The Walking Dead's Robert Kirkman may not be a stranger to killing off beloved characters, but he knows who the real maester is: Game of Thrones' George R.R. Martin.

Speaking at Annecy (via Deadline), Kirkman said, "He is the master and I am but the learner. He is way better at killing characters than me."

But that's not for want of trying. While Martin may have made his name by putting characters on the chopping block – Ned Stark, Jon Snow (before his revival), and Joffrey Baratheon among them – Kirkman reveals he has a twisted sense of bloodlust, especially surrounding the AMC adaptation of his ever-popular The Walking Dead comic.

“When we started on Walking Dead I was the lunatic in the writers' room who was like, 'I don't know, just kill the main character, who cares? We'll do something weird.'"

That even extended to "pushing to kill Daryl Dixon for a while." Norman Reedus' Daryl Dixon went on to become a fan favorite, eventually starring in three seasons of his own spin-off series with a fourth on the way.

Kirkman added, "Any character in The Walking Dead, at some point I was in the writers' rooms saying, 'Why don't we kill them today?'"

The Walking Dead writer has continued his killstreak on the small screen with Invincible, which has left plenty of crushed skulls and unspooled organs in its wake.

But George R.R. Martin's work is matching him death for death. He may no longer be involved in the series after behind-the-scenes drama with showrunner Ryan Condal, but House of the Dragon season 3 featured plenty of casualties in its Battle of the Gullet premiere. One actor involved even revealed they had a specific request for their death scene.

For our verdict, check out the House of the Dragon season 3 review. If you're still playing catch up on Kirkman's bloodletting, we have a guide the best way to watch The Walking Dead in order.

The Walking Dead has given us its fair share of reunions in the past few years: Michonne found her way back to Rick; Daryl met up with Carol once more; heck, even Negan has his mitts on a new Lucille.

So, what of the horror franchise's big bromance? The Walking Dead boss Scott M. Gimple isn't ruling out Rick and Daryl sharing the same space once more.

"Absolutely still a hope," Gimple told Brandon Davis on YouTube.

"It's very challenging for a variety of reasons, which have everything to do with 2026 [style of] production. But things change very quickly."

Gimple even admitted he has prepared several (unnamed) possibilities for where The Walking Dead might go next.

He said, "I've drawn up all sorts of forking paths, [these] kinds of plans. It might be a minute, it might be tomorrow, I might be off at the retirement home. But I think eventually we'll get there. There's enough stuff to handle – source material, emotional, plot-wise, everything – that we could do something brilliant."

One stumbling block may involve Daryl's actor Norman Reedus. Upon the conclusion of filming the fourth season of the standalone Daryl Dixon show, he penned what felt like a definitive farewell to the character.

"It’s been such a joy for me to play this guy with all of [you] for this long. I feel really blessed. Truly," Reedus wrote.

Elsewhere, The Walking Dead story continues with Dead City season 3, starring Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Lauren Cohan, which premieres on July 26.

If you're still playing catch up, shamble over to our guide on how to watch The Walking Dead in order. Then relive some of the series' finest moments with our ranking of the best Walking Dead episodes.

After 16 years of playing the fan-favorite crossbow-wielding survivor Daryl Dixon, Norman Reedus is walking away from The Walking Dead franchise after filming his final season.

On June 16, the star took to Instagram to share some behind-the-scenes snaps from The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 4, and said goodbye to the franchise. "I can’t wait for people to see this show," said the star. "The feeling of accomplishment when it was over was just amazing. Such hard work and so much heart put into this, I think you’re gonna feel it. It was a special season. I can’t wait for you to see it. It hits just way differently this time."

Now, we already had a feeling that Reedus would be exiting the franchise after this season. In July 2025, the Daryl Dixon spin-off was renewed for its fourth and final season. Then in November 2025, Reedus confirmed he had filmed his last scene. "Last filming day today for Daryl Dixon," said Reedus on Twitter. "It’s been such a joy for me to play this guy with all of u for this long. I feel really blessed. Truly."

However, many fans were holding out hope that the end of the spin-off wouldn't mark Dixon's last zombie venture. Even Andrew Lincoln returned as Rick Grimes in the 2024 spin-off The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live after he exited the main show early in season 9. Reedus then led the series for two more seasons. Since then, Reedus hasn't really had much of a break, so, understandably, he'd want to explore other projects.

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 4 does not yet have a release date, but is expected to air sometime in 2026. The final season will conclude Daryl and Carol's (Melissa McBride) rather lengthy journey across Europe, as they try to make their way back home to America.

Next up for Reedus, the actor will star in The Black Swan writer Mark Heyman's psychological horror film Pendulum, and is set to be part of the third The Boondock Saints movie, which is currently in pre-production.

For more, check out our list of the best Walking Dead episodes, and our guide on how to watch The Walking Dead in order.

Have you heard? Widow's Bay is the next Martha's Vineyard and definitely not cursed. At least, that's what the Mayor of this quaint island town has been telling anyone who will listen.

There is something a little odd about this sleepy haven, though. Read between the lines of the brochure and you'll pick up on stories about a mysterious fog or a man who was bit by an animal and apparently became that animal. What should we make of that time in '42 when all the train workers suddenly disappeared? Or locals indulging in a little spot of cannibalism back in the 1800s?

Still, Widow's Bay sure is charming. That's something everyone seems to agree on, whether they're visiting the fictional New England island or tuning into Apple TV's show of the same name.

There's a reason why industry stalwarts such as director Guillermo Del Toro have described Widow's Bay as "the best streaming series in a long time". Acting on his recommendation, video game legend Hideo Kojima gave it a go too before declaring, "It’s been a long time since a series pulled me in this completely." And he's not alone either.

[Note: full spoilers for Widow's Bay season 1 follow]

What lies beneath

Like so many of the best Apple TV shows, Widow's Bay arrived with little fanfare, only to grow each week via word of mouth. Like the unnatural fog that rolls through town in episode one, Katie Dippold's show has seeped into our collective consciousness, cementing this series as one of the year's best already.

Attempts to compare Widow's Bay to existing stories don't really do it justice. It's Twin Peaks, but funny? It's Parks and Recreation, but scary?

Eerie supernatural occurrences do evoke the small-town horrors of David Lynch's masterpiece and it's worth noting the show did actually start out as a spec script that helped Dippold get a job on Parks and Rec (the legendary sitcom which Dippold was writing for at the time). Still, Widow's Bay is very much its own thing, transcending the various influences in its DNA, from The Office to The X-Files, to become something entirely special in its own right.

Much of that is down to the show's unique tonal balance, which you might have picked up on already in those aforementioned comparisons.

Mayor Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys) is in denial when it comes to the paranormal, so desperate he is to boost local tourism and make Widow's Bay a place worth visiting. Never mind the ghostly killer clown or the Boogeyman serial killer who lurk in this town's darkest corners.

Loftis doesn't believe in any of it, not at first, but when a sea hag sits on his face at home one night, it's suddenly hard not to. How this scene unnerves as much as it amuses is a testament to the show at large (as is the decision to not drag out Tom's disbelief). Rather than tiptoe into the horror or throw some laughs in to break up the tension, Widow's Bay fully embraces both worlds, avoiding what could be spoofery in favour of a story that truly blends the two.

Frightfully funny

Widow's Bay is simultaneously the funniest and scariest show of the year, which is no easy feat. Most newcomers struggle to nail one, but Dippold and her team have knocked it out of the park on both fronts – and the secret to that success is how these two approaches work in tandem.

Much has been made of how laughing and crying are two sides of the same coin, how comedy and horror are both defined by timing. What makes Widow's Bay stand out, though, is how it treats them both as equally important. Punchlines and one-liners build and relieve tension throughout while grounding the show's genuinely quite horrific scares in a reality that's uncomfortably similar to our own.

For example, when Tom's colleague Rosemary (Dale Dickey) charts how the island's curse has worked its way through a local bloodline, hearing her drolly tick off "Dead baby. Dead baby. Lesbian," is peak comedy, even if the words themselves might suggest otherwise.

It's as if the mundane oddballs who populate offices in the real world and sitcoms alike have just been dumped into a Stephen King novel, nonchalantly addressing the supernatural like they might explain planning permits or who brought biscuits into the staff room. Never mind the unknowable evil that's been hidden in the basement. There is a literal demonic force that exists right below the feet of these municipal office workers, which speaks to how embedded the supernatural is in the very foundations of Widow's Bay.

Taken at face value, each of these supernatural threats is actually quite familiar, deliberately so, for the writers to subvert these horrors, building lore that scaffolds and subverts the typical monster-of-the-week format that was once so familiar to TV viewers.

Island strife

Sitcom tropes are also utilised, such as in episode four when Patricia (Kate O'Flynn) throws a party to become more popular. So far, so standard, but the monstrous turns this takes hit harder precisely because of how the format lulls us in with awkwardness and heartbreak. What was once a simple sitcom premise suddenly becomes a vehicle for unsettling folk horror that also digs into something real. Namely, Patricia's desperate need to be understood and accepted.

In a lesser show, Patricia's weirdo assistant would be sidelined or reduced to the occasional one-liner. Instead, Widow's Bay puts her front and center, transforming the underdog into a TV icon who ends up leading two of the best episodes aired in any show this year.

The second of the two, where Patricia is chased by the literal Boogeyman that's haunted her for decades, also brings with it one of the funniest moments of the year. "Oh, she's the worst," Patricia deadpans right after she tases a high-school bully from yesteryear. It's moments like this that confirm O'Flynn to be a breakout star worth rooting for, and the same could be said for pretty much anyone else in the supporting cast.

Rosemary, Wyck (Stephen Root), Ruth (K Callan)... each is more eccentric than the last, yet Widow's Bay never punches down with its humour. Instead, the unique strangeness of each character is fully embraced, just as we embrace the no-holds-barred performances that bring them to life.

Chief among them is Matthew Rhys, The Americans star whose expressions are a force unto themselves in this show. With each successive horror that Loftis faces, Rhys finds new facial configurations hitherto unseen on a human visage before. The true haunting on this show resides in the looks that he gives each episode rather than Widow's Bay itself.

That’s why each tonal shift works as well as it does: because of the people at this show's heart, be it the actors or seasoned directors like Hiro Murai who establish a visual style distinct to this series, one that can handle whatever the writers' room throws their way. Even the production design hides countless jokes, little Easter eggs just as clever as they are creepy.

In short, there's plenty to see and do for the curious-minded in Widow's Bay. And with that early season two renewal, there's plenty more to come as well, especially given how the finale reshapes everything moving forward.

So what are you waiting for? Head on down to the next Martha's Vineyard – which is definitely not cursed – for a grand old time. You'll never want to leave. You know, just like the townsfolk who were born there.

Widow's Bay is streaming now on Apple TV. When you've caught up with that, check out our guide to the 25 best shows on Apple TV for more great streaming.

The king of online film reviews, Hideo Kojima, has spoken, and this time the game developer is showing love to surprise Apple TV smash hit Widow's Bay.

Kojima took to Twitter to share his take. "It’s so incredibly good that I couldn’t stop, so I binged through Episode 9 in one go. It’s packed with horror elements, one after another. Fans of Stephen King and horror in general will love it. The pacing is excellent, and the balance between horror and humor is just right," said Kojima. "It’s been a long time since a series pulled me in this completely."

As well as recommending the show to Stephen King fans, Kojima went on to compare the new horror show to the likes of Steven Spielberg's Jaws and David Lynch's Twin Peaks franchise. Check out the full post below.

Kojima said he watched the show based on Frankenstein director Guillermo del Toro's recommendation, who tweeted out his own review of the series on June 1. "Widow's Bay may very well be the best streaming series in a long time… and hands down one of the most mesmerizing acts of narrative prestidigitation in Horror," said Del Toro. Well, that certainly is big praise from the Pan's Labyrinth helmer.

Set in a fictional New England island called Widow's Bay, the series follows a new mayor who attempts to attract tourists and breathe new life into the outdated town. However, the locals claim the island is cursed, which soon becomes apparent when a string of unexplainable, paranormal events occur. The series stars Matthew Rhys, Kate O'Flynn, Kevin Carroll, Dale Dickey, Kingston Rumi Southwick, and Stephen Root.

The show landed on Apple TV on April 29, but has slowly grown in popularity. Widow's Bay sits at an impressive 97% on Rotten Tomatoes and has already been renewed for season 2.

The final episode of Widow's Bay season 1 lands on Apple TV on June 17. For more, check out our guide to the best shows on Apple TV, and keep up with new shows heading your way.

Horror legend Guillermo del Toro says Widow's Bay is one of the best things to hit streaming in a long time, point blank period.

"If I may- in my estimation- #WidowsBay may very well be the best streaming series in a long time… and hands down one of the most mesmerizing acts of narrative prestidigitation in Horror," Del Toro tweeted.

The series follows Tom Loftis (Matthew Rhys), the skeptical mayor of a fictional, titular New England island town, who doesn't believe in ghosts or curses or the paranormal... until he starts experiencing an array of supernatural occurrences that suggest his quaint little town is most definitely cursed. The core cast includes Kate O'Flynn, Dale Dickey, Stephen Root, and Kevin Carroll. The very long list of guest stars features everyone from Toby Huss to Chris Fleming and Betty Gilpin.

Widow's Bay was created by Parks and Recs writer Katie Dippold, who is perhaps best known by the chronically online as the woman who dressed up as the Babadook for a friend's Halloween get-together... that no one else was dressed up at.

The 10-part series currently sits at a 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, and I have a feeling Apple TV Plus will definitely be renewing it for a second season. The first season is still airing through June, so we have a bit of time yet.

Widow's Bay is streaming now on Apple TV. When you've caught up with that, check out our guide to the 25 best shows on Apple TV for more great streaming.

Hideo Kojima is back with another new TV recommendation – and this time it's a Netflix show that's already out on streaming. The Death Stranding creator took to Twitter to share his thoughts on Korean horror drama If Wishes Could Kill.

"I finished all eight episodes of 'If Wishes Could Kill (GIRIGO),'" Kojima wrote. "It was really good. Like many recent series, it did have a 'flashback' episode (important for the story), but episodes 7–8 never lost momentum. It builds steadily toward a grand finale, tying up the characters' setups along the way with great pacing. The ending is full-on fan service, in the best way."

The eight-part show was written by Park Joong-seop and directed by Park Youn-seo and tells the story of a group of high school students who uncover the truth behind a new application. Called 'Girigo', it's a wish-granting software that starts predicting the students' sudden deaths. The group must then work together to try and stop the cycle of deaths by finding out who – or what – is responsible for the app.

