The Derry Prequel Just Uncovered a Figure from Stephen King's It That's Been Under Our Nose the Whole Time
The latest installment of It: Welcome to Derry is loaded with new information, offering the most vivid glimpse yet at Pennywise portrayed by Bill Skarsgård. Still, with such a dense narrative packed into a single episode, a subtle reveal might have been overlooked completely, and it's a aspect 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 swiftly relocates his family to the military installation on the outskirts. It is also revealed that Hank Grogan's bus to Shawshank State Prison was attacked. Later, viewers find him in the back of Madeleine Stowe's character car. At first, it appears he's seized control as a means of getting out of town. However, once in the woods, the two embrace with a kiss.
Hank asserts the bus was assaulted (presumably by the sinister clown), allowing him to escape. He then asks Ingrid to locate a person who can help him prove he was framed for the murders at the movie theater.
At the conclusion of the installment, Ingrid makes contact to meet with Mrs. Hanlon, who is already interested in Hank's situation. It is at this moment that Ingrid looks directly into the camera and discloses her identity.
“Mrs. Hanlon, my name is Kersh, Ingrid. You don’t know me, but we have a mutual friend,” 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 Beverly Marsh 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 illusion created by It. Whether Ingrid is the offspring of this character or the character itself is unconfirmed, but it's entirely possible that the two are identical.
In It: Chapter 2, which exists in the same timeline as Welcome to Derry, Mrs. Kersh has a couple of clues: the way she enunciates the word “father” and the line “no one truly perishes in Derry,” both of which Ingrid has said, in turn, throughout the season, in a similar cadence to the film.
If Mrs. Kersh is indeed an real human and not just a disguise of the entity, it will spell trouble for Ingrid, especially as she attempts to unravel the conspiracy behind the theater murders. Of course, we are aware 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 previous interview, the actor noted how pleased he feels 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 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 develop those nuances independently. [...] But Hank has that."
With only three episodes left, expect more narrative threads to intersect as the season races to its conclusion. After the disclosures from the latest episode, the real identity of Ingrid shouldn’t be far off. And if she is indeed the same person, Ingrid will join the extensive roster of doomed characters fated to become linked to the clown for years into the future.