IT: Welcome to Derry - Season One Finale Review

Hello

boys and girls and welcome to the concession stand here on the KB radio network.

I am your host Kevin Reed and this is the review of

the season one finale of hbo's it welcome to dairy this has been six weeks of shock of twists of building suspense and finally we've reached the end to this season one and i'm hopeful hopeful prayerful that

we will get a second season third season 50 whatever i hope that this continues

Season 1 was a

banger this was peak television in my humble opinion and i know it doesn't mount up to much but it means something to me a big fan of it uh if you listen to my reviews throughout this series this season one you know that i've been all

in on this show every episode has has delivered for me i've enjoyed every single one i've enjoyed the story

I've enjoyed the characters.

I've enjoyed the mayhem that has taken place throughout this eight episode season.

This has been a joy to watch.

This has once again proves that HBO,

you know,

it's not TV is HBO.

They live up to the slogan,

man.

They know how to deliver on

TV.

This show,

at least.

this episode is the perfect ending to this season now was it a big crescendo to what uh you know like a big climactic end to this show not not in particularly you know it is not anything to wow you in a sense like man they should have put this in the theater or something but it it

wrapped up this season you know i thought it wrapped it up

pretty nicely with a bow even if we don't get a season two if this is it if it was one and done it's satisfactory you know everything was on point to me uh this finale we left off last uh episode

i should say last episode we left off where pennywise was about to go into his slumber after the tragedy at the black spot where we saw multiple

multiple deaths in that episode,

including one that still haunts me,

that still is tearing at my heart.

A week later,

and that is the death of Rich and how he went out,

went out like a pure soldier,

man.

I mean,

best character on the show by far.

Loved him,

hurt when he died.

But my God,

if you watch this episode,

you got.

the payoff of a century uh involving rich now we left off uh after that pennywise went into his slumber where was about to go into his slumber where he was taking the apocalypse

now type bath in all of that blood and guts and he was awakened because the military took one of the pillars and destroyed it pretty much destroying the barrier that was keeping him at bay in dairy

and so we opened this episode well before we get to this episode he he he took will you know he he made will float and so that's how we left off last episode so we opened this episode with

the aftermath of the military's actions uh now we get the mist that has swept through the town of dairy or fog but i like to say miss because you know to keep it stephen king related

It came in like the mist.

If you read the book,

if you've seen the movie,

it was pretty much the same way that this mist just covered the town,

blanketed the town,

which led to the children at school who are at the school.

Not our main kids,

not the losers,

but just the kids who are at school.

We see Pennywise make the announcement for all the kids to gather in the auditorium.

He comes in,

he uses the principal as a puppet.

literally rips his head off in front of the children and does the pennywise dance and then puts them all in a trance causing them to float uh i knew immediately i knew immediately at

this point nothing else they can do can ruin this finale that's all i needed to see actually they could have cut it short there it could have been the shortest episode in history their first five minutes.

and just went off i would have been satisfied that was all i needed to see and leaving it off in a cliffhanger like that would have been awesome but we got more uh our losers gang they are in their little clubhouse and they notice the mist coming in they

go to investigate what's going on they notice all of the missing children posters of all the children in dairy

And start freaking out.

Like,

what's going on?

How is everybody missing?

This must be a joke.

And then they see one of the posters for Will.

So now the stakes have raised to insurmountable levels at this point for the kids.

And now they're on the hunt to find out where

Pennywise has taken

Will and the other children.

And we get a scene where they're following this bloody trail.

uh and carnage along this trail we see the just the torn apart bodies and severed heads and all this other good stuff uh that was enough to say you know what i'm not gonna follow this road i'm

gonna just hide somewhere but our losers game they they are soldiers they soldiered on and they tried to ride their bike to catch up to pennywise

who is pretty much like the Pied Piper at this point,

marching the children out of town.

They discover the milkman has been torn apart,

but the milk truck is still there.

And so they decide to steal the milk truck,

march with her one eye and has never driven.

She said,

well,

my uncle has a truck.

Oh,

he taught you how to drive?

No,

I just watched him.

And they drove off to find Pennywise.

follow behind him meanwhile you also have uh uh leroy who is seeking help from dick to find will and dick is going through it right now he is going through it with these voices in his head with all of the visions uh

that he is uh seeing with the dead people that is virtually driving him insane to the point where he's about to commit suicide

And before he can commit suicide,

Leroy comes in,

basically talking him out of it before he's able to kill him,

kill himself,

I should say.

