Previously on HBO Max’s IT: Welcome to Derry, Leroy Hanlon begins to notice how strange Derry truly is. At school, Marge suffers a hallucination, and people think Lilly attacked her. Meanwhile, Dick uses his powers to pull the location of Pennywise’s pillars from Taniel, Rose’s nephew, and it works.
The episode begins with Taniel having a seizure after Dick’s mind control. They rush Taniel to the infirmary while Dick is mentally and physically exhausted. Meanwhile, Lily checks on Marge at the hospital. Marge realizes that Lily was right about everything that’s been happening, now that she’s lost her eye. She apologizes for not believing her.
While they’re at their secret spot, Will, Rich, Ronnie, and Lily talk about what happened to Marge. They hear someone crying in a tent. They confront them and see Matty, who says, “Help me.”
While General Shaw tells Leroy about Pennywise, Matty tells his friends how the creature lives underneath Derry. Pennywise sleeps during the day, so Matty chose to escape. He says that Teddy and Susie are both dead. Phil is still there, alive.
Charlotte waits outside the station as Hank is escorted onto the bus to Shawshank. Phil and Susie’s father rushes in with a gun, but the police apprehend him before he can shoot Hank. Startled, Charlotte looks up to see a police officer grinning —possessed by Pennywise, before he vanishes. When she’s back at home, Leroy tells her everything and decides to bring Charlotte and Will to the base for safety while the mission continues.
General Shaw gets a visit from Rose, who’s furious with what he did to Taniel. Shaw now remembers every detail of the summer they spent together when they were kids. Rose tells him that Pennywise can’t be controlled; his plan won’t work. Rose tells him that now that they know where the pillars are, they’ll need her help. Rose goes to Taniel and gives him the blade to help them kill Pennywise. He will go with Shaw to Neibolt Street.
At home, Charlotte overhears on the news that the Shawshank bus crashed, causing multiple casualties. But Hank escaped.
The Air Force team starts their mission at the Neibolt Street house. Dick, Leroy, Taniel, and the others descend into the sewers, where a steep drop sends Dick plunging into the water. As he hits, his mind snaps into another place —a body of water that leads him to surface in a bathtub. He comes face-to-face with his grandmother, who warns that his grandfather is coming for him. Dick’s grandfather holds a box filled with all of Dick’s secrets. He shoots Dick’s grandmother and slowly opens it, sending Dick into a panic as he clutches his head in pain.
The soldiers are still looking for Dick when they hear a yell. Their flashlights die, and they see movement in front of them —Pennywise. Dressed as Uncle Sam, he yells, “I want you,” before attacking them. Taniel makes a run for it while the guard is distracted, but drops the blade. He tries looking for it, but can’t find it, so he continues to run away.
Will escapes the base to meet up with his friends, which now includes Marge. The six kids go to the sewers, each taking some of Lily’s pills to help them relax before entering. Matty tells them that they’re getting close to Pennywise’s home.
Leroy and Pauly Russo are worried about Dick, but they continue to move forward. Leroy hears Charlotte, and he sees her, but Pauly doesn’t see anything. Their lights begin to flicker, and before Charlotte’s possessed body attacks them, Leroy shoots Pennywise.
The kids see all of their friends’ dead bodies, noticing that Phil’s dead too. They all start to freak out, and Matty begins to sing a song. He then begins to change into Pennywise —it was a trap. They start to run, and Pennywise chases after them. They run into Leroy and Pauly, yelling for help. Leroy doesn’t realize that Will is real, so he shoots, but Pauly runs in front of the gun, taking the bullet. Leroy tries to help Pauly, but Pauly tells him it’s okay.
Left behind, Lily gets lost in the sewers as Pennywise corners her. He tries to attack her, but is stopped by the blade lying under the water by Lily. As he disappears, she realizes that the blade is a barrier for her.
Ingrid Kersh, the housekeeper from Juniper Hill and Lily’s friend, goes into her car only to find Hank hiding in the backseat —she’s the woman he’s been secretly seeing. Ingrid goes to Charlotte to tell her about Hank.
Overall, this was a very stressful episode. There was so much happening, a lot of erriness. We finally got to see Bill Skarsgard’s Pennywise in his actual creepy form, which was very exciting. It was expected that Matty was a trap to get the kids into the sewer. This episode was the best one yet. Is the box with Dick Hallorann’s secrets foreshadowing his psychic abilities?
Rating: 10/10