It wouldn’t be Halloween without everyone’s least favorite clown, Pennywise. In honor of the holiday, Max has unveiled eight first-look images from It: Welcome to Derry, HBO’s upcoming It prequel series from Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, and Jason Fuchs.
Set in 1962, It: Welcome to Derry is set 27 years before the events of Muschietti’s It. The series explores interludes written by Mike Hanlon, who interviews older people — specifically, his father, Will — who lived in the town in the 1960s. Will and his Air Force buddies opened The Black Spot, a nightclub that catered to Black patrons.
In 1962, a white supremacist group known as the Maine Legion of White Decency burned the Black Spot down, killing several people inside. Through his investigation, Mike learns that Pennywise appeared on that tragic night in 1962. Instead of a clown, Pennywise showed up as a giant bird and snatched a victim in its talons.
“Twenty-seven years is the dormant period of Pennywise,” wrote the Muschiettis in an email to EW. “It’s a different part of American history with a new set of fears for children, as well as adults having in mind the cost of the Cold War. Our baseline is 1962, but we do a few jumps to the past … Every 27 years when It appears, it’s cycle is marked by two catastrophic events, one at the beginning and one in the end. We are using the Black Spot as an event in which many stories are built around.”
— Max (@StreamOnMax) October 31, 2024
It: Welcome to Derry stars Jovan Adepo, Taylour Paige, Chris Chalk, James Remar, Stephen Rider, Madeleine Stowe, and Rudy Mancuso. Bill Skarsgård returns as Pennywise from the It films. The prequel series will explore Pennywise’s origins. Character details remain hidden. However, Adepo is wearing a military uniform with the nametag “Hanlon,” suggesting he could be playing Will Hanlon.
Andy will direct four of the nine episodes. Based on Stephen King’s It, Welcome to Derry premieres on HBO and streams on Max in 2025.
