IT: Welcome To Derry EPs Reveal Three-Season Plan, Explain Finale's Surprising Connection To The Films

The following post contains spoilers for the season finale of "IT: Welcome to Derry." Proceed with caution!

It's back to the Derry sewers for Pennywise the Dancing Clown — but defeated, he is not.

During Sunday's finale of "IT: Welcome to Derry," the remaining members of the Losers Club successfully stopped the entity known as It from spreading its evil beyond the borders of Derry, Maine. In a long, intense sequence taking place on the frozen river at Derry's border, Lilly (Clara Stack), Marge (Matilda Lawler), Ronnie (Amanda Christine), and Will (Blake Cameron James) — with a little help from the badass ghost of sweet Rich (Arian S. Cartaya)! — managed to plunge that mystical dagger into the base of an old tree standing at the town's edge, uniting the dagger with the other pillars in Derry that keep It from ever escaping.

So, a big win, right?

Well, sort of. Although Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård) was banished to the sewers for his 27-year hibernation, he revealed some startling information on his way out. For one, we learned that Marge, years down the road, will become the mother of Richie Tozier (played by Finn Wolfhard in the 2017 "It" movie), who, as "It" fans know, is part of the future Losers Club that ostensibly defeats Pennywise. And yet, the clown was quick to tell Marge that he experiences time much differently than humans: When Richie & Co. kill him in the future, it's really Pennywise's birth, of sorts — prompting Marge to wonder if Pennywise might go farther back in time when he's awake next, to prevent Marge and her friends from ever being born.

Meanwhile, in an episode-ending coda, "Welcome to Derry" made another connection to the "It" films with a surprise cameo from Sophia Lillis, who popped up as her movie character, Beverly Marsh, in a short scene at Juniper Hill. Plus, in a curious twist that fans of the first "It" movie might recognize, the final "Welcome to Derry" title card had the words "Chapter One" added to it, suggesting this series is not quite done.

Although HBO has yet to officially renew "Welcome to Derry," executive producers Andy and Barbara Muschietti — who also shepherded both films — confirm to TVLine that they've got a multi-season plan for the series. Keep reading for those details (and their insights on key finale scenes), then grade Sunday's "Welcome to Derry" finale in our poll!

TVLINE | Let's get some burning questions out of the way about how this episode ends. First, when Ronnie and her dad are driving out of Derry at the end, the show's title card now says "Chapter One." Are you hoping for this to be a multi-season story?
ANDY | The answer is yes. From the genesis of this project, we had the idea to make it three seasons, aligning with the three more important catastrophic events that are described in the interludes [of the book]. Those are the burning of the Black Spot in '62 — well, in the book, the dates are different, because we did a transport of the periods — but then the massacre of the Bradley Gang in '35, and the explosion at the Easter egg hunt in 1908. It was always that blueprint for us. We wanted to make a three-season event story.

BARBARA | We hope we get to.

TVLINE | Have you heard anything from HBO about a renewal?
BARBARA | It's a high bar [of quality to produce], and it's also not a cheap show. But I think everybody's intention is to make it.

ANDY | The idea of putting "Chapter One" on the final card came in post-production, even though we knew that three seasons was the big arc. I wanted to create kind of the same excitement from the end of our first movie [2017's "It"]. Most people went to the cinema not knowing that it was a two-part movie, but the story in the book required a second half. We have great memories of watching the end of Chapter One [with audiences], and putting "Chapter One" at the end, and people went like, [screams]. It was great. So at the end of this one, I said, "Wait, let's do the same," and we did it.

TVLINE | At the end of the finale, Marge tells Lilly what Pennywise told her about experiencing time differently, and Lilly says it will have to be someone else's fight if Pennywise goes farther back in time to wreak more havoc. Is that conversation your way of planting seeds for Season 2?
ANDY | Yes, precisely. I can't talk too much about the logic, even though it's hinted, because I don't want to spoil it. But in that conversation, Marge is speculating, "What if he can go to the past and mess with our ancestors?" And in the book, nothing [about Pennywise] is learned. Nothing is engraved in stone. Nobody gets to learn anything about It; it's all speculation. But in the book, you take all those speculations as truth. Everything that the Losers wonder and speculate about — it's like, "Oh, maybe we should believe it."

TVLINE | The finale connects to the "It" movies in two ways: We find that Marge eventually becomes Richie Tozier's mother, and we see Beverly Marsh at the end in that final coda. Talk to me about drawing those connections and why you wanted to merge the show and the film worlds.
BARBARA | For us, [the films and show] are the same thing, so it was always very natural. But back in March or April, we were [shooting] some tiny pickups in Toronto, just tiny little things. And Andy — who never, ever gives his brain a break about a story — tells me, "We need to gel the movies to the series beyond the [Marge/Richie] bloodlines." Andy had just been talking to our lovely cameraman Angelo, and Angelo, in passing, tells Andy, "I just worked with Joan Gregson, and she's doing great." Joan Gregson had played Mrs. Kersh back when we shot "It Chapter Two" in 2018, so that definitely inspired Andy to basically set the ground for this last scene. We called Joan, and she was just delighted and delightful, and we called Sophia [Lillis], who's our buddy — and, thank God, manages to keep her very youthful looks. [Laughs] And she got on a plane from New York and came to join us on that scene. We were incredibly lucky — lucky's not even the word, but blessed — because Joan left us two months later. And it's such a good memory. She had a great time, we had a great time, it was lovely.