This is actually the second time that Kojima tweeted about the show too after he wrote a lengthy review when he started bingeing it as he's a big fan of the director's previous show Moving. Calling it "incredibly entertaining", the game designer concluded that it "strikes a great balance between humor and horror, as well as friendship and betrayal."

Kojima is something of a king of TV and movie recommendations, often taking to social media to share his favorites. He's also known for polite silence when things don't quite live up to his expectations, as was the case with his Madame Web review…

For more recommendations of what to watch, check out our guides to the best Netflix thriller movies and the best Netflix shows to currently stream.

From season 4 has debuted to a perfect 100% Rotten Tomatoes score, making it one of the best-rated shows of the decade, with each season receiving a score over 90%.

The MGM Plus show stars Harold Perrineau (Yes, Mercutio from Baz Luhrmann's Romeo and Juliet!) as Boyd Stevens, the sheriff of a small town in America that traps anyone who enters... and the unwilling residents are left to fight off nightmarish creatures as they desperately search to find a way out.

Season 1 holds a 96%, with season 2 at 93%, and season 3 at 100%. Season 4 premiered on April 19, with MGM Plus swiftly renewing it for a fifth and final season. Created by John Griffin (who guest-starred on MGM Plus horror original The Institute), the cast includes Catalina Sandino Moreno, Eion Bailey, David Alpay, Elizabeth Saunders, Scott McCord, Ricky He, and Chloe Van Landschoot.

"This season, the hunter has turned the key just a little and heat up just a little bit more," Perrineau told Inverse, when asked about the highly-rated fourth season. “They are maybe the most evil hunter you have ever experienced. And that is the town itself."

Horror legend Stephen King has previously spoken out about the show, agreeing with a fan that From is one of the most "criminally underrated horror shows of the decade." The series has been nominated for numerous Saturn Awards, bringing home the award for Best Horror Television show in 2025.

For more, check out our guide to the best new TV shows coming your way in 2026 and beyond.

We're one step closer to welcoming Pennywise the Dancing Clown back to our lives, as Andy Muschietti confirms work is currently underway on IT: Welcome to Derry season 2.

Season 1 of the Stephen King spin-off was one of the most pleasant surprises of 2025, and it acted as a prequel to Muschietti's two IT film adaptations.

"It's 1935 – we're now working on it, and it's so much fun," Muschietti revealed at Deadline's Contenders TV panel for Welcome to Derry. "For the ones of you who read the books, probably the Bradley Gang sounds familiar. The Bradley Gang was a gang of bank robbers that – not accidentally, but they were on their way somewhere and they stopped in Derry to buy some ammo and something horrible happens."

We already knew the plan for Welcome to Derry was to focus on three pivotal events in the titular town's history, spanning three seasons. The first installment focused on the Black Spot fire, and season 2 will be about the Bradley Gang massacre, a shootout in Derry. Season 3 will be about the Kitchener Ironworks explosion, which killed 88 children on an Easter egg hunt.

"The Bradley Gang is based on the Brady Gang, which is a real-life gang of robbers that were executed in the streets of Bangor, Maine," Muschietti explained. "And now we're not creating the event that the big paroxysm of violence in this case will be the massacre of a Bradley gang."

As he went on to detail, the setting will be very different this time around, as the reality of the Great Depression means the familiar IT storytelling will have to change. "It's fascinating because the thing that is so much fun in this stage of development is that we're facing an era which is the Depression Era that changes dramatically the setup of things," he shared. "There's no suburban comfort – the trope of the kids that live in suburbia and they ride their bikes and suddenly one of them disappears is nothing like this. This is in 1935. It's a very dire situation. People are very poor. They're struggling to survive, so the setup will be very different."

There's no release date for IT: Welcome to Derry season 2 just yet. While you wait, check out our guide to all the most exciting upcoming TV shows.

Jeffrey Dean Morgan quickly wrote his name into The Walking Dead legend as Negan, the maniacal, Lucille-swinging villain who very quickly made an impact upon his on-screen debut in 2016.

But it could have been very different had the show's producers opted for their backup choice while Morgan was contemplating his next career choice: Scream and Scooby-Doo actor Matthew Lillard.

Speaking on The Big Thing podcast (via The Wrap), Lillard revealed that, after multiple callbacks, he received word that he wouldn't be considered for the part of Negan.

It wasn't until a few years later during a chance meeting at San Diego Comic-Con that Lillard found out how close he was to becoming The Walking Dead's most-talked-about villain.

“The creator of the show comes over, and he said, ‘You have no idea. You had the part for like 10 minutes. At that point, I would’ve had another 10 years of work.”

Lillard explained that his take on Negan would have been markedly different to the cold, calculating figure that graced our screens for six seasons of The Walking Dead, plus multiple seasons of the Dead City spin-off.

"He’s super masculine, and I just would’ve been more wicked and funny," Lillard said. "He was super badass and masculine. We would have had very different takes."

Lillard added, "That part goes on. He becomes a legend."

For his part, Lillard has showcased plenty of the villainous chops needed for Negan throughout his career, from Scream's Stu all the way through to Daredevil: Born Again season 2 and the enigmatic Mr. Charles.

The Walking Dead, meanwhile, is carrying on across multiple spin-off series, including Daryl Dixon season 4 and Dead City season 3.

For more, check out how to watch The Walking Dead in order.

Interview with the Vampire spin-off Talamasca: The Secret Order is the latest in a string of this year's TV casualties. AMC has canceled the show after one season, Variety reports.

"While we are not proceeding with another season of Talamasca: The Secret Order, we are proud of the series and grateful for the efforts of everyone involved," an AMC spokesperson told the publication in a statement. "The Talamasca has a storied place within the Anne Rice Immortal Universe, and we expect to see at least some of these characters, and the organization itself, in future expressions of the franchise."

Created by Mr. Harrigan's Phone director John Lee Hancock, the show follows Guy Anatole, played by Nicholas Denton, who has the ability to read people's minds. He's recruited to join the Talamasca, a secret society that monitors the activity of immortal beings, like vampires and witches, to maintain order with the mortal, human world.

Eric Bogosian, who plays Daniel Malloy in Interview with the Vampire, made a crossover cameo in the show, and Jason Schwartzman also appeared in a guest role. The show had a fairly lukewarm response from critics after it premiered in October 2025, with a score of 61% on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes.

Talamasca: The Secret Order didn't adapt any specific Ann Rice novels, like Interview with the Vampire and The Mayfair Witches, but instead created a new story around the organization that features in those novels. Elsewhere in AMC's Immortal Universe, Interview with the Vampire is returning for a third season later this year, and The Mayfair Witches has also been renewed for a third installment.

Interview with the Vampire season 3 arrives on AMC on June 7. In the meantime, check out our guide to the other best new TV shows on the way in 2026.

It looks like the Duffer brothers have struck gold again, as just over three months after their hit sci-fi show Stranger Things came to an end, the duo's new project has hit Netflix to positive first reviews.

The Duffer-produced horror series, Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen, follows a young bride and groom in the week leading up to their disastrous wedding. The complete first season dropped onto the streamer in the early hours of March 26, 2026, and not long after, reactions from critics and audience started to roll in.

Digital Spy's Laura Jane Turner called the new body horror a "captivating," adding, "Despite some flaws and untapped potential to push its impressive themes a little further, it brings something fresh and original that's absolutely worth your time." Tom's Guide writer Rory Mellon goes as far as to liken the new series to Mike Flanagan's Haunting of Hill House, adding, "Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen appears to have come from the Alfred Hitchcock school of tension-building."

Many critics seem to be loving the wedding setting, as A Shot Magazine writer Mai El Mokadem said, the nuptials "curdles into something far more sinister – a blood-soaked, dread-filled nightmare." The Guardian's Lucy Mangan said the show highlights the horrors of commitment, and poses the question, "Can you think of anything worse than being trapped by sacred ritual to the wrong person?"

However, not everyone is a fan, as Twitter user Pramitheus pointed out that the show's bad lighting had an effect on their watching experience, and HuffPost's Candice Frederick said "Something Very Bad is Going to Happen should have been a 90-minute movie, not a series with 8, nearly one-hour episodes." Time's Judy Berman also said that the show takes "way too long" for something bad to actually happen.

At the time of writing, the show does not yet have a Rotten Tomatoes score, but has so far scored 63 out of 100 on Metacritic based on just a handful of collected reviews.

Led by showrunner Haley Z. Boston, with the Matt and Ross Duffer serving as producers, Something Bad is Going to Happen stars Camila Morrone and Adam DiMarco as the newlyweds-to-be, alongside Jennifer Jason Leigh, Ted Levine, Gus Birney, Jeff Wilbusch, and Karla Crome.

Something Very Bad is Going to Happen is out on Netflix now. For more, check out our guide to the best shows on Netflix.

The Last of Us has cast two important characters for season 3.

Deadline reports that Michelle Mao will play Yara and Kyriana Kratter will play Lev. The pair are Seraphites, members of the religious cult in Seattle that Ellie and Dina get a glimpse of in season 2. Lev is Yara's younger brother, and the character is trans in the game. The publication reports that this will be the case in the show, too, although Kratter is not trans.

15-year-old Kratter is best known for starring as KB in the 2024 Star Wars show Skeleton Crew, while Mao played Rosamund, the antagonist in the latest season of Bridgerton.

Lev and Yara are both important to Abby's story after the pair cross paths with her in Seattle, with Lev in particular being something of a moral compass for her. In a narrative switch-up, Abby will be the focus of The Last of Us season 3, and (if it follows the course of the game) we'll see the events of the second season from her point of view. That means diving deeper into what's going on in Seattle with the WLF and the Seraphites.

Other recent additions to the show's cast include Patrick Wilson as Abby's father Jerry, Jason Ritter as WLF soldier Hanley, and Clea DuVall as another member of the Seraphites. They join an existing cast list that includes Kaitlyn Dever as Abby and Bella Ramsey as Ellie.

In Abby's story, Jeffrey Wright returns as Isaac, with Tati Gabrielle as Nora, Spencer Lord as Owen, Ariela Barer as Mel, and Jorge Lendeborg Jr. as Manny (who takes over from Danny Ramirez). In Ellie's corner, there's Isabela Merced as Dina and Gabriel Luna as Tommy.

Filming is currently underway on season 3.

The Last of Us season 3 is expected to premiere on HBO in 2027. For more on what to watch, check out our guide to the other best new TV shows on the way.

Hannibal creator Bryan Fuller has confirmed that he's still aiming to get a fourth season of the show going over ten years after it ended with season 3, saying it's "still out there in the universe." He's also reiterated that he'd like to adapt The Silence of the Lambs with Zendaya in the lead as Clarice Starling.

"I would love to do a Clarice story," Fuller tells Screen Rant. "I'm a big fan of Zendaya. I think she would be an amazing Clarice Starling, and bring a completely different temperature and point of view to the character than what we've had before. I would love to get Zendaya and Mads Mikkelsen together in a Hannibal story."

Fuller also explains that he's still seeking the rights to adapt Thomas Harris' original 1988 novel The Silence of the Lambs. The original film rights for the novel had their own tangled journey to the big screen, with actor Gene Hackman attached to develop the movie and potentially star in it before director Jonathan Demme took the reins in 1991.

In the original film, which reached the highest echelons of critical acclaim, fledgling FBI agent Clarice Starling is played to perfection by Jodie Foster, so if Fuller were to adapt the book and bring in Zendaya for the role, she certainly would bring a different energy to the performance.

Though we're not sure Bryan Fuller's Silence of the Lambs/Hannibal season 4 will ever happen, we're certain these are the best horror movies of all time.

HBO Max's It: Welcome to Derry streaming show hasn't been officially renewed for season 2, but according to co-showrunner Andy Muschietti, it's all but a done deal. Speaking at a press conference following this year's Saturn Awards, Muschietti confirms that season 2 is definitely in the works.

"There's not much we can say but yes," Muschietti says at the press conference (via Nerdist). "We're very proud that the expectations are high after the first season. I think we're going to deliver something that is greater."

This is another check in the 'yes' column for It: Welcome to Derry season 2, following HBO CEO Casey Bloys reassuring fans that it's in the works, though there are still some questions about when it might go into production.

"Let me say, [it's] not in limbo at all. Hardly. It was a huge success for us," Bloys said earlier this year. "Andy and Barbara [Muschietti] are hard at work trying to come up with an idea for a story they'd want to tell for another season. I would happily do it. One of the challenges is, there's not a book that you're basing it on, so it's invention. They want to make sure that they have a story they're excited to tell. So it's not limbo other than they need to land on something they're excited by creatively. We'll be there."

Welcome to Derry is a prequel for Stephen King's novel It, which was adapted into two films by Muschietti. The show tells the origins of Pennywise, the monstrous clown who is the villain of the novel and movies, and how it ties inextricably to the town of Derry, Maine.

It: Welcome to Derry season 1 is streaming now on HBO. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our round-up of everything we know so far about It: Welcome to Derry season 2.

Before The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live hit screens in 2024, The Walking Dead prosthetic artist, director, and executive producer Greg Nicotero says the team considered making a reunion show that would reunite original characters such as Rick, Michonne, Daryl, Carol, and more.

"There's been a lot of talks about that sort of reunion-type show," said Nicotero on The Brandon Davis Show in response to Davis asking if there was ever a plan to bring back Daryl, Carol, Negan, and Maggie to help Rick and Michonne fight the CRM and start a new world. "There have to be a lot of great characters. I mean, we've been talking about it for a couple of years, even before the Rick and Michonne show."

However, the team decided to use The Ones Who Live to conclude Rick's story. "The people wanted to see what happened to Rick. That was it. And I think that was the great part about it, the excitement of like seeing where Rick went and what happened because it was always intended that way," said Nicotero. "It was always intended that we follow Rick and we see where he goes."

There was even a discussion about turning the limited series into a feature. "It was going to be a movie. We're going to do a Walking Dead movie," said Nicotero. But it was decided that six episodes would suffice. The Ones Who Live ultimately gave Rick the happy ending that audiences wanted to see. At the end of the sixth episode, Andrew Lincoln's weary traveller reunites with Michonne and his daughter Judith after the CRM is destroyed, allowing the trio to return home and live in peace.

But The Walking Dead Universe is far from being over. The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon season 4 has wrapped filming and is eyeing a 2026 release, and The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3 is currently filming.

For more, check out our ranking of the best Walking Dead episodes and get up to date with the franchise with our guide on how to watch The Walking Dead in order.

Yellowjackets has officially entered production on its fourth and final season with a typically cryptic teaser that calls back to the fateful moment at the end of season 3 in the flashback timeline, in which the stranded soccer team finally reaches a means of escape from the wilderness back to society.