And they try to find a way to find Will,

even though

Dick at this point,

at this stage,

he can't help nobody.

He can't even help himself,

obviously.

So it's a battle within itself.

The children manage to catch up to the floating bodies of the children who are behind a wagon of Pennywise.

And they find Will.

They try to get Will.

But right before that,

I've skipped a part.

Right before that,

you have

Lily who has the dagger.

And she's freaking out.

You know,

she's,

the dagger is pretty much.

corrupting her mind they have to fight her in a sense to kind of get her under control to help because they got to do this together you know and this is something this is a theme that was planted this little seed that was planted throughout the show uh

every episode or every other episode we got that line we we can do it but we got to do it together it's all about doing it together no one person can defeat pennywise on their own and it is

staying true with the original with the films in the miniseries you have to do it together and so i love the element of that i love that they kept that same vibe that same tone and uh stuck to their guns with the losers in

this era that have the same mindset as the losers in the era that we know and so they managed to get her to her senses they catch up to the truck

they catch up to the children um and they encounter pennywise and that was this was a good scene because he manages to separate march from the group who are holding

the dagger at this point to keep him at bay uh pennywise does get march out of it and he decides to give a monologue at this point now this is the only part of the episode where i was kind of like why did they do this and

it was cool because it you know easter egg wise reference wise nostalgic wise he told her about the future oh you're gonna have the kid in it

pretty much confirmed a theory that a lot of people have that uh marge was the mother of richie from the movies and so it makes sense it

all makes it it's something like you knew it but it was confirmed here that made you be like ah so he tells her that in the future your your kid and to other kids.

are going to be the ones to defeat him.

Why would he tell her this?

It makes no sense.

It made no sense for him to do that.

I don't understand it.

Maybe it'll get clarified later on when I think about it,

meditate on it.

But in the moment,

I was like,

why would he do this?

I don't understand.

Just kill her.

If you know that her son is going to be...

part of the losers group in the

80s that's going to defeat him why why keep it why keep her alive that'll end it right there but he chose to do the typical villain thing in monologue at that moment and tells her all of these things and he you know he pulls out the poster of

rich of the actor i think that's is that finn wolfhardt from stranger things who plays him i can't remember

I could be off,

but I think it is who played him in the movies.

But regardless,

that was a nice little Easter egg at that point.

Just as he's about to attack Marge,

he stops.

He freezes.

And

I'm confused.

So Marge manages to get away.

What made him freeze?

Because

Ronnie is the one holding the dagger and she's off.

You know,

she's nowhere near him.

So we later found out that it was Dick who put him in a trance just as they were driving up.

And,

you know,

for a good

15 minutes,

I was confused.

Like,

why is Pennywise stuck in this statuette stage right here?

You know,

it didn't make sense.

But at the same time that the parents pull up,

the military pulls up as well.

And they're trying to stop Leroy and everybody else from putting the dagger where that pillar was in order to reestablish the barrier.

And they managed to shoot Leroy in the leg.

They shoot Tanyu in the throat,

killing him,

R.I.P.

to Tanyu.

And,

you know,

at this point,

it looks like all hope is lost.

And so

Leroy gives the dagger to

Will and tell Will to go.

put the dagger in there and this was a cool father-son moment where you know Will tells him like you know I'm not like you I you know I'm afraid

I'm afraid and

Leroy tells him like you don't need to be like me and I don't want you to be like me and that was that was so that was so heartfelt you know because as a father as a parent period

you know you want your kids to be better than you you don't want your kids to be like me i certainly don't want my children to be like me i want them to be better than i am you know and hopefully all all of you parents out there feel the same way about your children you know you want your children to do better than what you do or what you have done and you

know that was a cool little moment even though it was in a pretty tense moment in the in the show

But

Will does take the dagger.

He runs off with the rest of the loser group to go plant that dagger in the tree.

So all the while,

we see the general,

Shaw,

he goes,

he sees Pennywise frozen.

So he goes to kind of talk to him,

which was crazy.

He goes talk to him.

