What is Operation Precept in It: Welcome to Derry, and is it based on anything in the book?

Following episode 1's dramatic rug-pull, It: Welcome to Derry episode 2 hits the ground running as it introduces us to the spin-off's version of the Losers' Club and sets up intriguing subplots outside of Pennywise's penchant for picking off pipsqueaks...

Warning! The rest of this article contains major spoilers for It: Welcome to Derry episode 2. If you're not up to date, and don't want to know anything that happens, turn back now!

In 'The Thing in the Dark', Leroy Hanlon (Jovan Adepo) approaches General Shaw (James Remar) and insists that there's no way Sgt Masters could've been one of his masked assailants, since he clearly doesn't know his way around a Makarov pistol. With that, Shaw admits that the attack was staged. "I needed to know, if word of your brain injury in South Korea was true," he says. Turns out, Leroy's "damaged amygdala" has left him unable to feel fear – and that makes him valuable to Shaw and the rest of his team. "It was a test, son, and you passed."

Shaw then introduces him to "Operation Precept", a classified Department of Defense program. He explains that they're not building a weapon, like Leroy first assumes, but "looking for one". A weapon that "could scare a man badly enough to kill him where he stands" and "was buried in Derry a long time ago." Consider our attention grabbed.

Is 'Operation Precept' mentioned in the book?

Since the book interludes in which It: Welcome to Derry is based make up less than 10% of the 1,000-plus-page source, the show's creators have had to sprinkle in some original material to flesh out the chapters onscreen. With that, we can confirm that no, the 'Operation Precept' subplot doesn't seem to have been lifted from the novel, and was therefore solely written for the purposes of the show.

That said, General Shaw's mention of It as being "surrounded on all sides by a group of objects" did make us think of the Native Americans' attempts at containing It, referenced in It: Chapter Two and, more briefly, the novel.

"It's the Stephen King universe, and it is a family. But it's a family that we've been left out of," Kimberly Norris Guerrero, who plays Rose, explained during a panel at New York Comic Con (via Popverse). "The Natives have been there, but we've never been able to join you all at the table," she added, suggesting that we'll see that backstory expanded on in Welcome to Derry.

“I have never been to a reservation or a Native American community that did not have a place where you do not go. You do not go, because you do not know. It's undergirding so much of the Stephen King universe; the sense [that] something is going on with the land. The land remembers, even though we've forgotten. There is something dwelling there that could be very harmful, and we don't understand. There was a first Losers Club, and that Losers Club was a group of indigenous kids."

What are fans saying about 'Operation Precept'?

The addition of 'Operation Precept' hasn't gone down well with some fans, with a handful arguing that it makes the show feel like a Stranger Things knock-off or a high-tension anime series. Others, however, think it totally checks out...

"I don't understand why y'all don't like this? The government f***ing around with supernatural stuff is the key to a good portion of King's work. What's so bad about this premise?" said one viewer on Reddit, while another clapped back: "This plot sounds Pennydumb."

Adding in a throughline about government paranoia does make sense, really, when you consider the Muschiettis and Jason Fuchs have set Welcome to Derry in 1962. Throughout that year, the threat of nuclear war loomed and ultimately led to the Cuban Missile Crisis in October. It's not a stretch to imagine the US military catching wind of a powerful entity and [foolishly] wanting to co-opt it in order to win the Cold War.

"When Stephen King wrote It, he was writing a masterpiece of horror and a coming of age story, but also it was a parable of fear mongering and the weaponizing of fear in the real world," Argentina-born Andy Muschietti previously told Deadline. "That metaphor about fear mongering was very relevant when he wrote it, but somehow it seems much more relevant in the days that we're living now. So that's why I like to consider the show as a reminder that, if you believe in empathy and love, we can keep together and stand up against the violence and intimidation and cruelty that these f*cking clowns are bestowing upon us."

It: Welcome to Derry airs on HBO every Sunday at 9pm PT/ET. Episode 2 was made available to stream on HBO Max earlier, on October 31, in honor of Halloween.

Never miss an episode with our Welcome to Derry release schedule. For more, check out our breakdown of all the It: Welcome to Derry Easter eggs and cameos.