The Derry Prequel Just Revealed a Character from Stephen King's It That's Been Hiding in Plain Sight the Whole Time
The fifth episode of It: Welcome to Derry is loaded with fresh details, offering the clearest look yet at Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise. However, with such a dense narrative packed into a single episode, a subtle reveal 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 promptly gets his family out of town to the military installation on the outskirts. We also learn that Hank Grogan's bus to Shawshank State Prison was attacked. Later, we see him in the back of Madeleine Stowe's character car. Initially, it appears he's taken her hostage as a means of escaping Derry. Yet, once in the woods, the two embrace with a kiss.
Hank claims the bus was attacked (presumably by Pennywise), allowing him to escape. He then asks Ingrid to find someone who can help him demonstrate his innocence for the cinema killings.
At the conclusion of the installment, Ingrid reaches out to meet with Leroy's mother, who is already intrigued in Hank's situation. It is here that Ingrid looks directly into the camera and reveals her full name.
“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 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 one of the Losers' Club mistakenly visits, who is later revealed as one of Pennywise’s many forms. However, Welcome to Derry suggests that the character was a real person, not just a illusion created by It. Whether Ingrid is the daughter of this character or the same person is unconfirmed, but it's quite plausible that the two are identical.
In It: Chapter 2, which shares the same continuity as Welcome to Derry, Mrs. Kersh has a couple of clues: the way she pronounces the word “father” and the line “nobody in Derry ever really dies,” both of which Ingrid has said, in turn, throughout the season, in a comparable rhythm to the film.
If Mrs. Kersh 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 conspiracy behind the cinema slayings. Of course, we are aware that the entity is to blame for the killings. That means the likelihood is high that she — along with her companions — will probably encounter with the supernatural force.
In a earlier discussion, Stephen Rider noted how glad he is about the recent plot twists and that his character is receiving richer layers. "I play Black characters on screen, and a lot of times you aren't provided with substantial material, you just deliver background information," he says. "For him to have that hidden truth --- as actors, we have to create those secrets for ourselves. [...] But he has that."
With only three episodes left, expect more storylines to collide as the season barrels toward its finale. After the disclosures from the latest episode, the real identity of Ingrid is likely imminent. And if she is indeed the same person, Ingrid will join the long list of doomed characters destined to become linked to the clown for years into the future.