IT: WELCOME TO DERRY Drops the Biggest Pennywise Reveal Since Stephen King’s Novel
It: Welcome to Derry Season 1 is officially past the point of holding back. Episode 6, “In the Name of the Father,” unleashes Bill Skarsgård’s Pennywise in full force and pushes the series deeper into the creature’s twisted history.
Along with the escalating horror, the episode delivers one of the most important pieces of It mythology since Stephen King published the original novel almost four decades ago. Thanks to a chilling return to the home of Mrs. Kersh, the show connects long-running clues and finally confirms a major theory that fans have debated for years.
Episode 6 brings Mrs. Kersh back into the story, but this time the encounter isn’t about tormenting Beverly Marsh. Instead, Lilly Bainbridge visits her home and flips through a stack of old photographs that instantly raise eyebrows. The pictures show Kersh as a child alongside a man who looks unmistakably like Pennywise without the clown makeup.
If this feels familiar, it should. A nearly identical photo appeared in It: Chapter Two, showing the same man standing beside his daughter in front of a wagon labeled Pennywise the Dancing Clown, followed by a shot of him applying clown makeup.
It hinted at something deeper but never fully explained it. Book readers know his name is Bob Gray, one of the aliases It uses, and in Chapter Two Mrs. Kersh delivers the memorable explanation to Beverly Marsh:
“His name was Robert Gray, better known as Bob Gray, better known as Pennywise the Dancing Clown. Although that was not his name, either. But he did love his joke, my fadder.”
The series reveals that the real Mrs. Kersh had a real father who worked as a carnival clown named Pennywise. According to her, he was devoured by It. When the creature resurfaced 27 years later during the 1935 cycle, she believed her father had returned, describing him as changed and shadowed by something dark, yet still capable of breaking free.
This version of Kersh is not It in disguise. The dialogue makes this clear, and the shard meant to expose It’s presence doesn’t affect her. What she shares is genuine, which confirms what fans have suspected since 1986.
Bob Gray was indeed a man who existed in Derry, and It adopted his face, style, and persona after killing him. Pennywise wasn’t chosen at random. It was stolen.
Even before It: Chapter Two hit theaters, director Andy Muschietti hinted that there was something real behind Bob Gray’s name and face. He shared:
“Everything that relates to Pennywise and Bob Gray is very cryptic… We don’t know exactly what he is, where he comes from, or how Bob Gray is related. Was Bob Gray a real person? Is he incarnated in that thing because Bob Gray played a clown?”
At the time, it felt like commentary on King’s intentionally mysterious lore. Now, with Welcome to Derry, those hints read like early preparation for a reveal the franchise has been circling for years.
The episode’s flashbacks bring us to 1935, which lines up with the confirmed setting for It: Welcome to Derry Season 2. Mrs. Kersh, possibly going by Miss Gray at the time, is positioned to return with even more family history to unfold.
But the real treasure trove of Pennywise mythology is coming in Season 3, set in 1908. This is the period shown in the photos where Kersh is a young girl still living with her father. If the series sticks to the plan, it will likely show viewers the true Bob Gray and reveal how the creature formally became the clown we know today.
For decades, fans debated whether Bob Gray was a disguise, an alias, or a real person who somehow became bound to It. This latest episode give us the closest thing to a definitive answer. Bob Gray lived, died, and was claimed by the creature, who then carried his face forward through generations of terror.
The series is clearly building toward a full origin story that King never spelled out, and Episode 6 marks the moment the pieces finally lock into place.