And at the same time,

Pennywise is having a vision of his own.

when he awakened as Pennywise after he killed Bob

Gale and or Gray I should say Bob Gray and

the uh uh what's what's the guy named the circus i guess owner or ring ring master whatever he is his boss slaps him and pretty much mistreats him and pennywise is kind of in like defeated you know he's

defeated because i i took it as well he doesn't have fear of pennywise that's why he's you know uh getting the upper hand on him at this moment in this flashback and

We've come to find out that that is

Dick who has him in this dream state and he's able to bust out of it.

Pennywise is able to figure it out and get out of it as the military yanks

Dick out of the van that they was in and breaks the link.

And as he breaks the link,

Pennywise unfreezes.

He's standing there with the general and the general is like,

you're free.

You can go.

And Pennywise gives a sniff.

And this was so cool.

He gives a sniff.

He's like and starts to walk off.

And he's like,

don't wait.

I know you.

I know.

I never forget a smell.

And he thought back to when not the first episode,

maybe the second or third episode when we got the flashback of the general when he was younger.

uh and he's chased by the entity in the woods at that point he wasn't the form of pennywise so he was this other thing uh that he saw at the circus and so he he he turns his face into that thing and it scares the

general and at that point well he's done and sure enough pennywise uh eats his face off kills him quick

uh the kids are approaching the tree but as they get closer to the tree the dagger isn't letting will who's holding it get close to the tree he can't so it makes him turn around so the other kids come and they turn him around and they both they all of them are

pushing him towards the tree while they hold the dagger you know because they gotta do it together and as he's doing this this This was the coolest shot.

part of the episode by far pennywise is just skipping in slow motion as everybody else looks on the adults in the military everybody they look on and see him skipping past going towards the kids in the tree um

and he gives this look like he just gives this look a side-eye look to all of the adults as he's skipping.

going towards the kids to devour them and i'm like man this is cinema right here i loved that shot it was beautiful and so the kids are fighting they're trying to get there it's it's hard it's like it

was like uh how can i describe it you know uh i don't know pushing a rock up a hill or whatever the case i don't know how what description i could use but it is

virtually impossible for them at this point and it was sure defeat they do reach the tree but they can't quite get it in the tree uh the pressure was just too much and they couldn't get over it just

then you have dick and rose they feel something and they turn and they look and uh rose isn't able to see it but she feels the presence but dick can see it dick sees the uh

indigenous person that he saw before that led them to the pillar but who comes from behind him none other than rich man my heart just went oh it

was it was beautiful and he runs towards the kids and as he's running towards the kids this was the money shot he looks over at

pennywise pennywise looks over at him and he's like oh no you know that's what pennywise is looking and rich doesn't say nothing he doesn't have a line throughout but he just looks at pennywise and shoots the bird at him i'm like bravo bravo

rich even in death he's a soldier even in death he's a beast i was i stood up out my chair and i just started cheering man I'm like,

let's go.

And he reaches over,

he helps push,

just that little help.

And they were able to get the dagger in the tree and ultimately defeating Pennywise and putting him back to sleep.

touching moment there where all of the kids they're sitting there after they put the dagger in there and they're like did you feel that you know they were like did you feel that it was like an extra pair of hands and

one of them i can't i think it was lily it could have been ronnie uh who who said it was rich and all of them just it just dawned he was like yes it was rich

he was there i felt them everybody yeah we felt them and it was so beautiful man they all hugged it was great that was just perfection um i thought i was good i thought i was gonna get there i got through that without crying and so i was like man i

did it we're good and then the funeral of rich happened uh marge gave the eulogy which was kind of odd

but she gave the eulogy even though she starts off starts it off by saying you know i only knew rich for a month but that's what made it odd now you barely knew him but you're giving the eulogy but it was still beautiful i got through that fine i like okay that was touching that was nice you know because i it would have been ruined if she was stood up there and said yeah but i loved him with all my,

I'm like,

no,

don't do that,

but she didn't.

She didn't.

But the moment that got me was when Dick came,

he was standing in the background and you could see Rich.

You saw Rich.

He was there and he was comforting the losers,

his friends,

you know,

kind of having their head,

his hand on their shoulders and just give them like a little side hood from the back.

And I thought that is that is awesome.

But that's not the one that got me.

Once it was over.

You see rich parents sitting there and obviously they're mourning their hurt that they lost their son.

But you see a hand.