The teaser, posted on the official Yellowjackets social media, also shows some quick, violent flashes of the teen versions of the main cast, along with the message "The Final Call," referring to the shots of poor, dead Natalie calling for help on a satellite radio, with a response finally coming through.

Check it out:

Yellowjackets tells the story of a high school girl's soccer team whose plane crashes in the wilderness while traveling to a competition. Things quickly turn desperate, with the teens eventually turning to cannibalism to survive and dividing into competing factions.

Alongside the ongoing reveal of all the brutality of the team's survival, the series catches up with the few surviving adult Yellowjackets, showing how the trauma of their youth has contributed to the chaos of their lives.

Yellowjackets was originally planned as five seasons, but given where season 3 ended up, it's not the weirdest thing in the world to move ahead with a final season before the chance to resolve questions that have lingered through the entire show.

Even though she's basically the housewife version of the Joker, I'll still be sad to see the continuing misadventures of Melanie Lynskey's frankly diabolical Shauna and her path of destruction come to an end. It's just too juicy and too rare to stop hungering for the drama.

No premiere date for Yellowjackets season 4 has been announced. While we wait, fill out your watchlist with our guide to the best new TV shows you need to know about.

Frankenstein's monster, the Wolf Man, Dracula, and more of the classic Universal monsters are coming to TV in a new Netflix show from Scream 7 writer/director Kevin Williamson which he describes as an "adult Vampire Diaries."

"Netflix and Universal were very kind to let me go direct Scream 7 and put some projects on hold and now I'm focused on those," Williamson tells Esquire. "The one I'm writing right now is a show. You might call it an adult Vampire Diaries. It's based in the Universal monster land. I get to play with some of those characters like Dracula and Frankenstein and The Wolf Man and have fun there."

Universal's classic monsters of the '30s through the '50s formed one of the first prototypical 'cinematic universes' with numerous crossover films. However, attempts to revive what Universal has sometimes dubbed the 'Dark Universe' have proven unfruitful. The best version of the concept is 1987's somewhat dated but still charming cult classic The Monster Squad, which pitted a team of Universal monsters led by Dracula against a gang of horror movie obsessed teenagers. It's more of a B-movie romp than a filmmaking achievement, but it's the only one that's made a dent in the last, oh, 40 years or so.

The last time Universal took a sincere swing at developing a modern version of the idea, it resulted in 2017's Tom Cruise starring reboot of The Mummy, which sank so hard it essentially tanked what was planned as a series of films that would culminate in an Avengers style crossover movie.

I've been a fan of the Universal monsters basically my whole life - one of the first movies I remember begging to watch as a very young kid was 1931's Frankenstein - and I'm not exactly enthused about the continued swings at a shared universe revival. Setting aside the melodrama of the Vampire Diaries comparison, it feels like missing the forest for the trees.

Universal's original monster movies didn't start out with the intent of turning into a proto-cinematic universe. It happened somewhat organically many years into Universal's monster movie tradition. What made it work was the history of classic films that stand on their own two legs.

Kind of like how 2012's Avengers, the work that so many failed cinematic universes have tried to copy, followed a series of films establishing the characters in their own right before mashing them together.

There's no word yet on when Williamson's Universal monsters show will premiere. In the meantime, check out the best Netflix shows you can watch right now, and stay up to date on all the most exciting new TV shows you need to know about.

Meta and XRTV's immersive 3D spin-off of A24 horror hit Talk to Me has pinned down its cast – and this time, it's actors from the likes of Rebel Moon and The Buccaneers who'll be messing around with sinister spirits.

As Deadline confirms, Aubri Ibrag and Charlotte Maggi have been tapped to lead the series, with Sofia Hublitz (Ozark) and Julio Peña (Berlin), Charlie Hiscock (Ted Lasso), and Jude Law's son Raff Law (Masters of the Air) rounding out the line-up. Production on the show, which is being created exclusively for VR devices, is currently underway in Spain.

The report also revealed a few more plot specifics, like it being set in Ibiza, where estranged besties Lauryn (Ibrag) and Keeley (Maggi) catch up with socialite Blake (Hublitz) and a couple of others for a wild week of partying in the sunshine. After picking up some drugs from a local dealer (Peña), though, their holiday soon turns into a hellish nightmare.

Craig William Macneill (Westworld, Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) is set to direct all six of the half-hour episodes, while Danny and Michael Philippou, who wrote and directed the original movie, are on executive producing duty. Trent Atherton wrote the scripts.

Released in 2022, Aussie chiller Talk to Me centered on Mia (Sophie Wilde), who's still struggling to come to terms with the sudden death of her mother two years earlier. In an attempt to distract herself from her grief, she drags her best pal Jade (Alexandra Jensen) to a get-together, where fellow students, Joss and Hayley, are hosting another of their renowned séances.

With the help of a mysterious embalmed hand, the group take it in turns to open their bodies up to whichever deal soul lurks nearby. But not every ghoulie is benevolent – or happy to go back to the afterlife once their 90-second visit is over. A sequel, titled Talk 2 Me, is in development.

"There was this footage that I saw of this neighbor of mine that I watched for a while, and he was experimenting with drugs for the first time," Danny previously told GamesRadar+, which sounds interestingly more in-keeping with the show's premise. "He was on the floor having a really negative reaction to what he was taking, and all his friends that were with him weren't helping him though, they were filming him and laughing at him. That was a really big inspiration point."

While we wait for more news, check out our guide to the most exciting new TV shows heading our way.

Robert Kirkman will likely be dining out on this anecdote until the end of his career – and we're not talking about munching on brains here.

According to former Image Comics publisher Jim Valentino on Robservations with Rob Liefeld (H/T Popverse), Kirkman was once told "zombie books don't sell."

"Walking Dead from the time it was published had a positive sales slope," Valentino recalled. “And [Robert Kirkman] loves to tell this story, because I told him zombie books don’t sell."

In Valentino's defense, he added, "I wouldn’t consider Walking Dead a zombie book. It’s a survival book."

In a slightly more mortifying recollection for Kirkman, Valentino went through some of the legendary comic creator's initial title pitches for The Walking Dead.

“[Kirkman] hit me with the first thing which was, ‘I want to call it The Dawn of the Dead.’ No Robert, you can’t do that. It’s already a movie. ‘What do you think of Planet of the Zombies?’ Kirkman [then] says, ‘How about The Walking Dead?’ Boom. That's it. Call it The Walking Dead."

As of the last official count by Image Comics, The Walking Dead is up to over 45 million copies sold, as well as spawning a hugely successful TV show (which ran for 11 seasons on AMC), multiple spin-offs, novels, and video games, including the acclaimed Telltale series. Not bad going for a zombie book.

Next up for Kirkman is his job overseeing Invincible season 4, which includes an original storyline that never made its way into the comics on Prime Video. The episode features Steven Yeun's Mark Grayson coming into contact with a few hellish figures, including Damien Darkblood (Clancy Brown) and Satan (Bruce Campbell) himself.

For more, check out our guide on how to watch The Walking Dead in order and our picks for the best Prime Video shows.

The next Stephen King adaptation from horror maestro Mike Flanagan could have a very seasonally appropriate release date, as one of its stars has revealed its apparent release window.

Katee Sackhoff, who forms part of the cast of the show (and is also known for playing Bo-Katan Kryze in the Star Wars universe), revealed the news at Fan Expo Vancouver, as reported by The Direct.

"Back to Mike Flanagan, yeah... the Flanniverse... October of 2026, Carrie comes out on Amazon. You guys are in for a treat. It's very good. It's very good," she said.

Not much is known about Flanagan's Carrie series just yet, though, obviously, it's adapting King's iconic novel. In the book, the horror author's first, teenager Carrie turns prom into a nightmare as a consequence of vicious bullying.

Summer Howell will play Carrie White, with Mattthew Lillard co-starring as Principal Grayle. Samantha Sloyan will play Carrie's mother Margaret, with the rest of the cast including Alison Thornton, Chris Hargensen, Thalia Dudek, Siena Agudong, Amber Midthunder, Josie Totah, Arthur Conti, and Joel Oulette.

"I mean, it's Carrie. There's fire? ... There might be some blood," Sackhoff teased at the convention. "Yeah, I'm just excited. You guys are gonna love it. Mike Flanagan is, so good at what he does: smart, psychological horror."

She added: "And he's very, very good at adapting Stephen King, and Stephen trusts him. So, as you can tell in the press, Stephen's giving him his entire library. He's like, 'You can do this one and you can do this one. How about this one? How about this one?'"

Flanagan has already adapted the likes of Doctor Sleep and The Life of Chuck, and he's working on an adaptation of The Dark Tower, which Flanagan has recently said is "moving. We've got a lot of scripts done for it. It's the first priority."

While you wait for Carrie, check out our guide to all the upcoming Stephen King movies and shows for everything else that's on the way.

After 50 years of questionable sequels and remakes, the Texas Chain Saw Massacre may finally be back in good hands. Following the news that A24 is distributing a TV reboot of the iconic 1974 slasher, producer Glen Powell has promised genre fans that everyone behind the scenes is committed to "protecting" the horror franchise's legacy.

"I'm realizing I'm in a position in which, the things that I really love, properties that I really love and care about... Texas Chain Saw is one of, I think, the most brilliant horror movies," the actor gushed to Variety, while promoting his upcoming comedy-thriller How to Make a Killing. "It defined the genre and is such a part of that era. I feel that A24 is a place that's really making such special things, and they're such a custodian and guardian of quality. And we just really talked to the rights holders...

"J.T. Mollner, and we have some other creatives around it... they're just so passionate about what we're doing. They have a really strong vision. Everybody around it really cares and when you have that group mentality protecting something like that – I care about it, everybody cares about it – I know we're gonna do something really special with it, so I'm feeling very, very good. It was a long process to get there but I know we have something really fun ahead."

When asked whether he'd appear on-screen in the TV adaptation, or even the separate movie that was announced at the same time, Powell added: "You never know. I am known for wearing masks, between Chad Powers and Leatherface... But no, I really do think it's just something for Barnstorm to produce but I'm definitely going to be very involved."

Directed by Tobe Hooper, who co-wrote the script with Kim Henkel, the original Texas Chain Saw Massacre follows a group of 20-somethings who stumble across the home of a family of violent, weapon-wielding cannibals. While it initially earned mixed reviews from critics, the film went on to be a box-office success, pulling in over $30 million worldwide against its $140,000 budget at the time.

Over the years, it's spawned eight follow-ups, including the black comedy take The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre in 1995, two prequels, and a sequel set 50 years after the events of the first flick.

It seems unlikely that Powell's TV show will be a straight re-do, given Henkel's tease of "an epic tale lurking in the Chainsaw backstory" and Mollner, who'll be directing, previously stating that he saw the project as "a fresh way in" to the saga.

While we wait, check out our guide to the most exciting new horror movies heading our way.

The first trailer for Netflix's new horror series Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen is here, teasing a nightmarish journey into marriage inspired by genre classics like Carrie and Rosemary’s Baby.

Following the Stranger Things finale last month, The Duffer Brothers are back on the streamer as executive producers of this new show, with Haley Z. Boston on board as showrunner. The Night Manager season 2 star Camila Morrone plays Rachel, the bride, while The White Lotus' Adam DiMarco portrays her fiancé Nicky.

Per the official logline, "Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen is an atmospheric horror series set at a wedding, following a bride and groom in the week leading up to their ill-fated nuptials. That’s not a spoiler – just read the title."

In the trailer, we see the pair taking a road trip to Nicky's wealthy family's vacation home ahead of their wedding, but things don't turn out as expected. "Prone to superstition and paranoia," the synopsis continues, "Rachel can't shake the relentless feeling that something bad is going to happen. Her foreboding doubts, coupled with a series of eerie coincidences and dreadful surprises, force her to ask the question: What makes two people soulmates? And worse – what could be scarier than lifelong commitment to the wrong person?"

According to EW, "each episode tracks a single day around this private ceremony, and each day Rachel’s paranoia and superstition, fed by an accelerating number of strange occurrences, ramps up."

Joining Morrone and DiMarco in the cast are Jennifer Jason Leigh as Nicky's mother, The Silence of the Lambs star Ted Levine as Dr. Cunningham, Jeff Wilbusch as Jules, Karla Crome as Nell, and Gus Birney as Portia.

Boston, whose previous works include shows like Baby Reindeer and Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities, described the new series as an exploration of "the fear of marrying the wrong person through a horror lens" (via What's On Netflix). According to the showrunner, the goal is for viewers to "feel the paranoia and the fear that Rachel is feeling," deliberately "constructing the show in terms of her discomfort."

Something Very Bad is Going to Happen arrives on Netflix on March 26. In the meantime, fill out your watchlist with our guide to the best shows on Netflix right now.

The Last of Us actor Ashley Johnson, who surprised fans when she cameoed as Ellie's ill-fated mom Anna in the HBO TV show, says she "understands" the backlash to season 2 – but that "sometimes it feels not great" when players' passion for the games inspires such intense negativity.

When asked by The Direct about the response to the second chapter, Johnson, who brings Ellie to life in both Naughty Dog's The Last of Us and The Last of Us Part II, said: "Yeah, I feel like with The Last of Us, people really love that story, including me, and it's very, very passionate fans. And sometimes that passion feels really great, and sometimes it feels not great. But you know, I understand it. I understand loving something so much, and wanting it to be what you want it to be."

She added that she "loves" The Last of Us "in every form" and that she's "so happy" she gets to "be a part of that telling of the story."

Johnson went on: "It can be hard sometimes, when you are making these things, and on your side of things, you're passionate about it, and excited about it, and hopefully that those two things can meet. Sometimes they do not. And that's hard, because I mean, anytime you're working on anything, you want people to like it, and you want people to love it as much as you."

While The Last of Us season 1 followed the source material pretty faithfully, season 2 took more creative swings – deviating from the games in regards to its structure, pacing, and diluting Ellie's quest for revenge. It said goodbye to Pedro Pascal's Joel, too, of course, which will have shocked viewers who aren't familiar with the games.

Even before it premiered on April 13, 2025, Craig Mazin, one of the co-showrunners at the time, admitted that he anticipated "furor" at the new batch of episodes. "I mean, there usually is, starting even with casting," he explained candidly to Entertainment Weekly. "We are not interested in creating social media fear. We just want to tell the story the way we think it should be told."

The Last of Us seasons 1 and 2 are streaming now on HBO Max. Be sure to keep up with The Last of Us season 3 with our handy, everything-you-need-to-know guide.

After the tragic death of Catherine O'Hara, The Last of Us season 3 showrunner Craig Mazin has confirmed that the late actor would have returned in the upcoming third season.

O'Hara played Gail Lynden in The Last of Us, a therapist whose husband Joel had killed.

