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Jennifer Chu
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Jennifer is a TV News Editor at ScreenRant. She started her journey in entertainment media in 2022 when she first joined Valnet at CBR before coming to ScreenRant.
Jennifer loves TV, especially science fiction. She also loves late-night talk shows, due to her insomnia. Alien: Earth is definitely one of her favorite shows, and she jumps on any chance she gets to write about it. Even on her days off, she will claim an Alien Earth article if one is available.
Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon are two of her favorite late-night hosts, and Conan O'Brien before he left his show.
Her Alien: Earth coverage for Screen Rant is by far the work that she is most proud of so far.
She began her career as an editor in 2014. She was initially a finance editor, but her passion for pop culture convinced her to transition into entertainment journalism.
During her off time, she loves to binge-watch cooking shows such as Kitchen Nightmares. Jennifer also loves spending time with her daughter and cherishes every moment of it.
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Warning: The following contains spoilers for It: Welcome to Derry season 1, episode 5.Bill Skarsgård's Pennywise finally shows his face halfway through It: Welcome to Derry season 1.
It: Welcome to Derry's fifth episode titled, “29 Neibolt Street" delivers a major surprise. Matty Clements (Miles Ekhardt), who both the audience and characters in the show believed to be dead, randomly appears in the Losers’ Club’s hideout. Apparently, he somehow survived his encounter with Pennywise in the debut episode.
Obviously, this was a trap. The terrifying clown pulled one over on the children he is currently stalking and terrorizing. Then, in an eerily familiar scene, "Matty" lures them to the sewer. And, in the blink of an eye, the adorable little boy turns into Skarsgård's iconic iteration of the character, revealing what is, to many, his most terrifying form.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, the creators and showrunners of It: Welcome to Derry, Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, and Jason Fuchs, discuss the highly anticipated reveal and why they chose to wait so long for it. Barbara explained that they stalled it to build suspense so it would be all the more scary when it actually happened. She compared it to Jaws, where part of the anxiety the characters and audience have is because they can't see the creature that is endangering them.
We decided that, in this season, Pennywise should be a little bit like the shark in Jaws. You really want to be strategic. In both movies, it was very important for us to keep the mystery and the fear for this character alive. We find that familiarity is the enemy of that. So it was important for us to delay the pleasure, or the terror, as much as we could.
Andy said that for him, it was "a game of anticipation." He wanted to keep the viewers on their toes, he wanted them to be desperate to see Skarsgård's Pennywise. The creator said the goal was to "get people in that state of, 'I need to see the clown! Where is it?!' That's what we would've liked as an audience. It's a bit of a slow burn."
Fuchs, who originally teamed up with his colleagues as a co-producer and script reviser on It: Chapter Two, says the most compelling thing about the creature is its ability to take on different forms. He adds that this approach also plays into audience expectations. After two films featuring the film's version of the creature, viewers were naturally anticipating when or if that iteration would surface again.
In the movies, there's only so much space to see those non-Pennywise manifestations of that creature," he says. "Because you're in TV...you get full episodes where you get to explore the other ways It is gonna torment these kids.
Fuchs explained how planning the reveal was very tricky and took quite a while for the three of them to work something out. And, now that Skarsgård has shown his face, the co-creator said that fans can expect to see him do all sorts of things that the clown has never done before in any adaptation of the Stephen King novel.
We went back and forth. We always knew this was not gonna be front and center in the first scene of the pilot in the way that It 1 opens with the introduction to Georgie and Pennywise. But a huge part of the creative process was, 'When do we introduce this character in the context of this story?' It really was a function, ultimately, of the story and the characters dictating it.
[Skarsgård] has opportunities with this character that the story of the films did not present. Not only are you getting a really, hopefully, thrilling build-up to seeing Pennywise, you are also gonna see Bill doing things you've not seen him do in this character yet.
It: Welcome to Derry releases new episodes every Sunday at 9:00 PM ET and 6:00 PM PT on HBO.
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It: Welcome to Derry
10 stars 9 stars 8 stars 7 stars 6 stars 5 stars 4 stars 3 stars 2 stars 1 star Like Follow Followed TV-MA Horror Mystery Drama Release Date October 26, 2025 Network HBO Directors Andy Muschietti Writers Jason Fuchs, Stephen King, Austin Guzman Franchise(s) IT
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Dick Hallorann with his eyes wide looking angry in It Welcome to Derry
Bill Skarsgard's Pennywise in IT Welcome to Derry trailer 2Image courtesy of HBO Max
Kid similing in IT Welcome To Derry
It: Welcome to Derry teens looking surprised at something off screen
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