This article was originally published on FearHQ.com.
In episode 3 of It: Welcome to Derry, we find a boy visiting the circus in 1908. He plucks up the courage to enter the freak show (as a strangely familiar young clown watches on from a distance), and is horrified by an emaciated man he encounters inside.
Later, he meets a young Native American girl with whom he spends the summer. They wander into a forest, though she tries to stop him from going any further. Why? Well, the forest is where "It" hunts, and taking on the form of that emaciated man, the creature chases the boy, becoming more and more monstrous until he reaches the edge of the wood and can come no further.
During their escape, the boy used his catapult to hit the entity we know better as Pennywise the Clown. Later, it's revealed that these flashbacks were following a young General Francis Shaw, who is determined to capture the entity that's been tormenting the town every 27 years.
As for the girl, she's Rose, the woman who now owns Derry's pawn shop, and Shaw, having regained his memories of his encounter with "It" since returning to the town, gives Dick Hallorann—a younger version of the same character from The Shining—the catapult so he can track the entity's location.
However, in doing so, Hallorann catches a terrifying glimpse of the monster within his mind...and Pennywise sees him, too. It: Welcome to Derry's kids, meanwhile, manage to capture a blurry shot of Pennywise on camera after a terrifying chase through a graveyard.
Talking to Esquire, Chris Chalk, who plays Hallorann in the series, explained what we can expect to see from the man tasked with using his psychic abilities to help the military find and capture Pennywise.
"We go into the lore of why Dick is who he is and why he is this version of himself now versus the more master of his skills," the actor teased. "In The Shining, he’s like: 'I know how to control this. I can teach someone how to use it.' But he’s a student now, and he’s a student who’s been avoiding the assignment since he was nine years old."
Here's a trailer for next week's episode of It: Welcome to Derry, which promises to finally reveal more about Pennywise's origin...
Set in the world of Stephen King's It universe, It: Welcome to Derry is based on King's It novel and expands the vision established by filmmaker Andy Muschietti in the feature films It and It Chapter Two.
The cast is led by Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, Chris Chalk, James Remar, Stephen Rider, Madeleine Stowe, Rudy Mancuso, and Bill Skarsgård.
The series, from Warner Bros. Television and developed for television by filmmakers Andy Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti (It, The Flash) and Jason Fuchs (Wonder Woman), will debut on HBO and also be available to stream on HBO Max. Muschietti will direct four episodes of the nine-episode series.
The first two episodes of It: Welcome to Derry are now streaming on HBO Max, with new episodes released weekly leading up to the season finale on December 14.