"I don't think it's a big spoiler to say that she was gonna be in our show again, because of course she was," Mazin said on the Scriptnotes podcast. "She's so good. But she was stolen from all of us. The thing that's upsetting me is I don't get to see her in other stuff. Like, I don't care about my show. I wanted to see her in other things, cause what else was gonna happen?"

O'Hara died on January 30, 2026 from an undisclosed illness. Along with The Last of Us, she memorably starred in Beetlejuice, Home Alone, Schitt's Creek, and many more movies and shows across her storied career.

The Last of Us season 3 is switching focus to Kaitlyn Dever's Abby, which was teased in The Last of Us season 2 ending. "The fans are really going to like it, I think, the shifting perspective onto Abby, getting some more context onto her storyline and going back in time with this season. So, I'm very excited for the fans to see it," Dever said in January.

However, creator Neil Druckmann won't be as involved as in earlier seasons this time around. "It was right when we were about to start the writers' room for season 3," Druckmann explained. "I looked at what's in front of me, what would the next season might look like, and with all the various Last of Us things I'm working on – not just the show – with all the various games I'm working on, the biggest one that takes up most of my time is Intergalactic: The Heretic Profit, our next big IP for Naughty Dog and PlayStation, it felt like I could better serve all of my responsibilities if I stayed at a higher level."

The Last of Us season 3 doesn't have a release date just yet. In the meantime, check out our guide to all the most exciting new TV shows of the year.

It's been two months since It: Welcome to Derry's finale pulled in 6.5 million viewers and cemented the horror prequel as one of HBO Max's biggest hits – though it's still not been renewed. Fans needn't worry, though, according to network boss Casey Bloys...

"Let me say, [it's] not in limbo at all. Hardly. It was a huge success for us," the CEO recently told Deadline. "Andy and Barbara [Muschietti] are hard at work trying to come up with an idea for a story they'd want to tell for another season. I would happily do it. One of the challenges is, there's not a book that you're basing it on, so it's invention. They want to make sure that they have a story they're excited to tell. So it's not limbo other than they need to land on something they're excited by creatively. We'll be there."

Andy Muschietti, who directed multiple episodes of It: Welcome to Derry season 1 as well as big-screen adaptations It and It: Chapter Two, has previously said that the second season would center on the Bradley Gang Massacre, a bloody event that's briefly touched on in the interludes of Stephen King's novel It. With season 1 having fleshed out and recontextualized the burning down of the Black Spot, a similarly tragic moment in Derry's history, we can imagine more of the same in season 2.

"It takes place during the Depression in Derry, and there are some new characters and some characters from this season as well, but younger versions of them," Muschietti previously explained to Variety. While they're clearly still trying to figure things out, we can assume that that means we'll see fresher-faced versions of long-time locals Rose and Ingrid, who were played by Kimberly Guerrero and Madeleine Stowe in the existing eight episodes.

It: Welcome to Derry season 1 is streaming now on HBO. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our round-up of everything we know so far about It: Welcome to Derry season 2.

Netflix has unveiled the first look at Something Very Bad is Going to Happen, the new show from Stranger Things creators the Duffer Brothers.

Per the official logline, "Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen is an atmospheric horror series set at a wedding, following a bride and groom in the week leading up to their ill-fated nuptials. That’s not a spoiler – just read the title."

Daisy Jones and the Six star Camila Morrone plays Rachel, the bride, while The White Lotus' Adam DiMarco is her fiancé Nicky. According to Entertainment Weekly, the pair takes a roadtrip to Nicky's wealthy family's vacation home five days before their wedding, and "each episode tracks a single day around this private ceremony, and each day Rachel’s paranoia and superstition, fed by an accelerating number of strange occurrences, ramps up."

The cast also includes Jennifer Jason Leigh as Nicky's mother, as well as Ted Levine, who's best known for playing Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs. You can see more images of the show below.

Haley Z. Boston is on board as showrunner, while the Duffers are executive producers. Boston has previously worked as a writer on shows like Hunters and Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities, and compares her new show to Carrie and Rosemary's Baby.

The Duffers recently said goodbye to one long-running Netflix show, after the Stranger Things season 5 finale aired on New Year's Eve 2025. The final episode proved controversial, coming under fire from fans with some even launching a conspiracy, known as Conformity Gate, that an extra secret episode was on the way to serve as the "real" finale.

Something Very Bad is Going to Happen arrives on Netflix on March 26. In the meantime, fill out your watchlist with our guide to the best shows on Netflix right now.

The Last of Us star Kaitlyn Dever has teased her bigger role in the upcoming third season – and said she starts her prep for season 3 in just a few days.

"I'm getting mentally and physically prepped right now. I go up in a couple days, actually, to start prep over there," Dever told Deadline. "I'm so excited to kind of take on a much bigger role in the season."

The Last of Us season 2 ending saw the perspective shift from Bella Ramsey's Ellie to Dever's Abby, promising to take us back in time to show us Abby's side of the story.

"The fans are really going to like it, I think, the shifting perspective onto Abby, getting some more context onto her storyline and going back in time with this season. So, I'm very excited for the fans to see it," Dever added.

One of the biggest changes for season 2, however, is behind the scenes – creator Neil Druckmann has stepped back from the series (though he's still onboard as an executive producer), along with The Last of Us Part 2 game co-writer Halley Gross.

"It was right when we were about to start the writers' room for season 3," Druckmann previously explained of his decision. "I looked at what's in front of me, what would the next season might look like, and with all the various Last of Us things I'm working on – not just the show – with all the various games I'm working on, the biggest one that takes up most of my time is Intergalactic: The Heretic Profit, our next big IP for Naughty Dog and PlayStation, it felt like I could better serve all of my responsibilities if I stayed at a higher level."

The Last of Us season 3 doesn't yet have a release date. While you wait, check out our guide to all the most exciting new TV shows of the year.

Good news, kiddos! It: Welcome to Derry season 2 is "in the works", despite HBO not having officially greenlit the horror prequel's return.

At the same time The Hollywood Reporter revealed that Birds of Prey's Christina Hodson has been tapped to write the DCU's Batman: The Brave and the Bold, the publication stated outright that director Andy Muschietti was working on the sophomore chapter of the horror prequel.

The filmmaker has spoken openly about his plans for the TV show, which focuses on the origins of Bill Skarsgård's Pennywise the Dancing Clown as new generations face off against the titular killer, so it's hardly a surprise we're getting more episodes. But it's still good to know that things are moving in the right direction.

"We can only say the stuff that's already known, like it's in 1935, 27 years before season 1 and it involves the massacre of the Bradley Gang from the books," Muschietti said of the prospective follow-up in an interview with Variety back in December. "It takes place during the Depression in Derry, and there are some new characters and some characters from this season as well, but younger versions of them."

With that, fans can expect to see longtime Derry residents Kimberley Guerrero's Rose, James Remar's Shaw, and Madeleine Stowe's Ingrid in season 2, though it's likely that they'll be played by different actors this time around since it'll be set almost three decades before the events of season 1. One thing's for sure... Skarsgård will be back to wreak more bloody havoc as the eponymous evil entity.

It: Welcome to Derry season 1, or "Chapter One" as the promising title card over the end credits says, is streaming now on HBO Max. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our ranking of the best Stephen King adaptations.

Looks like The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3 is gearing up to break our hearts, with recently captured set pics revealing that Emily Kinney's Beth is going to have a cameo in the new batch of episodes.

In a bunch of snaps posted to X by @TWDUfilming, we can see Maggie actor Lauren Cohan and Kinney shooting a scene in Central Park. Judging by the regular clothes they're sporting, the takeaway coffee cups they're holding, and all the un-undead extras, it seems set to be a dream sequence. Makes sense, of course, given that Maggie's younger sister Beth died in The Walking Dead season 5 – or 18 years ago, if we're going by the horror franchise's timeline.

"I'm so emotional about this! Maggie deserved this, [to] see her little sister one more time, say their good byes. Maybe in her dream, [her] dad is alive too," one emotional viewer replied to the tweet.

"Oh I will be SICK, this is everything," said another, while a third wrote: "Nonono they sure do know how to make a b***h cry." Check out the pics below...

Back in the day, The Walking Dead was notorious for killing off its main characters. As the series was coming to an end, it was always shocking seeing old stills from the first couple of seasons and realizing how few of the survivors actually made it out alive. While Negan's vicious murder of Maggie's husband Glenn (Steven Yeun) stands out as one of the franchise's most brutal, and subsequently paved the narrative way for the Dead City spin-off, the one that always stuck with me was Beth's.

During a tense hostage exchange inside Grady Memorial Hospital in 'Coda', Beth stabbed corrupt cop leader Dawn in the shoulder with a pair of scissors, causing Dawn to accidentally shoot Beth in the head. The youngster died on the spot, leading to a tearful Daryl (Norman Reedus) immediately executing Dawn – one of the few times he actually killed a living character up until that point.

Whenever I rewatch the series, I always hate how sudden and unnecessary it feels, and it guts me every time when a sobbing Maggie falls to her knees, having spotted that Beth isn't alive in Daryl's arms as he carries her out of the hospital. In short, I'm going to stock up on tissues before their reunion in Dead City season 3...

Interestingly, this won't be the first time The Walking Dead Universe has seen a character wonder what their life would've been like had the world not succumbed to a devastating zombie apocalypse. In The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live, Rick (Andrew Lincoln) imagines meeting Michonne (Danai Gurira) in a pre-outbreak world.

In those moments, we see them strike up a conversation on a park bench, as a nervous Rick asks Michonne for directions to a nearby building ahead of his first day on a new job. "It was very cute. We talked very intensely about how you take something like The Walking Dead, which is not a love story genre, and really lean into making it a love story genre," Gurira previously told GamesRadar+. "When Scott [Gimple] came up with this aspect of it in the teleplay, I was like, 'Oh, that's good. That's good stuff.' Because it's like, 'Of course that's how he survives, he has to escape. He escapes and goes into a dream place that is wholly devoid of the issues and the horror and the apocalypse and the loss'. That's how he keeps himself alive. It encompasses that hope and joy of falling in love."

The Walking Dead: Dead City seasons 1 and 2 are streaming now on AMC+. For more, check out our our guide on how to watch The Walking Dead in order.

Pennywise actor Bill Skarsgård has revealed his take on the evil clown's ability to time-travel in Stephen King spin-off It: Welcome to Derry, and it sounds super complicated.

At the end of It: Welcome to Derry season 1, we learn that despite the season being set 27 years after the first It movie and 54 years before It: Chapter 2, Pennywise has already experienced everything that happened in 1989 and 2016, despite currently being in 1962. He is targeting the kids in the series so that those in the Losers Club are never born and will not be able to kill him in the future. With this, it seems as though time moves in a completely different direction for the evil entity, or so we thought.

"I thought that was an interesting thing that the character is kind of going in two different directions," said Skarsgård in an interview from 2025 that has since made its way onto Twitter, before questioning, "But what's time to something that is not part of this dimension?" If what Skarsgård is saying is that Pennywise isn't affected by time at all, then the clown either experiences time on a constant loop or can bounce from era to era as he pleases.

"It's so abstract this transdimensional evil being thing with a spider and a turtle or whatever. It is really out there. From reading the book, you can interpret it a thousand different ways," added the star. Featured in several King novels, the turtle Maturin is It's nemesis and an ancient cosmic being who comes from a place before time started. However, despite King touching on the time travel issue in his works, he never fully explains it. "I'm pretty sure Stephen King doesn't really know," said Skarsgård.

If Pennywise is from the same place as Maturin, that explains why he isn't affected by our time constraints. That all sounds very confusing, but there's no need to worry yourself over it, as Skarsgård says the series isn't really about that. "It's kind of this little bookend thing how we ended it," added the star. "I'm not quite sure where we're going with it, but there's something fun to explore that Pennywise might be going backwards, but it's forwards for him just as it is for the audience who are."

Fans will continue to experience It director Andy Muschietti's series backwards as the showrunner plans to make two more seasons of It: Welcome to Derry, with It: Welcome to Derry season 2 jumping back to 1935, and season 3 set in 1908.

It: Welcome to Derry season 1 is available to stream on HBO in the US and Now in the UK. For more, check out our guide to It: Welcome to Derry Easter eggs and cameos, and keep up with upcoming Stephen King movies and shows heading your way.

Bill Skarsgård has shared he originally wasn't completely sold on returning as his horror icon Pennywise in the HBO prequel show It: Welcome to Derry.

Speaking to ScreenRant, the actor admitted that he was "more hesitant about it going into it than going out of it," though he eventually had "a lot of fun" making the show.

According to the actor, when the idea of playing Pennywise again was originally broached, he thought that "we did the two movies, and they were very successful," and he was concerned that "you don't want to milk this one out with a TV show" that might not compare to "the success of the previous films."

However, once he saw the plan for the show, he was convinced. "I feel that, in the end, we explored some parts of Pennywise that we hadn't seen before or hadn't done," he said. "Andy [Muschietti] and I always have fun together, and I think that we did those aspects of it. Even with Pennywise's performance, there was like, 'Okay, here's a juicy scene, and you see something else from Pennywise, or more of him.' I had fun with those scenes, for sure."

Welcome to Derry showed us a whole new side to Pennywise, finally revealing the truth behind his origins as Bob Grey, as well as bringing in the twist that Pennywise can see the future – and might be targeting the parents of the Losers' Club kids that will grow up to kill him.

So far, It: Welcome to Derry season 2 hasn't been officially confirmed. If it does get the green light, though, it will adapt the Bradley Gang Massacre, a huge shootout in Derry. It will also be set 27 years before season 1, which would place it in the 1930s.

All episodes of Welcome to Derry are streaming on HBO Max now. For more, fill out your watchlist with our guide to all the upcoming Stephen King movies and shows, or the best shows on HBO Max.

While It: Welcome to Derry season 2 hasn't been confirmed yet, fans are wondering if we might not have seen the last of the Bainbridge family.

Welcome to Derry is working backwards, with the first series set in the '60s, and the next series due to be set 27 years earlier in 1935. It will cover the Bradley Gang Massacre, a deadly shootout in Derry that was teased in season 1 when the army uncovered the victims' cars.

Judging by a new deleted scene shared by Terri Bainbridge actor Alixandra Fuchs, we might be seeing more of her character – mother of Lily Bainbridge, one of the kids in season 1's Losers' Club – in the next season.

In the clip, shared as a series of behind-the-scenes videos on Fuchs's Instagram story, we see Lily attempt to ask her mother about growing up in Derry, and if anything as horrible as the kids being killed in the movie theater in episode 1 happened while Terri was younger.