They never really showed.

This was made it so great.

They never showed rich in his entirety.

Like the way it was shot.

You never saw his face clearly.

You know,

just just the lower part,

like his chin or his mouth area down.

I mean

I think part of that is because Dick sees you as you die,

you know,

when he has those visions and we know that,

uh,

the way that rich died,

it wasn't gruesome,

but he,

he died from smoke inhalation.

He died from suffocating basically.

And his eyes was wide open and all this here.

And so it wasn't a pretty sight.

So I'm glad they didn't really show it.

And so they didn't really show it,

but it,

they shot it in a way like he's there,

but he's not there.

And it just made it feel more real.

I don't know.

It's weird,

but I love that they did that.

But anyways,

he has his hands.

He has his boy about to break now.

Lord have mercy.

He has his hands on his parents shoulder and they feel it.

You know,

you can see his father kind of like reaching up to touch his shoulder,

you know,

but he.

doesn't quite reach up because it's weird he knows nothing's there but he feels it and he's just it's it's oh my god but that's not where i broke where i broke is when dick came and sat next to him and

he leaned over and he said look uh you know that hand that y'all feel on your shoulder right now that's rich he's there with you and he's always gonna be there with you ed

It's like the two actors who played his parents there did an awesome job because they gave it off.

Like it wasn't like,

who is this crazy fool telling me that at my son's funeral,

you know,

it was more of thank you.

I thought that was him.

I just wanted confirmation.

You know what I'm saying?

So it was so touching,

man.

I couldn't do anything but break.

It was so comforting.

In this show,

there has been nothing but dread.

You know,

no happy endings at all.

To get that for those parents was just beautiful to me.

So,

as it goes off,

the losers are cleaning up their clubhouse as they're about to...

Well,

they basically go,

they separate.

At least some of them are leaving Derry.

Marge tells

Lily what it told her while she was separated from him that,

you know,

her son was going to.

defeat him in the future and you know uh that he sees the past present and future at the same time and all this here and lily was like what what can he go back in time or you know can he change it marjorie like yeah he probably go back in time and change it maybe he'll kill our parents or something like that so

lily was like well that'll be their fight you know there's nothing they can do so that'll be their fight and that sets up so much that not only what

the story that we all know but past stories that um from what i understand if there's a season two and season three that's what it's going to be they're going back in the time uh i think the

1920s possibly uh different era uh in season three as well so it sets that up and so at the end of episode how everything closes the season off we get uh oh man i'm i'm

I can't think of her name now.

Pennywise daughter or Bob Gray's daughter,

who was comatose from the deadites from the last episode.

She's in a mental institution going crazy,

but they play a song that her dad used to play and it calms her down.

And we flash forward to 1988,

where she's much older now.

And a woman has hung herself,

killed herself in her room.

And she walks over there.

And trying to see what's going on.

She sees the woman who hung herself.

And she sees the husband and the daughter there.

And the husband,

well,

the father of the daughter just pushes her off,

you know.

Pushes off the daughter.

And

Mrs. Kirch,

I think,

yeah,

Mrs.

Kirch.

She sees the girl and is none other than Beverly.

And it's the same actress who played her.

in the movie and she looks the same the girl didn't age the girl didn't age at all and she tells her you know what they say about dairy you know people who die here don't don't really die and that's how it goes off and we know that she's told that uh again in the future when she's an adult and

so it comes for a circle and i thought this was great i i really enjoyed this season i enjoyed this series finale.

I think,

I think...

this is peak television this is one of the best shows that come out of 2025 what a way to end the year i i've enjoyed i really can't think of a bad episode this season all of them hit for me all eight episodes hit

for me i give this season of it welcome to dairy season one a letter grade of an a great television people great great television if you're a fan of it

or if you're a fan of Stephen King,

if you're a fan of horror,

this was the show for you.

I would like to know,

what did you think of this season of It?

Welcome to Derry.

Did you like it?

Are you looking forward to a season two or did it not just do it for you?

I would love to know your thoughts.

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Here on the KB Radio Network,

everybody,

thank you for joining me all season long for it.

Welcome to Dairy Season

1. I want you all to know that I love you.

Continue to love everyone.

And until we speak again,

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

And I love you.

Continue to love everyone.

IT: Welcome to Derry - Season One Finale Review

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