The creators and stars of IT: Welcome to Derry were shocked that HBO allowed so much “disgusting” scenes to remain in the series. After working on the previous one IT movies, Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, and Jason Fuchs reunited to create a prequel series about Derry and the demonic entity commonly known as Pennywise.
Early Welcome to Derry reviews have been largely positive, with a 78% critical debut score on Rotten Tomatoes, and critics praising the many surprising and inventive scares.
While speaking with VarietyBarbara Muschietti revealed that she was shocked HBO did not want some of these scenes to be cut. She was expecting to receive a call with pushback, but instead, the studio was supportive throughout the entire process. Check out her comments below:
While we were shooting, I kept thinking, “I’m going to get the call.” But we kept on presenting these scenes and episodes and they kept on responding and loving them. We’ve been very lucky to have the support from the studio.
Chris Chalk, who plays the role of Dick Halloran in Welcome to Derry‘s cast, was also surprised by the full extent of the horror in the series, and shares that he didn’t understand the complete scope until he saw the show for himself:
There are things that you are going to see that are appropriately disgusting.
Fuchs explains that he and the show’s creative team “wanted to push the boundaries in terms of the horror” and to stimulate and surprise the audience in new ways. This “ruthless” approach goes beyond pure shock value, though, as he emphasizes that the series is about “the darkness inside all of us”:
I think the audience likes to be surprised, likes to be stimulated in ways that they weren’t before. We did it more intensely in every aspect.
I think it is a show about the darkness inside all of us. Everyone’s got the dark. Everyone’s got the light. I may have more (darkness) than most, but in the case of a show like this, it’s certainly very helpful. We really wanted to push the boundaries in terms of the horror, the scares, the gores. It is ruthless. It doesn’t pull any punches.
With IT (2017) being the highest-grossing horror movie of all time, and IT Chapter Two (2019) also near the top of the list, HBO knows that the approach taken in the previous adaptations works. There was no need to interfere with that, and as evidenced by many other HBO shows, it is a streaming home that often welcomes boundaries being pushed.
The level of “appropriately disgusting” gore and other horror elements are even more amplified than in the R-rated movies. The ability to surprise audiences more than before is partially rooted in this being the first time that the story is being told.
While the story of the Losers Club was directly adapted in the 2017 and 2019 IT movies and in the 1990s miniseries starring Tim Curry, Welcome to Derry is based on the interlude chapters of the original Stephen King book. This means that audiences get to see the horrifying history of Pennywise and Derry in ways that have never been shown onscreen before.
With its October 26 premiere, which is perfect for the Halloween season, IT: Welcome to Derry will of course be scary, but Muschietti, Chalk, and Fuchs are making it clear that the series will go far beyond the expected scares.
- Release Date
- October 26, 2025
- NETWORKS
- HBO
- Directors
- Andy Muschietti
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