Andy Muschietti has revealed his three-season plan for the upcoming prequel series Welcome to Derry, which is all about Bill Skarsgard's Pennywise.
"It’s a story that’s based on the interludes of the book. The interludes are basically chapters that reflect Mike Hanlon’s research. They’re fragments of his research. For 27 years, it’s the guy trying to figure out what it is, what did it, who did it, who saw it, and all that stuff," Muschietti told Radio Tu during a live-streamed interview, translated by Bloody Disgusting.
"So they talk about catastrophic events from the past, like the fire in the Black Spot…. the massacre of the Bradley Gang, a gang of bank robbers in the ’30s… and the explosion of the Kitchener Ironworks,” the filmmaker continues. “Every time [Pennywise] comes out of hibernation, there is a catastrophic event that happens at the beginning of that cycle. We are basing the three seasons of this series on each of these catastrophic events.”
Added Muschietti: "The first season is 1962, the second season is 1935, and the third season is 1908."
The series takes place 27 years before the events of the first It film, and explores the origins of Pennywise the Dancing Clown. Skarsgard reprises his role from Muschietti's films, with the cast including Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, Taylour Paige, James Remar, and Stephen Rider.
Muschietti also touched on incorporating Pennywise's iconography into the year 1908 and delving into historical inaccuracies in films like Gladiator and how viewers respond. (Luckily, balloons were invented 1824.) The director also acknowledged that, in the original novel, Pennywise's true form is revealed to be a spider, which we see in the original 1990 It miniseries. Pennywise becomes a clown-spider hybrid in Muschietti's It: Chapter 2, but not the literal man-sized spider we see in the original series. Whether the show will uncover his true spidery origins remains to be seen.
Welcome to Derry is set to hit Max sometime in 2025. For more, check out our list of the best new TV shows coming your way in 2025 and beyond, or, check out guides to the best Max TV shows and the best Max movies to add to your streaming queue.
