Who Dies and Who Survives in IT: Welcome to Derry?

‘IT: Welcome to Derry’ follows Pennywise’s killing spree in the year 1962 and promises a bloodbath from the get-go. This time around, the dancing clown has Lilly Brainbridge and her friends on his radar. He manages to secure four victims at the very start of the show. However, things become more complicated once Lilly and her newly acquired gang, including Marge, Ronnie, Will, and Richie, begin to decode the threat of the supernatural entity and begin pursuing their own hunt against him. Yet, General Shaw’s manipulative plan to release the eldritch horror from his geographical cage ultimately provides Pennywise the push he needs to take over the town of Derry. This brings the narrative to a haunting climax in the final episode 8 titled ‘Winter Fire,’ where most characters’ fates are sealed for better or for worse. SPOILERS AHEAD!

Will’s Family and Friends Save Him From Pennywise’s Deadlights

After Shaw and his men successfully destroy one of the pillars of Pennywise’s cage, the clown re-emerges from his hibernation, eager to unleash his villainy without any limitations. The first target on his list is Will, who, along with his friends, managed to escape the clown’s terror despite being marked in his feeding cycle. In order to entrap him, Pennywise uses his deadlights on the kid to put him in a trance and subdue him under his control. Afterward, he pays a visit to Derry High School to deliver a similar fate to the town’s kids. Once subjugated, the clown collects all the kids, taking them away, presumably back to his lair. However, Will’s friends and family refuse to give up so easily.

Once Lily, Ronnie, and Marge figure out what has happened, they decide to follow Pennywise’s tracks, while armed with the cage shard, which can be used as a weapon against the entity. Similarly, after Leory learns his son is in danger, on account of the clown’s own taunting admission, he employs the help of Dick Hallorann and Rose to rescue his boy. Ultimately, this brings both groups to the iced lake on the outskirts of Derry’s forest. While the kids go up against the clown with the dagger, Dick uses his shine to trap Pennywise inside his own mind. This renders his power over the deadlighted kids null, allowing Will to escape from his clutches. Thus, in the end, Will survives and joins his friends, helping them to entrap the entity once again.

Rich Manages to Help His Friends From the Other Side of the Veil

Rich “Richie” Santos faces a brutal end in the penultimate episode of the season. During the attack on the Black Spot, Rich and Marge are among the numerous people who get trapped inside the burning building with no hope of escape. Still, despite the impossible odds, the kid manages to find one way of surviving the suffocating smoke: a trunk. The trunk is big enough to fit a kid inside it, and should theoretically allow them to survive the smoke long enough for help to arrive. However, instead of saving his own life, he tricks Marge into getting inside. By the time she realizes he can’t fit beside her in the trunk, Rich has already locked her inside, sprawling himself on top of it as an extra layer of security. Ultimately, Rich sacrifices his life in order to ensure Marge, the girl he loves, has a fighting chance.

In the aftermath of the attack, when authorities finally arrive on the scene, they find his dead body among those of multiple other patrons. Yet, this isn’t the last time that the kid puts up a fight to help out his friends. In the finale, Will and his friends find themselves tasked with the responsibility of burying the cage’s shard inside a tree to reactivate the powers of the cage so that it can entrap Pennywise within Derry’s borders once again. Nonetheless, much like the clown, the shard also resists an underground fate, making it difficult for the kids to fulfill their mission. During this time, Dick witnesses an eerie dark silhouette, allowing Rich to go and help out his friends in their last push against Pennywise. Even though no one aside from Dick, with his shine, can see him, Marge and the others feel Rich’s presence as it helps them seal their enemy’s fate.

Lilly and Marge Survive Pennywise’s Attack and Learn Something About the Future

Lilly and Marge face a daunting threat as they go up against Pennywise. Initially, when they, alongside Ronnie, decide to rescue Will, they’re planning on killing the clown with the cage shard. For years, this weapon has been in the protection of the guardians of the pillars, including Rose. However, Lilly manages to acquire this dagger after the kids and the military’s simultaneous venture into the town’s underground sewers. Initially, as the girls try to find Will and Pennywise, the dagger has an adverse effect on them, polluting the holder’s thoughts and making them paranoid. Yet, they manage to spot the signs early on before any significant tragedy strikes. Thus, the trio decides to trade off on being the holder of the dagger as they continue their search for Will.

Yet, the real challenge begins once they find him and the other kids. During this time, Pennywise manages to drag Marge away, leading to a confrontation between them. In this encounter, the clown reveals to the kid that she would go on to become a Tozier through marriage and then give birth to Richie Tozier, the boy who would ultimately kill Pennywise with the help of his friends. In the aftermath of the entity’s entrapment, Marge and Lilly come out of the other side alive. However, the former can’t help but remain worried in light of Pennywise’s confession about his non-linear experience of time. She’s worried that, much like how he targeted her (and unbeknownst to her, Will), the clown would attempt to go after their ancestors to prevent Richie Tozier from fulfilling his fate. In turn, Lilly can only comfort her with the knowledge that such a scenario would be outside of their control and would have to become someone else’s fight.

Rose Has to Cope With Taniel’s Tragic Death

While multiple of the central characters manage to escape the finale with their lives intact, unfortunately, not everyone walks out of the final battle unscathed. Initially, after Leroy realizes Will is in danger, he moves quickly to assemble forces who can help him out in the impossible scenario. This includes Dick Hallorann as well as Rose, who knows more about Pennywise and how to stop him, perhaps better than anyone. Naturally, her nephew, Taniel, comes along for the mission to fulfill his responsibility as a keeper of the pillar. However, shortly after they arrive at the frozen lake, so do Shaw and his armed men.