ANDY | [The epilogue] was a very last-minute idea when I realized there was something missing to this whole story, which was a visual connection with the characters that we know and love from "It." I have to say, my idea of an epilogue included a couple more things. There was Marge as an older woman with a f***ed-up eye, saying goodbye to Finn Wolfhard [who played Richie in "It"] as he got on a school bus. And then later on, there was Mike Hanlon at the grave of Leroy, and doing a weird time [jump]. But none of that happened. I decided to go for one single epilogue, because I knew the ending was getting very bulky. We went for [Beverly], and in "It Chapter Two," it's mentioned that her mom [died by] suicide, and I thought it was fascinating to link those two characters [Beverly and Mrs. Kersh] earlier in their life. In "Chapter Two," we see Jessica Chastain going to her dad's home, and he's dead, but this old lady lives there.

BARBARA | Also, Mrs. Kersh is the only character we see in four facets of her life.

ANDY | I thought it would be very original to imply that these two met before in their lives. They just don't remember. Beverly doesn't remember, because she was in shock when that happened. It's a scene that's connecting the series to the film in a very simple way. But the other thing you mentioned, which is Marge being Richie's mom — that's the first idea that I had.

TVLINE | Like, first idea for this show, period?
ANDY| Yes, this was before even pitching it to Stephen King. I told him, "Look, I want to do this hidden story that connects the interludes, which goes backwards." And the one character I knew there should be was this little girl who wears Coke bottle glasses, and it's Richie's mom.

BARBARA | And she's funny.

ANDY | She's funny, she has the DNA of Richie Tozier, but not so much that you can see it immediately. And we wouldn't reveal this until the very end, though people seem to already have read between the lines, and they're already speculating. Many people know.

TVLINE | It's hard to keep anything a secret on the Internet, right?
BARBARA | And it's good! What an honor to have people think about it instead of scrolling while they're watching. People are actually tying the strings, and it's an honor.

ANDY | I also did a little sketch of Marge, like, three or four years ago, and she had an eyepatch already. So I knew she would end up being some sort of pirate leading the charge. Of course, after the development [of the show], she isn't necessarily the leadership, because she goes back and forth [between friend groups].

TVLINE | This finale has a long sequence that takes place on the frozen river, in the fog, which is one of the most ambitious scenes in the whole show. Can you walk me through the complexities of bringing that sequence to life? Was it the toughest thing to shoot?
ANDY | It wasn't the toughest, probably the toughest was the Black Spot [burning]. But there was the challenge of shooting something that happens on ice. How do you film on ice? How do you create a floor that looks like ice? Luckily, we work with people that are incredibly talented, and [production designer] Paul Austerberry and his team basically granted that we could do all of this on a stage. ... We shot on a stage that was foggy all the time, and the ice that you see is actually painted on the floor. Every inch of that set was painted as if it was ice. It's very difficult, because ice normally has a three-dimensionality. You can see the depth. But they did such a great job. It's hand-painted, it's fantastic. Just feet and feet of hand-painted floor. And the other challenging thing is endurance. We'd been there for, like, two entire weeks. Every day, surrounded by fog and not knowing where the door was. [Laughs] And getting into very, very physical performances — the camera doing crazy moves, and the actors on the floor and fighting and doing all kinds of crazy stunts. But it was fun.

BARBARA | I'll add an award to Joanna Moore, our [assistant director], for constantly being able to understand and keep the geography of this scene, and having to constantly explain it to our amazing cast and to me. We basically took over a full stage and fogged it, so it was very difficult to understand that geography. You didn't know where you were most of the time.

ANDY | I drew a little map. [Laughs] But the problem also is that it's such a long scene, and there's so many focuses of attention. Given that it's such a foggy set, the audience will be lost. The challenge was, "Where do we put the camera to understand where each of these groups of people are at any given time?" Plus, we were shooting on a stage that was way smaller than the actual extension of the land. We were always cheating everything possible to get more distance. But I think everyone did a great job, and it's not confusing [to watch]. I hope. [Laughs]

BARBARA | I'll add one more interesting tidbit. We ended up having that ending because the writers' strike forced us to go into winter. We were not originally supposed to go into full-on winter, so we had to think. For a second and a half, we thought maybe we'd have to shoot [that scene] in nature, and we very quickly came off it and decided to shoot it on a stage. The pain would have been incredible — [Laughs] — and uncontrollable. But the fog and the ice look like that because we were able to control them. Otherwise, it would have been a very different ending.

TVLINE | I was struck, while watching this finale, by the challenge it must have been for you to keep viewers' anxiety up all season long, when we already ostensibly know that Pennywise does stay trapped in Derry, because that's where he is in the two films. How do you approach keeping those stakes real when viewers know some of the outcome?
ANDY | At the end of the season, we understand we have a monster who doesn't experience time in a linear way, so he could potentially rewrite history. In that way, we imply that the killing — his demise in 2016 — might be altered. So we're not going to see two more seasons of thinking It dies in 2016. That's one of the ideas that's sort of refreshing. It's like, "Oh, wait. This could end in a different way." It's true that Pennywise does stay in Derry, but our hope is that people are so immersed in that moment that they don't think too much about it. [Laughs]

BARBARA | We met with Damon Lindelof about five years ago, and we were just chatting, and we talked about "Welcome to Derry," and he said, "Mm, that's why I don't do prequels. I already know how it ends." So I think a big part of this season was subverting that, and making it in a way where, even if you think you know how it ends, you don't.

What did you think of the "Welcome to Derry" finale? Are you hoping that Seasons 2 and 3 will come to fruition? Cast your vote in our poll below, then drop a comment with your full reviews!