing that Ingrid might need to choose her personal title. However Ingrid loves this concept, excitedly taking over the mantle. The sensitivity and affection between these two offers the second the place It takes Bob a shocking sense of tragedy, as a poorly lit vagabond baby leads Pennywise the Dancing Clown to his dying within the western woods. As Dick Hallorann as soon as stated, “All of it comes round. Ka is a wheel.”
The motion strikes to again to 1962, with Clint Bowers (Peter Outerbridge) main his armed, masked lynch mob into the Black Spot demanding Hank Grogan (Stephen Rider) in return for the remainder of the patrons’ security. Although Hank’s prepared to present himself up, the Black airmen right here aren’t about to let these good ol’ boys take Hank with no combat… however that’s precisely what they get and it doesn’t go their approach. Chaos erupts as Bowers and his mob lock the doorways and firebomb the place, giving technique to stressfully choreographed lengthy takes the place Muschietti catches glimpses of airmen and their dates being shot via the home windows, hit with Molotov cocktails, and succumbing to smoke inhalation. And that’s all earlier than Pennywise enters the fray and begins to feed whereas the place remains to be in flames.
Amidst the morass of grownup patrons both dying by hearth or gunfire, the youngsters (minus Lilly) battle to seek out their technique to security and we bid farewell to Wealthy Santos (Arian S. Cartaya), who goes out just like the courageous knight he all the time dreamed of turning into, defending his “honest maiden” Marge along with his life. Wealthy makes use of the outdated “there’s sufficient room on the door for each of us” trick to get Marge into the one refuge left within the Black Spot – a fridge – because the roof begins to break down. Their last farewell via the door the place they confess their love for one another reveals Cartaya and Matilda Lawler at their finest, every completely unguarded and grounded of their terrifying circumstances. Now appears like nearly as good a time as any to level out that the legacy of Wealthy’s sacrifice will reverberate for years to return in Derry: “Marge” being quick for Margaret, Margaret being the title of Wealthyie Tozier’s mother and all that…
It’s within the quick aftermath of the hearth that Derry’s resident nightcrawler Ingrid Kersh/Periwinkle emerges simply lengthy sufficient for her to introduce her “dad” to her jerk husband Stan Kersh, and for Pennywise to chop Stan’s head in half along with his personal cleaver. Right here, the absence of that real love Bob confirmed for Ingrid lastly hits house, however she involves that realization too late to forestall herself being glamoured by Pennywise’s deadlights. Madeline Stowe performs this dawning horror simply positive, however the second doesn’t actually make all that a lot sense within the context of how a lot she appears to learn about It’s violent proclivities. It’s felt like Welcome to Derry has been kicking the Periwinkle can down the highway all season, and, sturdy although “The Black Spot’s” prologue could also be in its personal proper, Muschietti doesn’t join the dots very nicely right here.
There’s nonetheless some hope for Periwinkle within the finale although: that creepy, catatonic look at Will (Blake Cameron James), Ronnie (Amanda Christine), and Marge (Matilda Lawler) as she’s being wheeled away by paramedics suggests she’s able to get into her new household’s enterprise. Lilly (Clara Stack) higher maintain that ceremonial dagger shut. In any case’s stated and executed, the Augery proves to be intensely horrific and tough-to-watch, however there’s not loads of room in all of the flame and fury for a lot of affecting scares.
Regardless of the Augery now being full and It seemingly sated, Common Shaw’s (James Remar) determination to “depart the cage door open” by melting down the pillar they’ve recovered (encased in a turtle shell, no much less) appears like a flip extra rooted in squeezing one final massive set-piece out of subsequent week’s season finale than in sustaining the believability of Shaw’s motivations, as a lot of the turns of this plot thread have. Remar has been a gradual hand all through Welcome to Derry, at instances the one a part of the navy equipment that stored this nook of the story value revisiting, however even he can’t maintain the chaos that ensues as soon as Leroy pulls a gun on the troopers smelting the pillar on the rails. By the point Shaw’s attempting to elucidate why defeating “the enemy inside” America by placing worry into the hearts of homegrown degenerates, it’s arduous to care an excessive amount of about his reasoning.
Welcome to Derry had some fascinating instructions to take this thread with Shaw and Rose’s (Kimberly Guerrero) shared historical past on the town, however except subsequent week includes a complete rug-pull that utterly upends Shaw’s thought course of right here, it’s arduous to think about wanting again favorably on this incohesive navy storyline subsequent to the way more fascinating goings on in Derry correct. The exception to the general weak point of the navy plot, after all, stays Chris Chalk’s Hallorann, whose brawny efficiency continues to transcend Hallorann’s in any other case restricted position as Shaw’s pillar detector. Hallorann has an essential half to play in the course of the Black Spot hearth, surviving a face-to-face encounter with Pennywise and serving to Hank, Will and Ronnie escape with steerage from Sesqui’s (Morningstar Angeline) spirit. However whereas we get some good imagery of the encroaching ghosts plaguing him now that his psychological lockbox has been opened by Pennywise, Hallorann’s largely within the background this week – right here’s hoping Welcome to Derry places Hallorann’s (and Chalk’s) Shine to good use within the finale.
With the pillar destroyed, Pennywise is awake for a little bit mid-hibernation snack, and he’s already obtained Will in his deadlights and on his plate. Do you know Pennywise slept in a pool of blood and viscera? I didn’t! Seems cool as hell!