After first rebuffing her daughter, Terri then begins to talk about life under Prohibition, when alcohol was banned in the US. She says some people still "sold it" and "fought over it," and "some of those people lived right here in Derry."

"So, yes, there were incidents," she finishes. When Lily asks if those incidents involved a clown, Terri looks away and doesn't answer, as if she might be remembering something. Eventually, all she says is "bad things happen all the time, honey. We need to focus on the good." Check out the clip below.

Season 2 will be set in 1935, which is a few years after Prohibition ended – though the Bradley Gang in the show could end up being former bootleggers. Terri, then, could be referring to the Massacre, which, in the book, features Pennywise gunning down some gangsters himself.

Now, whether Terri shows up again in season 2 remains to be seen. Andy Muschietti has already confirmed that younger versions of season 1 characters will be in the show, though, so it seems possible.

"Lily’s mother, Teresa Bainbridge will play a significant role in Season two that is set 27 years prior to 1962, she was Lily's age at the time of the Bradley Gang Massacre," speculates the person who shared Fuch's clip.

"Guys I'm still not over this it's like 1000000000% confirmed we get Terri in season 2 now. Right," wonders another fan.

"Lilly survived, big P will go after her parents," predicts someone else. We saw in the season 1 finale that Pennywise is aware of his future death, after he threatened to kill Marge Truman – the future Maggie Tozier, mother of Richie Tozier – to prevent Richie from being born (we might not have heard the last of Richie, either).

So far, it's all speculation, as Welcome to Derry season 2 hasn't even been officially greenlit yet. We'll just have to be patient a little while longer.

You can fill out your watchlist with our guide to all the upcoming Stephen King movies and shows, or the best shows on HBO Max.

After Richie Tozier made a surprise cameo in the It: Welcome to Derry season 1 finale, Finn Wolfhard has revealed that this might not be the last reference to his character.

In the season 1 finale, Pennywise corners Marge Truman – revealed to be the future Maggie Tozier – and tells her that she'll have a son, Richie (implied to be named after Rich Santos after his heroic sacrifice saved Marge at The Black Spot), who will grow up to kill Pennywise with his friends. To drive the point home, the evil clown shows with a flourish the missing poster of Richie that appears in Neibolt Street in the first It film, which features an image of Wolfhard.

In a new interview, Wolfhard shared that he knew about his cameo of sorts in advance, and that there might still be something else on the way.

"I knew that years ago, actually. When they first started thinking about that show, it was probably 2021," he told Esquire. "Barbara and Andy Muschietti both told me, 'You're involved.' Yeah, I’m connected. I think there's something else that will come up eventually that I'm excited for people to see."

It's not clear what exactly might be in store for Richie Tozier – though, with Pennywise revealed to know the circumstances of his death, we wouldn't be surprised if he tries to track down some more Trumans or Toziers in It: Welcome to Derry season 2 and 3 (the show is planned for three seasons, but the remaining two haven't been officially greenlit yet). Whether that involves another Wolfhard appearance or not remains to be seen…

Outside of It, Wolfhard also recently wrapped up Stranger Things season 5 with an emotional finale. You can check out our Stranger Things season 5 finale review for our spoilery thoughts on the ending, or our Stranger Things season 5 finale ending explained for a breakdown of everything that happened.

Welcome to Derry season 2 isn't yet confirmed, though you can keep track of everything else that's on the way with our guide to all the upcoming Stephen King movies and TV shows or fill out your watchlist with the best HBO Max shows.

It: Welcome to Derry co-showrunner Jason Fuchs says that surprise Losers Club cameo in episode 8 wasn't in the original script... though now it makes one particularly harrowing scene in It: Chapter Two even more so.

Warning: Spoilers for It: Welcome to Derry episode 8 below!

"That was a very, very last-minute decision," Fuchs, who also wrote episode 8, tells GamesRadar+. "That scene came about in reshoots. Reshoots are a normal part of any big show or any film, but we were at the tail end of everything. And that was a scene that had been talked about a few times, just generally, like how do we have one more piece of architecture linking us to the films? We certainly had the Rich Tozier missing kids poster that popped up, but what was one other piece of the puzzle that could sort of build a bridge to the films and make it feel like this really takes you in many ways to the doorstep of It: Chapter One?"

The cameo in question is none other than Sophia Lillis's Beverly Marsh, who is crying on the floor of a hospital room at Juniper Hill, staring up at her mother, who has tragically hanged herself. At the end of the season finale, we fast forward 27 years to an elderly Ingrid Kersh who, despite causing the deaths of over 20 Black residents of Derry at the hands of racists, suddenly seems like some kind, quiet old lady. It doesn't stay that way for long, however, as Ingrid hears the commotion down the hall and cheerfully goes to investigate. She finds Beverly on the floor next to her abusive father, who pulls away from her. Beverly looks up at Ingrid in tears, only for Ingrid to creepily say, "No one ever really dies in Derry."

You might recall that, in It: Chapter Two, Pennywise appears to an adult Beverly as an old woman known as "Mrs. Kersh." It's an awful scene, where Bev is made to feel guilty about the abuse at the hands of her father – the thing she fears most in this world. Well, now we know that Mrs. Kersh was more than just a random guise for Pennywise.

Continues Fuchs: "It also changes the context of that scene in It: Chapter Two, because now you're understanding, 'Oh, wait, the reason that It takes that guise in Chapter Two is not just about tormenting Beverly as it relates to her traumatic relationship with her dad.' It's actually scratching a very deeply repressed piece of trauma in the back of her brain, which is Mrs. Kersh, the person she met the day she suffered the most traumatic event of her young life to that point, which was the suicide, obviously, of her mom."

All episodes of IT: Welcome to Derry are now streaming on HBO Max in the US and NOW in the UK. For more on what to watch, check out our guide to the best new TV shows on the way in 2026.

A new behind-the-scenes clip from It: Welcome to Derry episode 8 has arrived, and it proves that Bill Skarsgård doesn't need any CGI to be completely and totally terrifying as Pennywise the Dancing Clown.

The brief clip, which can be viewed below, shows us a pre-VFX and a post-VFX version of the season finale when Lilly, Will, Marge, and Ronnie are struggling to place the cosmic dagger back into the ground in order to send Pennywise back to sleep for another 27 years. In the top clip, Skarsgård is screaming into the camera with just his Pennywise makeup on - and it's somehow scarier (to me, anyway) than the bottom clip that edits in a darker sky, swirling snow, and those piercing yellow eyes.

Oh, and that voice is also real. If you're a Stranger Things fan, you might be aware that while Jamie Campbell Bower plays Vecna and does his voice, the voice is then edited in post to sound just a little bit deep and a little more menacing. Skarsgård, however, is able to just kind of...sound like that. Not to mention the fact that, aside from the SFX-applied enlarged head and hair, those creepy facial expressions are also just...Bill's face. No edits needed there, either.

Though It: Welcome to Derry season 1 has come to a close, Andy Muschietti has plans for two more seasons of the hit prequel series, and that means at least 16 more episodes of Pennywise doing his little dance-y dance while eating children and preying on their deepest darkest fears. Woohoo!

All episodes of IT: Welcome to Derry are now streaming on HBO Max in the US and NOW in the UK. For more on what to watch, check out our guide to the best new TV shows on the way in 2026.

Following It: Welcome to Derry's big season 1 finale, star Taylour Paige has admitted she "wanted more" for her character Charlotte Hanlon.

*Warning! Spoilers below for It: Welcome to Derry episode 8. If you're not up to date, turn back now*

After sending Bill Skarsgård's Pennywise back into his 27-year hibernation, Rose, the Grogans, and Dick Hallorann all make plans to leave the titular town. The Hanlons, however, decide to stick around and take over the former's farm, despite Leroy's earlier protestations. "Maybe the next damn fool mission needs to be together," Charlotte tells her husband with a smile, suggesting that the family will be Derry's new protectors.

For Paige, it was hard to imagine Charlotte would've made such a choice after all they've gone through. "I'm not happy with the way this was written, if I'm being honest," she recently told Deadline in a post-mortem interview. "I'm like, 'There's no f*cking way.' I mean, I guess the lore is that you forget when you're in Derry, but I don't buy it."

Paige went on to say that she "wanted more" for Charlotte, Leroy, and their son, Will, even though she understands that a woman electing to "get back to business" as a homemaker makes some sense within a period context. "I think it would have been maybe too radical for Charlotte to leave," she noted. "And also too radical for women of 1962 to be like, 'I'm out.' That was very rare. It just didn't really happen then, right? Most people stayed in loveless marriages. Most women, I think, had to deny themselves to keep the family together."

While Paige wasn't super satisfied with how Charlotte's story concludes (we're unlikely to see her again if It: Welcome to Derry season 2 is greenlit, due to the fact that it'll be set 27 years earlier), she was super into Charlotte's mother-son scenes. She liked the character's subplot with Hank Grogan, who she helped after he was wrongly accused of committing the movie theater murders, too.

"I think, being a mother – at least I can speak to it now after, I wasn't a mother when I was shooting -- but I think becoming a mother gives you these superpowers, and this super kind of compassion," she explained. "That was a nice way to kind of get a little bit of more of Charlotte's inner world and the way that she thinks, and what she believes in, kind of gives you a little bit more color than just like, she’s at home cooking, stewing."

It: Welcome to Derry is streaming now on HBO Max. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our deep-dive into this year's many Stephen King adaptations.

Across its eight-episode run, It: Welcome to Derry has been bursting with Easter eggs – most of which were deep-cut novel references and wider nods to Stephen King's other works, like Carrie or The Shawshank Redemption.

In the finale, as General Shaw and the military forced It out of his 27-year hibernation, a fog descended upon the titular town. It looked, admittedly, a lot like the haze in King's 1980 thriller The Mist, which sees protagonist David Drayton forced to hide from the vicious creatures lurking in the gloom inside a supermarket. According to a new interview with director Andy Muschietti, though, it's "not" a allusion to the other tale even if it is "related"...

"Of course, in The Mist, they say that the mist comes from the Todash Field, the same interdimensional plane that It is from," he told Variety, confusing us all further. "So it's unrelated, but it's also related.

"I wanted to use the fog to visually illustrate the expansion of the clouds that surround the Dead Lights. When we see the meteor crash into Derry in episode 4, we see the three Dead Lights dancing around this cloud of fog. The physical element is established there, and for this story, I wanted to show that it is an expansive force."

While It: Welcome to Derry season 2 has yet to be officially greenlit, it seems like a dead cert that more episodes are on the way. Post-finale, Muschietti elaborated on his three-season plan for the show, confirming that the second chapter will feature the return of some existing characters despite being set further in the past. They'll just look a little fresher-faced...

"It takes place during the Depression in Derry, and there are some new characters and some characters from this season as well, but younger versions of them," he explained to the aforementioned publication.

It: Welcome to Derry is streaming now on HBO Max. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our deep-dive into this year's many Stephen King adaptations.

"No spoilers but the first half of It: Welcome to Derry episode 7 has shaken me to my CORE," I said in a message to a friend a couple of weeks back, caps and all. "Me thinks this is gonna be a good one," I added alongside several crying and gritted teeth emojis, which goes some way to explain my mental state as I watched the harrowing small-screen horrors unfold.

With the first season now done and dusted, I don't think I'm alone in claiming that the HBO spin-off's penultimate chapter wasn't just good, it was the standout – and an unforgettably chilling depiction of one of the most notable interludes in Stephen King's original novel: the burning down of The Black Spot.

They gave us ample warning, and yet still I found myself bug-eyed as Chief Bowers (Peter Outerbridge) and his racist cronies descended on Hallorann's club with their threats, guns, and Universal Monsters masks. Director Andy Muschietti revealed that the fire, which was alluded to in his movie adaptations, was going to be a key moment in the prequel series long before it premiered. Having just recently read the book, too, I knew the gist of what was in store. In truth, though, nothing could have prepared me. With a few twisted tweaks to the source material and a heartbreaking death, it wound up being the scariest sequence of the year – and not just because Bill Skarsgård's Pennywise spends the whole time slurping on severed heads and stoking up bloody carnage.

"We approached it with a tremendous amount of respect and caution because we know, although we are bringing a fictional subplot to life in terms of the canon, we are realizing an incident that has very clear echoes in the real world," co-showrunner Jason Fuchs tells GamesRadar+. "We had a responsibility to tell that story in a really serious way."

While the novel makes no secret of the fact that a lot of Derry's residents are horrid, it's heavily implied that much of their awfulness is due to It. Characters like Henry Bowers and John "Webby" Garton are undeniably prejudiced towards Black and queer locals, but their proximity to the violence-loving cosmic creature supposedly amplifies their existing hateful attitudes. It: Welcome to Derry boldly ignores such wishy-washy insinuations, and instead makes clear that Bowers and co have a clear motivation for torching The Black Spot; ferreting out wrongly accused fugitive Hank Grogan (Stephen Rider).

When the party-goers stand up against their brutish demands to give up Grogan, Bowers' supremacist group barricades the Black Spot's doors and starts throwing Molotov cocktails through the windows. Unlike in the book, they wait outside to shoot those who manage to escape. The awful scene kicks off with a three-minute oner; the camera weaving between characters as they panic, scream, and scramble in their attempts to avoid the flames. With so many actors, so much action, and a rapidly changing set to navigate, it's a huge technical achievement – and makes you feel like you're right there in the smoke.

"It was about showing these kids and the audience that the ultimate terror of Derry might just be the humans who live there," Fuchs notes. "They're not brainwashed. They're not hypnotized. Those are people making the cruelest choices imaginable, and I don't think there is an aspect of horror more horrifying in season 1 than what they do in the context of that attack. Although, you know, It has done his part to rile things up, and certainly takes advantage.

"To see that through the eyes of children, who are perhaps to some degree apportioning some of the blame to the supernatural evil, was really powerful. It spoke to a certain truth, and that's what we're always in search of with this show and with Stephen King; storytelling as emotional truth."

That loss of innocence isn't just spiritual, either. Lots of people perish in the fire, but in terms of main characters, it's Arian S. Cartaya's Rich who doesn't make it out alive. In a gut-wrenching act of self-sacrifice, the boy insists his crush, Marge (Matilda Lawler), hide out inside a cooler before climbing on top of it and sealing it shut with his body weight. As burning debris collapses around him, Rich recalls the first time he ever saw Marge before kissing the top of the cooler. It's devastating, and so much more lastingly terrifying than the gory theater massacre in the pilot or the Goosebumps-style ghosts in episode 3.

