Welcome to Derry Just Uncovered a Figure from It That's Been Under Our Nose the Whole Time
The fifth episode of It: Welcome to Derry is loaded with new information, offering the most vivid glimpse yet at Pennywise portrayed by Bill Skarsgård. Still, with so much baked into one episode, a subtle reveal might have been missed entirely, and it's a point that deserves attention.
After Leroy Hanlon discovers that Derry is more or less a mystical prison for an ancient evil, he promptly gets his family out of town to the air force base on the outskirts. We also learn that Hank Grogan's bus to the state penitentiary was attacked. Later, we see him in the back of Ingrid’s car. Initially, it looks like 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 asserts the bus was attacked (presumably by Pennywise), allowing him to escape. He then requests Ingrid to locate a person who can help him prove he was framed for the murders at the movie theater.
At the end of the episode, Ingrid makes contact to meet with Leroy's mother, who is already interested in Hank’s case. It is here that Ingrid looks directly into the camera 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 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 elderly lady that one of the Losers' Club mistakenly visits, who eventually turns out to be one of the clown's numerous disguises. 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 not yet verified, but it's quite plausible that Ingrid and Mrs. Kersh 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 tells: the way she pronounces 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 seeks to untangle the mystery behind the cinema slayings. Of course, we already know that It is responsible for the killings. That means the chances are pretty good that she — along with Hank and Charlotte — will likely cross paths with the supernatural force.
In a previous interview, the actor noted how pleased he feels 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 aren't provided with substantial material, you just tell exposition," he says. "For him to have that internal secret --- as actors, we have to develop those nuances independently. [...] But he 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 real identity of Ingrid is likely imminent. And if she really is Mrs. Kersh, Ingrid will join the long list of fated individuals fated to become linked to the clown for years into the future.