It – Welcome to Derry 1×5 Review: “29 Neibolt Street”

It – Welcome to Derry season one episode 5, titled ’29 Neibolt Street’, had Pennywise confront the kids as well as the military. The cosmic monster is planning something big before hibernating for another 27 years.

With the entire school thinking that Lilly was responsible for Marge’s injury in the previous episode, ’29 Neibolt Street’ was surprisingly quick at handling the entire conflict to make Marge part of the current Losers Club. I mean, I wasn’t expecting the writers to drag Lilly and Marge’s reunion and her being added to the group, but I was expecting a bit more development. It felt like things were rushed just to have Marge be part of the Losers Club’s mission to enter Pennywise’s lair in the sewers. In a way, Marge not being there wouldn’t have made a difference at all.

As for the reasoning behind the kids deciding to venture into the sewers in the first place, well, it dealt with Matty’s return. I mean, I knew it wasn’t really Matty the second he appeared onscreen. The biggest giveaway was when he mentioned how Pennywise only attacked at night. We, the audience, knew that to be a lie. Having said that, Matty’s deception did seem to work on certain viewers, judging from online discussions.

There’s been a theory about how Matty and Phil were still alive because Pennywise wasn’t using imagery of their rotted corpses in his illusions to scare the Losers Club. Matty’s return and his mentioning of Phil being barely alive in the sewers fed into the fan theory, encouraging some of the viewers to feel vindicated and trust Matty. Kudos to the creative team for dropping false hints about Matty and Phil’s fates in the previous episodes to give rise to said theory and then using the audience’s trust to deliver a chilling reveal involving Pennywise’s plan to lure the Losers Club to his home.

The scene where Matty, singing in rhymes, circling a pipe to slowly morph into Pennywise… so good!

I have to say that Lilly’s really out there dragging everyone into trouble just because she wants to do the right thing. It’s interesting to see how Pennywise seems to be exploiting her kind (and somewhat reckless) nature to get to more kids.

Lilly did survive getting eaten by Pennywise because of the mystical dagger Taniel dropped in the sewers. With Lilly in possession of such a powerful weapon, I expect her to be even more reckless than before to put a stop to Pennywise.

Talking about the adults, Dick’s psychic probing of Taniel’s mind led to the young man being sent to the infirmary. Of course, General Shaw used the information Dick was able to retrieve to immediately send a group to investigate 29 Neibolt Street. According to what General Shaw told Rose, he began remembering his childhood in Derry after taking certain substances administered by the army. Wanting to cage and use Pennywise as a weapon against enemies was what called Shaw back to Derry. His plan involved making the cage (created by 13 cosmic shards) around Pennywise smaller until Shaw could capture the cosmic being.

With Rose learning about what Shaw’s up to, I’m looking forward to seeing how she will try to stop him. The Indigenous community was aware that Pennywise was devising something grand before falling asleep again. Shaw’s involvement could exacerbate the situation for everyone. The townsfolk have already become meaner and more agitated, with Pennywise always negatively influencing communities more than usual as his grand finale inched closer.

The military’s mission inside the sewers could frankly be handled a lot better. The way Pennywise was able to separate the team had more to do with plot convenience instead of the creature figuring out a clever way to cause chaos between the men.

Due to Leroy not experiencing fear (in a medical sense), fans have been waiting to see him confront Pennywise. ’29 Neibolt Street’ had the creature target Leroy by appearing as a scared Charlotte. I don’t think Leroy experienced fear during the situation, but he was obviously quite confused, essentially meaning that Pennywise could trick Leroy into letting his guard down. Leroy would have been killed if Pauly (who couldn’t see Pennywise as Charlotte) hadn’t reached out to Leroy.

With Leroy locking in and deciding to shoot anything that didn’t make sense inside the sewers, his apparent lack of natural fear could have gotten Will shot if Pauly hadn’t intervened. Being responsible for Pauly’s death, I’m interested to see if Pennywise will use the guilt to his advantage when facing Leroy again.

As for Pauly, I did feel sorry for him. I’m okay with Pauly sacrificing himself to save Will. However, his death didn’t feel as impactful as it could have been if the show had allowed us to spend more time with him. So, while sad, Pauly’s death was quite “meh!” to me.

While Leroy and Pauly were busy trying to make their way through the sewer maze, Pennywise trapped Dick in an illusion where he made the man relive past trauma from his grandfather. Pennywise is adamant about forcing Dick to open the box containing his supernatural powers. But why? How can Pennywise benefit from making Dick stronger? I would like to know.

Another major development involved the reveal of Ingrid’s identity. Turns out, she’s Mrs. Kersh, an important character in It lore. However, as things stand right now, I’m not sure if Ingrid is actually a human who is possibly being influenced by Pennywise, or just another one of Pennywise’s many forms in Derry. Ingrid’s also revealed to be the woman having an affair with Hank. The two even kissed in the current episode. So, yeah, if that’s actually Pennywise, make of that what you will.

Ingrid did reach out to Charlotte to help with Hank’s situation. It’s only a matter of time before Charlotte gets to experience Pennywise’s fear-inducing powers.

Pennywise was obviously involved in crashing the bus taking Hank and other prisoners to Shawshank prison. The town’s clearly on edge, and Pennywise needed Hank to stay in Derry to continue fanning the flames of hatred, which do include a strong racial element that will (very likely) result in another important event from It lore very soon.

With only three more episodes remaining, you can tell things are going to get a whole lot worse for the people of Derry, including our main cast.

What did you think of It – Welcome to Derry season one episode 5 ’29 Neibolt Street’?

Let us know.

Author: Farid-ul-Haq

Farid has a Double Masters in Psychology and Biotechnology as well as an M.Phil in Molecular Genetics. He is the author of numerous books including Missing in Somerville, and The Game Master of Somerville. He gives us insight into comics, books, TV shows, anime/manga, video games, and movies.

Twitter

Help support independent journalism. Subscribe to our Patreon.

Copyright © The Geekiary