This article was originally published on FearHQ.com.
In this week’s episode of It: Welcome to Derry, "The Great Swirling Apparatus of Our Planet's Function," Pennywise continues to terrorise the show's young leads, leading to new contenders for the horror franchise's most harrowing scenes.
Will goes on a fishing trip with his father, but, left alone for a few minutes, he's targeted by the "entity." Seeing a red balloon nearby, he's soon dragged under the water and nearly drowned by a monstrous, hideously scarred vision of his father, who promises that he'll die in a fire (his actual father returns just in time to save the boy).
Lilly's friend, Marge, has her own encounter with It when a planned prank on Lilly suddenly leads to her eyes bulging from her head on stalks. Understandably hysterical, she runs to the school’s machine shop and uses a buzzsaw to try and chop them off. Unfortunately for Lilly, it looks like she attacked Marge, though that is eventually cleared up.
It continues to stalk Will, while Hallorann enters the mind of Rose's nephew Taniel, and Pennywise's origin is finally revealed.
We learn that, millions of years ago, an evil was cast down, bound in a falling star that broke open on impact. A spirit was set free until the creation of the first ancestors; they discovered that the star It fell to Earth in was its cage, and that the stone still had power.
The Native Americans of the time used it to make weapons, and ensured that It stayed in its territory. However, when settlers arrived, they ignored the Natives and were brutally slaughtered, allowing the entity to grow more powerful and extend its reach. A group was sent in to destroy It before it could get any more powerful, but the creature we know as Pennywise slaughtered them all.
Ultimately, Its lair was found, and shards of that star were used to cage it, buried around the woods that would eventually become Derry. It's revealed that Pennywise is trapped there and unable to leave so long as they remain buried. However, General Francis Shaw plans to remove them so that the military can capture the monster and use "It" against America's enemies.
Thanks to Hallorann, they know now that the route to Its lair begins in 29 Neibolt Street, and the stage is set for what promises to be a deadly confrontation next week.
Set in the world of Stephen King's It universe, It: Welcome to Derry is based on King's It novel and expands the vision established by filmmaker Andy Muschietti in the feature films It and It Chapter Two.
The cast is led by Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, James Remar, Stephen Rider, Madeleine Stowe, Rudy Mancuso, and Bill Skarsgård.
The series, from Warner Bros. Television and developed for television by filmmakers Andy Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti (It, The Flash) and Jason Fuchs (Wonder Woman), will debut on HBO and also be available to stream on HBO Max. Muschietti will direct four episodes of the nine-episode series.
The first four episodes of It: Welcome to Derry are now streaming on HBO Max, with new episodes released weekly leading up to the season finale on December 14.