Stephen King reveals the IT: Welcome to Derry scene that "sticks in [his] mind" and it involves pickles

IT author Stephen King has shared some high praise for spin-off show IT: Welcome to Derry.

The show is based on his terrifying novel and is directly connected to Andy Muschietti's two-part movie adaptation, IT and IT: Chapter Two.

"I like Welcome to Derry a lot," King told The New York Post. "There are plenty of horrors and lots of surreal visuals. There's a supermarket scare that sticks in my mind, complete with pickle jars."

Now, if you're not up to date on the horror show, turn away now, lest you be spoiled. If you're still reading, then you'll know exactly which spine-chilling scene King is talking about.

In the moment, Lilly is shopping in the supermarket when things start to turn twisted. As we learn earlier in the show, Lilly's father was killed in a gruesome accident at the pickle factory where he worked after falling into the machinery while trying to rescue her ring. As Lilly begins to have auditory and visual hallucinations, she then sees the grisly cherry on top of a horrifying cake: the face of her father's corpse in a pickle jar.

It's stomach-churning already, but things only get worse when the jars start crashing from the shelves, and a hideous monster forms from the mangled body of Lilly's father and attacks her.

If that wasn't horrible enough, we still haven't even laid eyes on Pennywise the Dancing Clown himself yet. "When Pennywise finally appears, he's still scary as hell," King added.

The show is a prequel to IT, and it also features a crossover with The Shining, since Dick Hallorann appears in the series. "It was all about staying authentic to the book. We wanted to use as much of the canon as felt appropriate. We sort of put on our Mike Hanlon hat and approached this the way the character did. We became amateur Derry historians," showrunner Jason Fuchs explained at a roundtable attended by GamesRadar+. "And so, just as Mike is sitting in the attic of the library, we're sort of sitting in the writer's room going, 'OK, what pieces of these interludes in the book that suggest elements of Derry history shrouded in mystery can we start to dig into?'"

IT: Welcome to Derry is airing weekly. You can keep up with our IT: Welcome to Derry release schedule, or fill out your watchlist with our guide to the best HBO Max shows and all the upcoming Stephen King movies and TV shows.