Welcome to Derry Has Revealed a Character from 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 Pennywise portrayed by Bill Skarsgård. Still, with so much baked into one episode, a subtle reveal might have been overlooked completely, and it's a point that needs to be discussed.

After Jovan Adepo's character uncovers that Derry is more or less a supernatural containment for an eldritch monster, he promptly gets his family out of town to the military installation on the outskirts. We also learn that Stephen Rider's character bus to the state penitentiary was ambushed. Later, we see him in the back of Ingrid’s car. At first, it appears he's taken her hostage as a means of getting out of town. Yet, 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 find someone 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 Kersh, Ingrid. You aren't familiar with me, but we have a shared acquaintance,” she says.

If that last name 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 old woman that one of the Losers' Club 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 daughter of this character or the character itself is not yet verified, but it's quite plausible that the two are one and the same.

In It: Chapter 2, which shares the same continuity as Welcome to Derry, Mrs. Kersh has a couple of tells: the way she enunciates the word “father” and the line “no one truly perishes in Derry,” both of which Ingrid has uttered, in turn, throughout the season, in a similar cadence to the film.

If this pivotal character is indeed an real human and not just a disguise of the entity, it will not bode well for Ingrid, especially as she attempts to unravel the conspiracy behind the theater murders. Of course, we already know 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 otherworldly being.

In a earlier discussion, the actor 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 don’t get all the meat, you just deliver background information," he says. "For him to have that internal secret --- as actors, we have to create those secrets for ourselves. [...] But he has that."

With only three episodes left, expect more narrative threads to intersect as the season races to its conclusion. After the revelations in episode 5, the real identity of Ingrid 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.

Patricia Harrison
Patricia Harrison

Financial analyst with over a decade of experience in international markets and investment advisory.