The fact that the kids were there at all was gobsmacking to me. On the page, Will Hanlon, the father of Losers' Club member Mike, reveals to his son he was present at The Black Spot when it came under siege in 1930 – the show, following the movies' timeline, retcons the events to 1962 – and only managed to escape thanks to its chef, Dick Hallorann. The show remains faithful to this, though there's one key difference: Will was an adult in the book. With that, I had assumed it would have been Will's pops Leroy who'd get caught up in the bar's blaze; I was wrong, and having youngsters there adds a whole new level of terror to the proceedings.

"In terms of Will and the kids being there, we wanted the audience to experience this through the eyes of those characters," says Fuchs. "They've experienced the entire story through the eyes of the kids, with the exception of Leroy, Charlotte and Hallorann. There's something even more tragic, I think, about seeing the worst of humanity through young characters who are all about what's best about humanity.

"These kids really represent the best of us; they're hopeful, they're determined. These are good people, and I think they're hopeful about the world. So to have that hopefulness challenged by the stark evil that they see there felt the most interesting dramatically; can light triumph over dark? Can the power of unified belief triumph over the divisiveness of fear?" The finale suggests so, with our heroes besting corrupt General Shaw (James Remar) and sending It back into a 27-year slumber. But with two more seasons on the cards, the frights are only just beginning.

Honorable mentions:

Snacking on the kitchen worktop, Bring Her Back – Poor Oliver's possession (and hunger) takes a dark turn in the final act of the Philippou Brothers' Talk to Me follow-up.

Bursting bean bag chair, Opus – They're uncomfortable enough when they're full of beans. Stuffing them with near-death humans is a step too far.

Gladys under the covers, Weapons – There should be a rule about jumpscares appearing in a movie that, up until that point, wasn't really jumpscare-y.

Swimming T-Rex, Jurassic World: Rebirth – One of the most nail-biting set-pieces in the book gets the big-screen treatment for the first time.

MRI machine, Final Destination: Bloodlines – Of all the ways to die, this one sucks the most

It: Welcome to Derry is streaming now on HBO Max. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our deep-dive into this year's many Stephen King adaptations.

It: Welcome to Derry season 1 might have come to an end, but there is still a three season plan for the show (even if It: Welcome to Derry season 2 still hasn't been confirmed).

While creator Andy Muschietti isn't giving anything away, he did confirm a few tantalizing details about what might be coming up next in the hit HBO show.

"We can only say the stuff that's already known, like it's in 1935, 27 years before season 1 and it involves the massacre of the Bradley Gang from the books," Muschietti told Variety. "It takes place during the Depression in Derry, and there are some new characters and some characters from this season as well, but younger versions of them."

In Stephen King's novel, the Bradley Gang Massacre is a bloody gang shootout that the whole town of Derry gets involved in. It was referenced briefly in season 1, when an old car featuring victims of the massacre was uncovered. It's also alluded to in Muschietti's movies by a huge mural the Losers' Club stands in front of while patching up Ben Hanscom in the first film, and which is seen in passing in the second film.

Most intriguingly, though, is Muschietti's confirmation that season 2 will feature the younger versions of some season 1 characters. That seems likely to include Rose, an expert on Pennywise the Dancing Clown (AKA the entity IT) and its weaknesses, but it could also include the parents of some of the new (or should that be old?) Losers' Club – especially since we now know that Marge will grow up to be Margaret Tozier, mother of Richie Tozier. We'll just have to wait and see exactly who shows up.

Season 3 also hasn't been confirmed yet, but we know it will take place in 1908 – 27 years before 1935 – and it will focus on the Kitchener Ironworks explosion, a devastating tragedy that saw the factory explode during an Easter egg hunt, killing 102 people (88 of which were children). This, too, was referenced in season 1, when Dick Hallorann sees the body of a headless child during the deadly Black Spot fire.

Since It: Welcome to Derry hasn't been confirmed yet, it doesn't have a release date – but the creators have indicated they want it to come sooner rather than later.

In the meantime, catch up on everything that happened in that action-packed finale with our guide to the It: Welcome to Derry season 1 ending explained, or fill out your watchlist with our guide to all the upcoming Stephen King adaptations and the best HBO Max shows.

You can also read our finale breakdown with showrunner Jason Fuchs, or all the It: Welcome to Derry season 1 Easter eggs for some deep dives.

It: Welcome to Derry co-showrunner Jason Fuchs says the epic, emotional season finale is likely the last time we'll see these Losers – and explains how important it was to not only give each character a proper send-off, but to wrap it all up in a way that honors their individual journeys. Get ready to cry... again.

Warning: Massive spoilers for It: Welcome to Derry episode 8 below!

"Important thing we wanted to resolve was the journey of this core group of characters – we're not planning on coming back to these characters," Fuchs, who also wrote the script for episode 8, tells GamesRadar+. "This is, in my mind, the sort of end of Lilly's story, the end of Ronnie's story, the end of this chapter of Dick Halloran's story before he goes on to the Overlook. So it was, how do you bring all these characters who, to some degree, have been in their own storylands the whole season, together and resolve them all in emotionally satisfying ways that feel appropriate to the road they've been on?"

The final episode of It: Welcome to Derry season 1 sees the Losers team up with the adults, resulting in an epic showdown that takes place entirely on an iced-over lake. After Leroy Hanlon receives a call from Pennywise, he immediately jumps into action to save his son. This results in Leroy finding (an understandably reluctant) Dick Hallorann and taking him over to Rose's house, where he's confronted by a distraught Charlotte. After Rose gives him a spiritual hallucinogenic known as the Maturin root (which, yes, is the same root that Mike Hanlon takes in It: Chapter Two before performing the Ritual of Chud), Dick is able to quiet the voices and locate Lilly, Marge, and Ronnie – and the adults pile into Taniel's van and head towards the ice.

It's the ultimate team-up: After fighting off the U.S. Air Force, Rose and Charlotte stand together in the fog, armed with military-grade guns. Both Leroy and Hank fire off rounds at Pennywise. All the while, Lilly, Ronnie, Marge, and a rescued Will race to place the dagger in its rightful spot and send Pennywise back to sleep for another 27 years.

"It was challenging. In some ways, it felt like the Avengers: Endgame of Welcome to Derry season 1, where it's all these characters coming together for one last heroic mission. And that was part of the excitement of the episode too – you're seeing character combinations you hadn't seen before. It was, how do we end these stories in a satisfying way, and also leave a little bit of room for the mystery of what's to come and where this would be going in the future? Which is, to say, the past."

Speaking of Avengers: Endgame and the way Marvel loves a good post-credits scene and a surprise cameo... Welcome to Derry episode 8 does the same, and it's both a treat for fans, and a full-circle connection to both It: Chapter One and It: Chapter Two.

Your hair is winter fire

Ingrid Kersh does not die after Pennywise puts her in the Deadlights. Instead, she's whisked off to Juniper Hill (lest she keep walking around Derry dressed in full clown regalia), and we fast forward some 27 years into the future. Ingrid, now an elderly woman, hears a commotion happening down the hall in another room of the hospital. She enters the room to see a woman hanging from the ceiling by her neck, and two people kneeling on the floor, crying out in grief. One of the people kneeling is none other than Beverly Marsh (Sophia Lillis), and the hanging woman in question is her mother. Creepily, Ingrid tells Bev not to worry... because no one ever really dies in Derry.

"That was a very, very last-minute decision," Fuchs admits. "That scene came about in reshoots. Reshoots are a normal part of any big show or any film, but we were at the tail end of everything. And that was a scene that had been talked about a few times, just generally, like how do we have one more piece of architecture linking us to the films? We certainly had the Rich Tozier missing kids poster that popped up, but what was one other piece of the puzzle that could sort of build a bridge to the films and make it feel like this really takes you in many ways to the doorstep of It: Chapter One?"

The scene accomplishes several things, but most importantly... it makes that scene in It: Chapter Two, where Bev visits the elderly woman, all the more harrowing. We quickly learn that the old woman is really just Pennywise in another form, taunting her about her abusive childhood. Now, we know that Bev had already met that woman some 27 years prior, during the literal moment that her mother committed suicide. Pennywise chooses to manifest as Ingrid, also fully knowing that Ingrid is the daughter of Bob Gray – the real-life human circus performer who It killed before inhabiting his body.

"It also changes the context of that scene in It: Chapter Two, because now you're understanding, 'Oh, wait, the reason that It takes that guise in Chapter Two is not just about tormenting Beverly as it relates to her traumatic relationship with her dad.' It's actually scratching a very deeply repressed piece of trauma in the back of her brain, which is Mrs. Kersh is the person she met the day she suffered the most traumatic event of her young life to that point, which was the suicide, obviously, of her mom."

Beep beep, Margie

Beverly Marsh isn't the only modern-day Losers Club member to make a surprise appearance in Welcome to Derry season 1 – and yes, it still counts as a cameo... despite it being a missing kids poster. Fans have been theorizing that Marge Truman is the mother of Richie Tozier since the first time she stepped out onto our screens... and episode 8 proves them right.

In the middle of the episode, when Lilly, Ronnie, and Marge walk out onto the ice and face Pennywise, the torment begins. After managing to protect themselves with that cosmic dagger, Marge suddenly finds herself all alone in the fog with everyone's favorite dancing clown. In the most dramatic way possible (because It loves nothing more than to put on a show), Pennywise greets her by her eventual married name: Tozier. He shows her Richie's missing poster from It: Chapter One and explains that it's her son and the rest of the Losers Club who eventually bring about his death. He attempts to remedy this by killing Marge – but thankfully, the dagger being nearby temporarily stuns him again.

"The idea started with the very earliest conversations between myself and the Muschiettis about how do we create linkages between the group of characters in this show and the films, and how do we try to create some linkages that are not immediately obvious," Fuchs explains to GR+. "I pitched the idea to Andy, 'Is it possible we have a character who is the mother of one of our Losers, so we don't have a dead giveaway of a last name? And that you don't find out that reveal until later in the season, and it becomes something that the viewer can sort of begin to piece together – that was the first idea."

Viewers pieced it together pretty quickly after episode 7, when Rich Santos dies in the Black Spot Fire. Rich, who loved Marge since the moment he first saw her, sacrifices his own life to save her by putting her in an air-tight container that would protect her from smoke inhalation – which is what Rich inevitably dies of. This is where it clicked: Marge, as a sweet way to honor her first love, would go on to name her son Richie in his memory. It's also impossible (at least for me) not to think about the moment where Rich kisses the lid of the box, kissing Marge goodbye forever, without bursting into tears. He dies with his eyes wide open, and it's maybe the cruelest part of the entire season.

"We just knew that there was going to be a love story that explained why Richie Tozier is named Rich Tozier, and that it would be infused with something really emotional and tragic," he continues. "And so that was sort of the sequence of events. And so now we knew, we had Richie's mom, we knew we had a character who would feel a little bit like Richie Tozier: comedic, smart, good impressionist, all the things that you know, you know and love about Richie... glasses." (It's worth noting that fans even went so far as to put clips of Marge's mannerisms next to Richie's from It: Chapter One in order to prove that they were undoubtedly related.)

"We knew that character needed to be among the most lovable characters we'd ever met in the context of this universe.. And little by little, Ricardo Santos was conceived," he continues. "It was a tragic death, but there was no Richie without that moment. And really, there's so much of the book that is about coming of age and first loves and first loss that it felt very thematically in sync with what we wanted to show, to have two unlikely characters sort of fall for each other and then have this very sweet boy make the ultimate sacrifice."

But Rich Santos did not die in vain, nor was he tucked away never to be seen again. At the end of episode 8, Rich returns in what is not only the best part of the entire season, but one of my favorite TV moments of the last 10 years.

Towards the end of the finale, Lilly, Marge, Ronnie, and Will manage to get the dagger over to its rightful resting spot so they can plunge it into the ground and send Pennywise back to sleep for another 27 years. However, it requires a lot more strength than they could've ever imagined, and Pennywise is only moments away from catching up to them and leading them to their deaths. What happens next, is, in the words of Dick Hallorann, "a motherfucking miracle."

"It is maybe, in some ways, the most hopeful moment of the season," Fuchs says (and I vehemently agree). "That even in death, this character we've all fallen in love with is able to still help his friends, the people he cares about the most, push back the darkness, and find the light. It seemed wrong not to have Rich involved in that moment. All season, we've seen the way he sacrifices for his friends, the way he's there for his friends. He's a pretty extraordinary companion, and he'd want to be there. He'd want more than anything to be there to help them."

Right before Pennywise transforms into a bat-like creature and flaps his way over to the Losers, Dick sees something off in the distance. The Indigenous warrior from the Galloo myth (who appeared to him earlier) has returned, but this time she's holding a little boy's hand. Rich lets go and sprints across the ice, flipping off a temporarily stunned Pennywise and rushing to help his friends. In those final moments, Rich makes it in time and grabs a hold of the dagger alongside them... effectively pushing it into the ground and making Pennywise deteriorate.

"We've established that Dick can see the dead," he explains. "We've established that the dead can't physically impact him, but that once he makes contact with them, they will be fixated on him. And it will be disturbing to the point of him being unable to live a life. But the idea that the dead can physically impact the corporeal world is a brand new idea. And so, when he says, I'm seeing a miracle, he means it. He didn't know this was possible. And although we don't get into the para-physics of how it's possible thematically, I think it suggests that love is every bit as powerful for us as any of the supernatural things we've seen in this show."

"... And for Rich to be the delivery vehicle for that moment, for Dick to believe in that moment in something greater than himself. Something greater than the rules of the world as he knows them. Because what Rich is doing in that moment breaks the rules."

"And that it is the sheer power of Rich's love for his friends and, of course, their love for him that allows him to pierce that veil between the living and the dead and help save the day. It was a joy to write that beat and a joy to see Arian running across that fake ice, flipping Pennywise off. Sometimes you gotta just tell evil to fuck off, and that's what Rich is doing in that moment."

"How much trouble can a hotel be?"

And where does that leave Dick? Well, there was a general assumption, mainly from the casual viewer, that Dick Hallorann would set out for his tenure at the Overlook Hotel immediately after Welcome to Derry ended. King superfans, however, spent time trying to calculate Dick's age in Welcome to Derry versus his age in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining and his age in the novel in order to determine where Dick was off to next.

Towards the end of the episode, Dick tells Leroy that he's off to be a chef at a resort in London (and earnestly asks, "How much trouble can a hotel be?"). The Overlook Hotel is famously located in Colorado... so when does he meet the Torrance family? Well, in the Tabitha King novel, Pearl, (which is canon to the overall King universe), Dick is the head chef at a resort in Key West, Florida. Key West is his last stop before he heads on over to the Overlook hotel for the winter.

In the Kubrick film, Dick is 70 during his time at the Overlook, but the novel puts him at 59. According to Fuchs, Dick Hallorann is around 43 in Welcome to Derry... which means, either way, he has a ways to go before he becomes the character we love and recognize the most.

