The Derry Prequel Just Uncovered a Figure from Stephen King's It That's Been Hiding in Plain Sight the Whole Time

The latest installment of It: Welcome to Derry is jam-packed with fresh details, offering the most vivid glimpse yet at Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise. However, with so much baked into one episode, a understated disclosure might have been overlooked completely, and it's a point that needs to be discussed.

After Leroy Hanlon discovers that Derry is essentially a mystical prison for an ancient evil, he swiftly relocates his family to the air force base on the outskirts. We also learn that Hank Grogan's bus to Shawshank State Prison was ambushed. Later, we see him in the back of Ingrid’s car. At first, it appears he's seized control as a means of getting out of town. Yet, once in the woods, the two share an intimate kiss.

Hank asserts the bus was attacked (presumably by the sinister clown), allowing him to break free. He then asks Ingrid to find someone who can help him prove he was framed for the cinema killings.

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 recognizable, 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 elderly lady that Beverly Marsh mistakenly visits, who eventually turns out to be one of Pennywise’s many forms. However, Welcome to Derry implies that the character was a real person, not just a manifestation of Pennywise. Whether Ingrid is the daughter of this character or the same person is not yet verified, but it's quite plausible that the two are one and the same.

In It: Chapter 2, which exists in the same timeline as Welcome to Derry, the character portrayed by Joan Gregson has a couple of clues: the way she enunciates the word “father” and the line “nobody in Derry ever really dies,” both of which Ingrid has uttered, respectively, throughout the season, in a similar cadence to the film.

If this pivotal character is indeed an actual person and not just a form of It, it will spell trouble for Ingrid, especially as she attempts to unravel the conspiracy behind the cinema slayings. Of course, we are aware that It is responsible for the killings. That means the likelihood is high that she — along with her companions — will probably encounter with the otherworldly being.

In a earlier discussion, the actor noted how glad he is about the recent plot twists 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 hidden truth --- as actors, we have to create those secrets for ourselves. [...] But Hank has that."

With only a trio of installments remaining, expect more narrative threads to intersect as the season races to its conclusion. After the revelations in episode 5, the truth about who Ingrid is shouldn’t be far off. And if she really is Mrs. Kersh, Ingrid will join the long list of doomed characters fated to become linked to the clown for generations to come.