Welcome to Derry Episode 6 slowed things down but damn it worked so well, like after episode five ending with that brutal Leroy moment where he killed Pauly I was expecting them to just rush into the next big thing but instead they took there time and built up all the pieces for whats about to go down in episodes seven and eight. This whole hour was about family connections and how everyone in Derry is basically falling apart because of Pennywise messing with there heads, the episode title "In the Name of the Father" works on so many levels here because its not just about Ingrids dad Bob Gray, its also about Leroy dealing with almost shooting his own son Will and Hank Grogan reuniting with his daughter Ronnie at the black spot. The opening scene starts in black and white at Juniper Hill back in 1935 during the previous Pennywise cycle and we meet younger Ingrid who works there as a nurse, she takes this girl Mabel down to the basement because the kid mentioned seeing a clown and Ingrid thinks its her father come back to life, the whole flashback is shot in this old timey style but the red balloon and blood stay in color witch looks sick as hell and really drives home how these memories stick with Ingrid after all these years.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt19244304/
- Platform: HBOMAX
Rottentomatoes Rating
The Periwinkle reveal was probaly the biggest thing this episode dropped and honestly it makes so much sense now, Ingrid Kersh is Bob Grays daughter and shes been helping Pennywise for decades because she thinks the clown is actually her dad who got taken back in 1908. Bob Gray was the original Pennywise the Dancing Clown from the circus that came to Derry and somehow the IT entity killed him or took him and then just started using his face and costume to scare kids, Ingrid stayed in Derry after the circus left because she felt drawn to the place and eventually got a job at Juniper Hill where she could feed troubled kids to Pennywise thinking it would bring her father back. That scene where she says Papa to Pennywise and he stops for a second like what did you just call me was crazy, you can see the exact moment when Pennywise realizes oh shit this is the daughter of the guy whose face I stole and then he just starts laughing because he knows he can use her to get more food. Bill Skarsgard playing both Pennywise and Bob Gray in the same episode was great, the way he switches between the two shows how good he is at this role, when Pennywise takes Bob Grays form without the makeup and talks to Ingrid saying let me in, hes not just asking her to open a door hes asking to get inside her mind so he can gaslight her for the next 27 years. The whole thing is tragic as hell because Ingrid believes she is helping her father when really she is just been Pennywises delivery service bringing him kids from the asylum, she even says she would do anything to see him again and you know Pennywise has been taking advantage of that desperation this whole time, its fucked up but also brilliant writing because it explains why Mrs Kersh acts so weird.
Lily figuring out the truth about Ingrid was intense, she goes to Mrs Kershs house and finds all these old photos going back to 1908 and recognizes Bob Gray because he looks EXACTLY!! like Pennywise, then she sees the Periwinkle costume and realizes that Ingrid has been following them around dressed as a clown trying to see her father. The confrontation between them was heavy because Ingrid tries to use Lilys grief over her own dad to manipulate her but Lily is not buying any of it, she knows her fathers dead and gone unlike Ingrid who cant accept reality, when Ingrid says no one who dies here ever really dies Lily just grabs her bag with the dagger and gets the hell out of there after slicing Ingrids hand. That dagger is from the meteorite that brought IT to Earth millions of years ago and its the only thing that seems to scare Pennywise, Lily wont let go that thing now that she knows its power, like when Will tries to touch it earlier in the episode like do not touch my precious, the thing makes her more angry and paranoid witch makes sense because its a piece of the same space rock that brought this evil entity here in the first place so I wonder if this rock has some side effects to who ever stays too long with it. The kids are all turning against each other because of what happend in episode five with Maddie, they almost died down in the sewers and now nobody knows who to trust, Ronnie calls Lily crazy and that word triggers her so bad because everyone has been calling her that since episode one, Rich is the only one smart enough to realize that this is exactly what Pennywise wants, to divide them up so they are weaker and easier to pick off one by one.
The whole Leroy and Will situation got worse this episode and you can see how living in Derry is slowly turning Leroy into the colder version of himself, he slaps Will for the first time and you can tell everyone in the room including Charlotte is shocked because this is not who Leroy normally is, Im not so sure if call Will brave or stupid on how he stands against his father and Charlotte considering she is so smart was kinda out of place instead of realizing what was really going on. Pennywise getting into Leroys head and making him kill Pauly has broken something inside him and now he is taking it out on his son, but still consider that there is some sense on his words, Will says I would never let my friends die and that hits below the belt so hard that Leroy just loses it, the whole scene shows how trauma from encountering Pennywise doesnt just scare you it changes you into someone darker and more violent. Charlotte tells Leroy she is taking Will back to Shreveport with or without him and this is the part that I was like you have no idea what you dealing with right now, but we know from the movies that Leroy stays in Derry and raises his grandson Mike so clearly Charlotte either dies at the black spot or leaves without Will somehow, its sad because you can see there whole family falling apart and theres nothing anyone can do to stop it, on top that this is real, this is not Pennywise messing with them when that happen it is all post trauma since they are at the base OUTSIDE of Derry. Dick Halloran is also struggling this episode because Pennywise opened his psychic box and now he cant control his shining ability anymore, he is seeing dead people everywhere including Paulys ghost walking around the base and he cant make it stop. The conversation between Dick and Leroy about the box was interesting because it connects to Doctor Sleep and The Shining, Dicks grandma taught him how to lock away all the scary stuff in a mental box so it wouldnt bother him but Pennywise ripped that lid off and now everythings spilling out, Leroy wants Dick to use his ability to ask the dead spirits where the pillars are but Dick knows thats a terrible idea that will only make things worse for everyone involved.
The ending of this episode set up the black spot fire and I was not ready for how brutal its about to get, all the racist townspeople show up wearing masks that make them look like clowns and demons, they found out Hank Grogan is hiding there because Ingrid was the anonymous tipster who called the police. She thinks causing a big tragedy will bring her father back out but really she was just helping Pennywise create another augury moment like the Bradley Gang massacre from the 1930s cycle, the whole thing is Pennywises plan to make the town tear itself apart with violence and fear, almost like preparing a big dinner for him. Will and Ronnie had some sweet moments this episode and I think they are gonna end up being Mikes parents, Hank even asks Will whats your favorite movie and Will says War of the Worlds witch is a great answer for a kid in 1962 who is dealing with an alien like entity. Rich and Marge also had there moments and you can tell they are falling for each other hard, but this is a horror show so you know all that happiness is just building up to something terrible happening to one or both of them, at the moment I knew had to be Rich, Richs paper airplane falling into the storm drain was a nice callback to Georgies boat and it feels like foreshadowing that Pennywise is about to ruin everything good in there lives. The music sequence at the party before everything goes to hell was beautiful and it reminded me why I love this show, they let these characters just live for a few minutes before reality comes crashing down on them, this is Derry Maine and nothing good lasts long here when Pennywise is awake and hungry. We only saw Pennywise in the flashbacks this episode but it worked perfect, they couldnt just hide him after episode five so showing him in 1935 serving his lore while building tension for whats coming next week was the right move, there is going to be a bloodbath in the final two episodes because they have been cooking this whole season and I know its gonna be worth the wait, solid episode probably tied with five as my favorite, giving it a strong 8 out of 10 because it did everything it needed to do without feeling rushed or dragging at all.
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