"I had written that both ways," Fuchs reveals. "I had a version of that scene that said I'm off to Colorado, then we had a version of that scene that said, I'm off to Key West. And I had a version of that scene that said, I'm off to London. Ultimately, the reason we went with [London] is because it felt like Dick Halloran had completed a specific journey in his life, but it didn't feel to us from an age perspective or even a character perspective, that the man we are saying goodbye to at the end of episode 8 is the man who's gonna turn up at the Overlook in The Shining."

"It felt like there was still story, there was still stuff that he's going to go through – adventures and demons to face between the end of our show and the beginning of The Shining. And so even putting him, you know, in Key West to suggest that this is the stop before The Shining... he's not there yet. I think there are many other adventures for him to go on between now and the beginning of The Shining."

Some fans (including myself) have wondered whether Dick shares the same fate as the Kubrick movie, or if he survives the Torrance family and dies in the 1990s (though this would be much later in the Muschiettiverse as the timeline is shifted) like in the King novel. Fuchs also says he has a "very specific idea" of what happens to Dick Hallorann next, but prefers to keep it a mystery: "I think, in a lot of elements of this show, the scariest thing we can do is not explain everything."

It: Welcome to Derry season 1 is streaming in its entirety on HBO Max. For more, check out our It: Welcome to Derry release schedule, or, check out our guide to all of the upcoming Stephen King movies and shows you need to know about.

It: Welcome to Derry episode 8 was packed with huge moments, but one in particular has fans scratching their heads.

The following will dive into spoilers for the finale, so turn back now if you haven't seen the new episode yet!

Now, if you're still reading, then you'll know that, in episode 8, Pennywise reveals to Marge that she'll grow up to become Margaret Tozier, AKA the mother of Richie Tozier… AKA a member of the Losers' Club who is instrumental in killing Pennywise, as seen in It: Chapter Two (Finn Wolfhard plays young Richie and is seen in picture form in the finale, while Bill Hader plays adult Richie).

Pennywise is fully aware that Richie will help kill him, too, because he perceives the past, present, and the future as all happening at once (though he also comments that his death might be a birth). Naturally, that's raised a bunch of questions – why doesn't Marge warn her son about Pennywise, and why doesn't Pennywise do anything about his apparent death?

One fan has a pretty genius theory for the Marge and Richie question, though. In It: Chapter One, we see the other Losers get stalked by Pennywise and shown terrifying visions of what they fear the most, but Richie doesn't confront Pennywise properly until he goes to Neibolt Street and is faced with a room full of clowns, after earlier admitting that he's scared of them.

When one person questioned why Marge wouldn't warn Richie about Pennywise, one person pointed out: "She just focused on raising a very confident kid! Or maybe she did and that's why he was scared of clowns idk."

So, while Marge might not have directly told Richie about the ancient entity who'd one day come after him, she might have at least warned him to steer clear of clowns…

As for the other mysteries raised by this development, fans are already debating what it all means.

"I like the tie in but leaves me with so many extra questions and how will they tie this backwards into season 2 and 3," says one fan.

"I think basically if they wanted to, Pennywise could theoretically continue to go back in time to try and prevent his death. I wouldn't be surprised if we do see the Maturin at some point in the coming seasons to prevent this cycle. But it's honestly a pretty good way for them to continue doing prequels but technically sequels as well," says another person (Maturin is the giant cosmic turtle who opposes Pennywise in the books).

"He said 'stuck in one place, in one time.' The cage locked him in in so many more ways than just physical. Now that it was broken, Pennywise is now aware of his death, and I think the next two seasons are going to be him trying to prevent that fate," says another fan.

"So killing of Pennywise in It: Chapter Two is actually rebirth of Pennywise in the past. Giving It the opportunity to change its course of death. That's what I am getting. Does anyone have any other ideas," speculates another person.

"I think that Pennywise only became aware of his future when the General destroyed the pillar. I seem to remember in the finale some reference was made to him not just being restrained physically by the pillars. That could insinuate a metaphysical freedom once his chains were broken. So then all he had to do was draw out Margie, kill her and change his destiny," thinks another person.

We hopefully won't have too long to wait for answers, either. While It: Welcome to Derry season 2 hasn't been confirmed, the creators hope it will come sooner rather than later.

In the meantime, fill out your watchlist with our guide to the best shows on HBO Max or all the upcoming Stephen King adaptations.

With season 1 now over, fans are already wondering when we'll get to see IT: Welcome to Derry season 2 on our screens. According to the show's executive producer Barbara Muschietti, the wait for new episodes shouldn't be too long, but it's ultimately up to HBO.

During a Q&A with the producers on Reddit, executive producers Andy and Barbara Muschietti – who also led the movies IT and IT: Chapter Two – replied to some burning questions and comments from viewers, including some about the future of the series. "Love the show, please dont make us wait for the next season for years like some other shows do," wrote one fan.

Barbara Muchietti wrote back: "Not the intention, I swear! Talk to HBO :)))" That somehow doesn't fill us with confidence given that season 2 hasn't been officially announced, but it's better than nothing. At the very least, we know the Muchiettis are committed to continuing with the story. In fact, they have already talked about what we can expect from a new season.

Andy Muschietti told Deadline before IT: Welcome to Derry had even premiered that the new season might be set in 1935, revolving around the Bradley Gang Massacre, a significant moment in Derry's dark history.

"There is an intentional bigger arc that will open. My intention with this was to create a story that is a little bit like an iceberg under the water all through seasons 1, 2 and 3. There will be an expansion in the mythology and more answers to the big questions. The second season will be in 1935. At the end of season 1, we are hinting at the reason why we are going to tell the story in two more seasons – and backwards," he explained.

Now that we've seen the last episode of season 1 (you can check our IT: Welcome to Derry episode 8 explained to get all the spoiler-y details), we can start to understand the producer's words. IT: Welcome to Derry ends with a clever twist that sets up season 2 in an unexpected way, and now fans can't wait to see these promises realized.

All episodes of IT: Welcome to Derry are now streaming on HBO Max in the US and NOW in the UK. For more on what to watch, check out our guide to the best new TV shows on the way in 2026.

It: Welcome to Derry was one of the best shows of 2025, so it's no surprise that horror fans are clamoring for a second chapter. Thankfully, while the HBO show hasn't been officially renewed yet, there's plenty of reason to believe it'll be back sooner than you can say, "We all float down here."

The season 1 finale saw Lilly, Ronnie, and Marge team up to save Will from the titular killer clown, while the Hanlons enlisted the help of an increasingly disorientated Hallorann to carry out their own rescue mission. Their efforts saw the two groups collide on the outskirts of Derry, as General Shaw and his troops closed in to protect to Pennywise (eek!). Given that it's a prequel, we could've predicted that good would've triumphed over evil, though, with It being sent back into hibernation and give the locals 27 years of peace and quiet.

Thanks to Andy Muschietti's movies, we know that the next time he emerged was in late 1988, when George Denbrough got killed trying to fetch his paper boat from a gutter. So where can the show go from here? We dive into all that below as we wait for the inevitable greenlight. Scroll on for all you need to know about a (possible) It: Welcome to Derry season 2, from plot and release date speculation to returning cast members and more...

It: Welcome to Derry season 2 release date speculation

As it stands, it's near impossible to predict when It: Welcome to Derry season 2 would air if the shows does get renewed, but we'll be sure to keep you posted. Once cameras start rolling, it'll be easier to guess, though all we know for now – thanks to a recent write-up of The Hollywood Reporter's – is that director Andy Muschietti is working on more episodes behind-the-scenes.

Season 1 kicked off filming way back in May 2023, with a suspected December end date. Production was disrupted due to the SAG-AFTRA strikes, though, and the shoot was stalled between July 2023 until February 2024. With that, it actually wrapped in August 2024.

On December 11, Stephen King himself took to Threads to suggest that the last episode (this year) of season 1 will "blow your mind". High praise, yes, but it's the brackets that really caught our attention. Might HBO drop a surprise second season in 2026? It's unlikely, but we're nostalgic for the lost era of annual releases and we're not above dreaming of their return...

It: Welcome to Derry season 2 trailer

There is no trailer for It: Welcome to Derry season 2 just yet. As soon as it lands online, we'll be sure to let you know.

It: Welcome to Derry season 2 plot speculation

Director and executive producer Andy Muschietti revealed before It: Welcome to Derry had even premiered that their plan is to set season 2 in 1935. In fact, he went one step further, by divulging that the second chapter would revolve around the Bradley Gang Massacre, a significant moment in Derry's dark history that has already been explicitly referenced in the show.

"There is an intentional bigger arc that will open," he previously told Deadline. "My intention with this was to create a story that is a little bit like an iceberg under the water all through seasons 1, 2 and 3. There will be an expansion in the mythology and more answers to the big questions. The second season will be in 1935. At the end of season 1, we are hinting at the reason why we are going to tell the story in two more seasons – and backwards."

In the book, Losers Club member Mike Hanlon is told by pharmacist Dr. Keene that nearby store Machen Sporting Goods used to be owned by Lal Machen in the early '30s, who – at the behind-the-scenes behest of It – rallied the residents of Derry to ambush The Bradley Gang. After the notorious bank robbers entered his shop and placed an obscene order for guns and ammunition, he swiftly began encouraging his pals to bring their own firearms to the three-way intersection of Canal, Main, and Kansas Street at the exact time he told Al, George and co. to pick up the goods. Things, as you can imagine, got very bloody – and neither of the Bradleys made it out alive.

It was their skeletons in the car found by Hallorann and Shaw at the end of Welcome to Derry season 2; complete with wads of cash and era-appropriate Tommy guns.

If season 1 is anything to go by, we can expect to meet a bunch of original characters and new subplots, but knowing The Bradley Gang Massacre will be at the center of the story is a good starting point.

It: Welcome to Derry season 2 cast speculation

Given that season 2 will be set almost 30 years before season 1, it's not likely we'll see kid characters Lilly, Will, Ronnie, and Marge again, which means Clara Stack, Blake Cameron James, Amanda Christine, and Matilda Lawler's time in the It universe could be done and dusted. Lilly's "I guess it'll be someone else's fight" in the finale has us doubling down on that theory. Considering we saw flashbacks from 1908 in the first chapter, though, flashforwards aren't entirely out of the question – and executive producers Andy Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti hinted at the "possibility" of it over on Reddit recently.

With spirit-seeing Chris Chalk's Dick Hallorann off to London, where he's been offered the head chef job at a remote hotel, it seems safe to assume that Arian S. Cartaya's Rich won't appear in season 2; flashforwards or not.

While we saw General Shaw as a kid in the 1908 flashback, the character spoke openly about leaving Derry and only having returned to locate It, so we're guessing he won't be present for the second installment, either. Same goes for Charlotte (Taylour Paige) and Leroy Hanlon (Jovan Adepo), who moved to Derry in episode 1.

Two characters that could realistically show up are Kimberly Norris-Guerrero's Rose and Madeleine Stowe's Ingrid Gray/Kersh, who've lived in Derry their whole lives. In the 1908 flashbacks, Emma-Leigh Cullum played Ingrid, while Tyner Rushing portrayed the character in the 1935 sections, so it's very likely they'll both be back.

The only dead-cert returning cast member at this stage, though, looks to be Bill Skarsgård. It wouldn't be an It story without It now, would it?

Will there be an It: Welcome to Derry season 3?

Given that season 2 has yet to be officially announced, it's no surprise that a third season isn't guaranteed, either. But for the same reasons we're sure we'll get a season 2, we're pretty positive HBO will let Andy Muschietti and co finish what they started with It: Welcome to Derry.

Before the first episode had even premiered, the director detailed his three-season plan for the show. Season 3, he explained, would be set in 1908; an era we've already glimpsed in flashbacks in season 1. The year, it turns out, was the year It first adopted his Pennywise persona, having witnessed a carnival performer's clown act on the outskirts of Derry and killing him before "stealing" his face.

While it wasn't covered in It: Welcome to Derry season 1, Muschietti previously teased that a third season would revolve around the Kitchener Ironworks explosion, an event briefly touched on in one of the book's interlude. In a nutshell, it was an Easter egg hunt that went catastrophically wrong, resulting in the deaths of 88 children and 14 adults back in the early 1900s. Jeremy Ray Taylor's Ben Hanscom looks up the tragedy in the Derry Public Library in It (2017).

In King's original novel, the explosion happens in 1906, but since the show follows the same timeline as Muschietti's movies, things had to be shifted to remain canonical.

It: Welcome to Derry is streaming now on HBO Max. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our ranking of the best Stephen King adaptations.

Much like Pennywise, IT: Welcome to Derry is a strange, curious beast. Both don't quite fit where they're supposed to, transcending time and space in the most unlikely manner. It's true of Pennywise, because he's an interdimensional entity of unfathomable cosmic origin. But it's also true of the show itself.

Welcome to Derry is a prequel that unravels backwards, starting in 1962 before plans to jump further back to 1935 in (the currently unconfirmed) second season and then 1908 in the planned third and final season. But why take us further and further into the past when we already know the outcome?

That's true of any prequel to some degree, and it's not like season 1 hasn't delivered with a few surprises of its own. But wouldn't it have made more sense to start in 1908 and work our way forward to IT: Chapters One and Two, where Pennywise will be defeated?

Filmmaker Andy Muschietti teased that there might be something more to this plan back in October during an interview with Collider, where he said: "Of course, everybody that knows the movies knows that It is alive in 1989, but there is a trick. There's something that happens and it's related to the reason we're telling the story backwards." But it wasn't until the season 1 finale when Muschietti's plan, and by extension, Pennywise's, finally fell into place.

Warning: there are major spoilers for the IT: Welcome to Derry finale ahead – turn back now if you haven't seen the episode and don't want to know what happens!

Keep it in the family

Episode 8 begins with Pennywise reawakening after one of the pillars that sealed him in was suddenly removed. Free to renew his reign of dancing terror, everyone's favorite demon clown uses the Deadlights on an entire cohort of school children, including Will.

Lilly, Ronnie, and Marge follow in pursuit, until they are confronted by Pennywise out on the ice. Their dagger, made of the same material that traps It in Derry, could only fend him off so long before he pulls Marge's feet out from under her, separating the one-eyed wonder from her friends.

With Marge now alone on the ice, Pennywise begins to taunt her, and it quickly becomes apparent that he didn't just pick her out at random. "I’ve always wondered how you taste, Margaret Tozier," says Pennywise. "But not yet… First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Richie in the baby carriage… Unless he dies with you?"