Shaw has convinced himself that the one true way to unite the country is to give them a common enemy to fear: Pennywise. Therefore, he’s willing to do everything in his power to ensure the clown escapes Derry and wreaks havoc across the entire nation. For the same reason, he tells his men to fire at Leroy and Taniel once it becomes evident they’re going after the entity. Although their bullets only manage to catch the former’s legs, they get Taniel square in the neck. In the aftermath, the military covers the entire thing up, and likely the young man’s brutal death with it. Ultimately, Rose has a hard time making peace with the unfair reality and realizes she needs a new start in order to find a way to move past the tragedy.

Ronnie Leaves Derry, For Better or For Worse

Ronnie, much like her friends, also survives the final confrontation against Pennywise. However, unlike the others, returning to her normal life isn’t quite so simple. Ever since the first disappearance of Matty, her father, Hank Grogan, had found himself on the cops’ radar for all the wrong reasons. Eventually, he’s falsely framed for the murder of Matty and the other kids. There isn’t enough evidence to justify his arrest or conviction. Nonetheless, since he’s unwilling to disclose a concrete alibi for the night of the murders, the local cops have no qualms about pinning the blame on him. However, Hank was with his secret lover, Ingrid, a white, married woman, on the night of the murders.

Therefore, the cops and the townspeople of Derry will vilify and target Hank either way. As such, the only path ahead lies in jailbreak and going on the lam. Fortunately, for him, once he escapes from the prison bus, Charlotte, Will’s mother, and a civil rights activist, are able to secure his passage out of the country. Once Pennywise is returned to his cage, Derry goes back to normal. Since they assume Hank died in the attack on the Black Spot, it makes it easier for the single father to leave the town with Ronnie to start their new lives. Even though it’s bittersweet for the young girl to leave behind her friends and abandon the budding romance between her and Will, she’s happy to finally get a chance to be happy and free with her father.

Pennywise Delivers Shaw to His Demise

Throughout the season, Shaw’s character has been a point of major intrigue and curiosity. In his childhood, the military General had a run-in with IT, before it ever took on the disguise of Pennywise. Even though he left town afterward and thus lost most of his memories of Derry, an inkling of the entity remained in the back of his mind. Therefore, he returns to the town with one clear mission: to find IT again. However, this time around, instead of becoming his prey, Shaw has plans of using Pennywise to fulfill his own deranged plans.

Nonetheless, it seems that somewhere along the line, Shaw forgets that just because he wants to use Pennywise as his weapon doesn’t mean that the clown is actually something one can control. During the confrontation on the frozen lake, the General goes up to Pennywise, while he’s still trapped inside his mind. Once the latter emerges, Shaw placates him, ensuring that he isn’t in any danger with him. However, Pennywise ends up recognizing the man for the boy that he once was when they last crossed paths. Naturally, it doesn’t take long for the clown to have his fill on the military General, making him a victim of the same weapon he sought to enforce against the masses.

Charlotte & Leroy Hanlon Decide to Stick Around Derry

Charlotte and Leroy remain in no more danger in the finale than the other citizens of Derry. At most, the latter takes a few bullets to his legs and engages in a fire battle against Pennywise from a distance. Ultimately, Will and his friends manage to fulfill the mission of completing the entity’s cage, entrapping him once again and freeing Derry of his hold. Thus, all the Hanlons survive the incident. In the aftermath, the military gives Leroy an honorable discharge as long as he promises to keep quiet about the real fallout of Shaw’s insane plans.

Considering how improbable proving the entire thing would be without any concrete proof, Leroy has no choice but to take the deal. Still, he plans on keeping an eye on the local military to ensure they don’t get up to any other menacing schemes. For the same reason, Rose offers him and Charlotte a spot as the guardians of the pillar to ensure Derry remains safe from the hands of Pennywise. Although they’re both reluctant to take the offer at first, Charlotte changes her mind before the family can leave. It’s no surprise that between her activism and her husband’s military calling, they’re both eager to take on the role of a protector for Derry and its people. Ultimately, this ends up being a blessing for Will as well, since it means he won’t have to sacrifice his memories of the town by moving away.

Dick Hallorann Survives and Considers a Hard Pivot in His Career

As the plot progresses throughout season 1, Dick Hallorann’s condition continues to get worse and worse. During the confrontation against Pennywise, under 29 Neibolt Street, the box inside the psychic’s mind is forcefully opened. As a result, he can see the ghosts on the other side of the veil constantly moving around him. Eventually, during the attack at the Black Spot, he’s forced to interact with one of these spirits, which opens up the floodgates of every other dead person haunting him at every corner. Consequently, slowly but surely, he starts losing his mind. It comes to a point where he considers taking his own life just ot make the voices in his head go quiet. Fortunately, Leory, who is desperate for his help in saving Will, manages to save him and convinces him to help him in his mission.

From there, Rose is able to help Dick by giving him an intriguing tea concoction, which helps him get a better hold on his shine. Although he still has tough times ahead of him, namely the final confrontation against Pennywise, where the psychic does much of the heavy lifting, he emerges alive on the other side. Furthermore, the tea’s effect continues, allowing Dick to finally return to his old self. In the end, the former military man decides to part ways with Derry and try his hand at a new career: a cook at a hotel in London. It isn’t the Overlook Hotel from ‘The Shining,’ yet it marks a new chapter for the character, one which will ultimately lead him to a place familiar to fans of Stephen King’s work.