Marge, being a literal child and all, is as confused as she is scared by this point. "Your son!" continues Pennywise. "The seed of your stinking loins and his friends bring me my death. Or is it birth? I get confused. Today, tomorrow, yesterday... All the same for little Pennywise. It’s not always easy being caged up in one place, one time."

It makes sense that a being of cosmic origin would see time differently, experiencing different eras all at once. But this is the first time that Pennywise has actually revealed this to be the case. And the implications of that are positively game-changing, not just for Welcome to Derry, but the IT franchise at large.

There's little time to dwell on this just yet, however, because Pennywise is about to make shish kebab out of Marge with his teeth. Thankfully, Dick Hallorann steps in and psychically freezes the monster just in time.

Back to the future

The biggest shock of all this is the confirmation that Marge is in fact the future mother of Richie Tozier, Finn Wolfhard's character in the IT movies who helps defeat Pennywise for good. The Dancing Clown even shows Marge a picture of her unborn child in one of the missing posters put up during Pennywise's future reign of terror.

Fans have long suspected this to be the case, especially after Rich sacrificed himself to save Marge in 'The Black Spot.' It makes sense that she would name her child after the boy she loved to honor his memory. But there's more to this scene than just a mere twist or fun little Easter Egg.

Marge and Lilly unpack this later after the gang stops Pennywise and (seemingly) saves the day. "[Pennywise] said I’m gonna have a son and that he and his friends… They kill him in the future. That’s why he wanted to kill me. He said to him the past, present and future are all the same and that his death was actually his birth."

The day has been saved in 1962, just like it will be saved by the next group of kids in 1989, but what if Pennywise had managed to kill Marge? Doing so would have unwritten the events of the film which led to his eventual demise. And it doesn't stop there either.

"What if [It] does see time differently?" wonders Marge. "What if he can go backwards? I know it sounds crazy, but what if he tries to go back and kill someone in the time before we were born, like our parents."

"I guess it’ll be someone else’s fight," Lilly replies, and then the kids move on, free to mourn Rich and celebrate their victory over Pennywise the Dancing Clown.

But we can't move on from that. Not yet. Because this means that every season of the show is connected far more deeply than we could have ever predicted. We're not just diving back into the history of Derry and what happens each time Pennywise wakes up. We're now following It traveling back in time to undo his own demise, changing the past to save himself in the future.

This big reveal ups the stakes considerably, because there's a wider battle to be fought now. Even the victory against Pennywise in the movies that preceded this show is under threat. And because we're traveling backwards, the kids in the past who will have to deal with all this can't even be told what they need to do or how to win.

Just like that, it suddenly becomes very clear why Muschietti and his team chose to work backwards in this way, setting up not just the next season but the entire premise of the show itself. Despite this being a prequel, we have no idea what's to come, and everything we do know could change at the drop of a hat or a simple two-step thanks to Pennywise the Dancing Clown.

All episodes of IT: Welcome to Derry are now streaming on HBO Max in the US and NOW in the UK. For more on what to watch, check out our guide to the best new TV shows on the way in 2026.

Very soon, the horrors of the Voorhees family will be ki-ki-ki-mah-mah-making their way onto television by way of Crystal Lake, the new prequel series to the Friday the 13th franchise, created by IT: Welcome to Derry co-showrunner, Brad Caleb Kane. The upcoming show will follow Linda Cardellini as a young Pamela Voorhees, the first original killer in the Friday the 13th franchise, which, honestly, is invaluable information if a serial killer ever calls you asking horror trivia questions.

Just how bloodthirsty Cardellini’s take on the character will be is unknown, as are a lot of other plot details about the show. What Kane has confirmed, though, is that things will certainly get messy. "In many ways, it's a psychological thriller. It's a paranoid '70s thriller," the showrunner explained to Entertainment Weekly in a recent interview. "It has all of the DNA of a slasher without quite being a slasher. There are rivers of blood in the show. There are very, I think, ingenious kill sequences and deaths and murders, but it's all done in service of character and theme and place and time.”

Kane also promises that Crystal Lake will focus on the era in which these evil incidents unfold. "I tried to think about Crystal Lake and a Friday the 13th prequel as, 'What era did the first movie come out of?'" Kane added. "It came out of the paranoid '70s thriller era. It came out of the mistrust-of-institutions era. It came out of the women's lib era, the National Organization for Women era, this consciousness-raising awakening era in America. I wanted to go and play with all of those themes."

Joining Cardellini in this impending nightmare are William Catlett as Levon Brooks, Devin Kessler as Briana Brooks, Cameron Scoggins as Dorf, and Gwendolyn Sundstrom as Grace. Given the history of the Voorhees family, it’s clear that Pamela will be a core character of the show and deliver a performance that Kane promises to be one to look out for. "She's gonna shock and surprise a lot of people. I think she's gonna get a lot of attention for this role. She's inconceivably brilliant in it. I can't really say any more.”

With no release date confirmed just yet for the show, we’ll have a while to wait until we head to Crystal Lake. In the meantime, check out when brave soul Gem Seddon dared to binge every Jason and Freddy movie here.

It: Welcome to Derry episode 7 ended in an absolutely horrifying way, and a new behind-the-scenes video has revealed just how Pennywise actor Bill Skarsgård filmed the moment. Warning, spoilers for the episode follow!

After the awful tragedy of the Black Spot fire, Pennywise calls Will Hanlon on the phone to taunt him over the death of his friend Rich. The phone call starts out with the voice of Ronnie, however, and slowly turns more sinister until Pennywise and Will are shouting at each other – and then Pennywise appears in the kitchen behind Will, ominously perched on the fridge. Pennywise jumps towards Will and traps him in the Deadlights, and the episode ends there.

The new video shared to social media, which you can see below, shows Ronnie actor Amanda Christine and Skarsgård reading their lines together, blending their voices to create that spooky sound effect. Skarsgård is in full Pennywise makeup, including the creepy, almost full-body red stain of blood he acquired from briefly hibernating until the army woke him up by destroying one of the pillars holding him captive in Derry. See it below.

Episode 7 set the stage for a terrifying finale. The trailer for the final episode shows Pennywise set loose, a strange mist enveloping Derry, and a confrontation between the killer clown and the kids. It looks like one epic send-off for the show, which is planned to return for two more seasons.

You can find out exactly when the finale drops with our It: Welcome to Derry release schedule, or see our roundup of all the upcoming Stephen King movies and shows and the best shows on HBO Max.

Wednesday season 2 wound up as the fourth most-watched English language show in Netflix's history after its initial 91-day streaming window by which the streaming giant calculates its ratings. But the milestone comes with a caveat, as the show dropped 52% in viewership and a 45% drop in viewing hours from the first season in the same window (via What's On Netflix).

Even with the drop, Wednesday season 2 still raked in 928.50 million viewing hours, totalling 119.3M views. Comparatively, season 1 reached 1,718.8 million hours watched over 252.1 million views.

The drop is not necessarily a surprise, as Wednesday season 2 was not only split in two, but also slightly longer than season 1 in terms of runtime. It's also definitely worth noting that Wednesday season 1 is the most watched original English language show of all time on Netflix - a position that would be tough for any show to surmount, even for its own direct follow-up.

The series is, of course, a drama oriented take on The Addams Family, casting Wednesday (Jenna Ortega) as an unlikely hero to a school of misfits, using her newfound psychic abilities to unlock the mysteries that surround her.

The first season of the show captured the hearts of fans thanks to its unique take on an even more eccentric version of its main family, with each Addams possessing their own supernatural gifts. A third season of Wednesday is already in the works, including new cast member Eva Green as Morticia Addams' menacing sister Aunt Ophelia.

For more, check out our picks for the best shows on Netflix to stream right now.

There's just one episode left of It: Welcome to Derry, and I'm already mourning the spin-off's new Losers. Not because they're definitely doomed – though I wouldn't take bets on my chances against a murderous, clown-costumed cosmic entity – but because they presumably won't be in any follow-up chapters if HBO decides to renew the horror hit. [Spoilers for It: Welcome to Derry episodes 1-7 follow]

Even before the show premiered, director Andy Muschietti had shared his plans for future instalments. They would essentially go back in time, he revealed, with season 2 being set in 1935 and season 3 taking place in 1908. Using the interludes from Stephen King's original novel as springboards for the show, each installment would center on a tragic, violent event from Derry's past: 1962's The Black Spot fire first, which we saw play out in Derry's heartbreaking episode 7, then the Bradley Gang Massacre and, finally, the Kitchener Ironworks explosion. To begin with, I was hyped by this novel approach… but that was before I met Will Hanlon, Lilly Bainbridge, Ronnie Grogan, Marge Truman, and Rich Santos.

The length of the It book often gets mocked (and I won't pretend like I haven't suggested to friends that it could've probably lost 300 pages or so), but a big part of its charm is the sheer amount of time you spend just… hanging out with Bill, Beverly, Ben, Richie, Stan, and Mike. Sure, they're often in peril; outrunning local bully Henry Bowers or desperately trying to convince themselves that they're not seeing a werewolf in a varsity jacket chasing them down the street. But there are a huge number of moments where they're just playing around, listening to rock and roll on the radio as they build a dam in the Barrens or whizzing around on Bill's super-fast bike, Silver. It's a key component of the decades-spanning story – so it's a real shame to know we could never have indulged ourselves in the same way with the new Losers, despite the longform storytelling benefits of TV.

Short-lived shortstacks

Over the last 7 weeks, I've grown so fond of the fictional fledglings as they talk about stardust with wide-eyed wonder, flirt awkwardly with one another, and decide whether they're the sorts of people who would help someone in need (a lifeboat) or not (an anchor). Poor Lilly (Clara Stack) and Ronnie (Amanda Christine) have been put through the wringer, especially, having both been present for It's violent attack on Susie, Phil, and Teddy at the Capitol cinema in episode 1. The duo not only witnessed the bloody carnage, they've been forced to deal with its harrowing consequences; Lilly being sent back to Juniper Hill Asylum and Ronnie's father being framed for the kids' deaths. Elsewhere, Marge (Matilda Lawler) almost lost both eyes after It had her thinking they were growing out on stalks, and sweet Cuban-American angel Rich (Arian S. Cartaya) lost his life saving the former during The Black Spot fire.

Watching them endure so much, it was inevitable I'd feel such empathy for them. The show has clearly been designed that way, knowing all too well that viewers' time with them would be fleeting. Unlike the movie adaptations to which it's linked, It: Welcome to Derry boasts a big ensemble of characters, too, so scenes with immediate, maximum impact were essential to us bonding with the spin-off's pint-sized heroes. All credit must go to co-showrunners Jason Fuchs and Brad Caleb Kane – who wrote five of the eight episodes between them – for penning dialogue that conveys these kids' personalities and connections so quickly and clearly.

As much as I don't want to admit it, there is an upside to It: Welcome to Derry taking the more anthological route, though. As a big fan of The Walking Dead, I've always admired horror shows that aren't afraid to off a main character without any warning; the ones that understand that if the protagonists are consistently navigating life-threatening situations, they're not all going to make it out alive every time. Maybe the knowledge that we're never going to see these guys again after the end credits roll on episode 8 will inspire the Derry team to be more ruthless in the run-up to its curtain call.

High risk, high reward

We've already seen Rich die – not at the hands of Pennywise, but Chief Bowers and his racist cronies' – proving that all bets are off as we head into the finale. In the movies (and book), Bill and his pals all make it out of their first confrontation with It alive. Might the show rug-pull us one last time and kill all of their small-screen equivalents? I don't want it to happen, obviously, but it ups the stakes substantially knowing that it's not off the table. Stranger Things, take notes.

There are certain characters that could pop up in a yet-to-be confirmed second season, which softens the blow, I suppose. Kimberly Norris-Guerrero's Rose seems likely to return, given that she's lived on Derry's outskirts since she was a child – and the people of the Shokopiwah tribe have been dealing with It since the 1500s. If season 3 gets greenlit, we already know General Shaw will feature, too, thanks to episode 3's 1908-set prologue. We can count on him not being played by James Remar, though, given it'll be set 54 years prior.

Unless Muschietti, Kane, and Fuchs are planning on introducing some seriously mind-bending time travel shenanigans going forward, then I've only got one more hour with Lilly, Will, Ronnie, and Marge. Hanging out a little while longer? I wish I could.

It: Welcome to Derry is streaming now on HBO Max. New episodes air on HBO every in the US, before broadcasting on Mondays on Sky Atlantic/NOW in the UK. For more, check out our picks of the most exciting new TV shows heading our way or our deep-dive into this year's many Stephen King adaptations.

It looks like It: Welcome to Derry's most violent scene so far is not all guts and gore, as one fan has found a hidden Easter egg in the background that references an earlier catastrophe that will be covered in season 3.

Warning, the following contains spoilers for It: Welcome to Derry episode 7, so turn back now if you have not yet caught up, but make sure to read our spoiler-free It: Welcome to Derry review first.

After jumping back to 1908 and filling in the blanks on how Bob Grey became Pennywise the killer clown, the penultimate episode, titled 'The Black Spot,' returns to the regular timeline, where an angry mob turns up at Hallorann's makeshift club, demanding they hand over Ronnie's dad, Hank. When Hallorann and his men refuse, the mob sets fire to the cabin, trapping everyone inside. As the flames start to engulf the innocent party-goers, Pennywise soon shows up to feast on the fear, quite literally.

However, one fan has spotted a hidden Easter egg in the back of the scene. As Pennywise approaches Hallorann and the kids, we see a gang of zombified creatures gather behind him, including a headless little boy with smoke rising from his burnt neck. "The Headless Egg Boy from the 1908 Kitchener Ironworks Explosion Easter Egg Hunt Tragedy was among them," commented the fan under the clip on YouTube.

If the boy seems a little familiar, that's because we have already seen him in the 2017 movie It, where he was used by Pennywise to taunt and scare the Losers' Club member Ben. The Kitchener Ironworks Explosion saw a massive explosion during an Easter egg hunt that killed over 100 people in 1908, with many witnesses reporting seeing a clown amongst the disaster.

However, we won't see this event play out until It: Welcome to Derry season 3. As Pennwyise awakens in Derry every 27 years, season 2 will jump back to 1935, followed by season 3, which will jump back to 1908. The reason why the series is jumping back in time is that we know what happens when Pennywise wakes up 27 years after season 1 – It: Chapter 1. 27 years after that is It: Chapter 2, which sees the Losers' Club finally defeat the evil entity.

It: Welcome to Derry season 1's final episode airs on December 14. See our It: Welcome to Derry release schedule for exact timings. For more, check out our guide to It: Welcome to Derry Easter eggs and cameos, and keep up with upcoming Stephen King movies and shows heading your way.