IT: Welcome to Derry aired in October 2025, developed by Andy Muschietti, Barbara Muschietti, and Jason Fuchs. Muschietti is no stranger to the eerie world of Stephen King’s compelling stories. After directing It (2017) and It Chapter Two (2019), the filmmaker returned to Derry as co-creator and executive producer of HBO’s prequel series It: Welcome to Derry.The prequel takes viewers into an exploration of the town’s haunted past while carefully lining up with the events of the films. But as Muschietti has now revealed, some of the season’s most talked-about cameos were not set in stone from the start.It: Welcome to Derry cameos were not originally in the scriptThe biggest surprise for fans arrives in the Season 1 finale, 'Winter Fire.' The episode leaps forward in time, advancing 26 years. It lands just one year before the first It film. In this flash-forward, viewers see an elderly Ingrid Kersh at Juniper Hill Asylum.This scene is soon followed by a young Beverly Marsh, once again played by Sophia Lillis. This moment directly ties the HBO series to the films in a way that feels both intimate and scary. This cameo makes for a perfect callback to the celebrated film series. According to Muschietti, that connection was not always predetermined. He expressed:“It was important for me to make a stronger connection to the movies.”This statement hints at how he was motivated in the production process. While the series already had common elements with the films, like themes, locations, and mythology, Muschietti wanted a visual and emotional bridge that immediately tapped into viewers’ memories.It: Welcome to Derry (Image via YouTube/HBO Max)It also resonated with the nostalgia of the former renditions. The cameos in It: Welcome to Derry were meant to do more than spark recognition. They were designed to deepen meaning. Muschietti has also mentioned how the decision came:“The idea of bringing Beverly back in the epilogue was a last-minute idea.”This explains why the reveal feels almost epilogue-like rather than central to the main plot. The team was nearing the end of additional photography when Muschietti felt something was missing. The solution was not to add mere spectacle, but memory. Beverly is a perfect fit because her trauma is integrally linked to Derry and to Pennywise’s manipulations.The scene of It: Welcome to Derry also reframes It Chapter Two. In the 2019 film, adult Beverly’s encounter with Mrs. Kersh and the scene makes for one of the scariest scenes from the film. By showing that Beverly once met the real Mrs. Kersh on the day her mother died, the series retroactively gives that scene new psychological weight. Further, bringing back Joan Gregson as Ingrid Kersh adds another layer. Her presence reinforces the idea that Derry is a place where time loops, memories rot, and the past never stays buried.The HBO title It: Welcome to Derry introduces the backstory of Derry with restraint and eerie cameo moments. Instead of overcrowding the narrative with constant callbacks, it saves the strong choices to garnish the tale at the end.More importantly, the finale of It: Welcome to Derry shows how prequels can enhance, and viewers once again relive Beverly Marsh’s trauma. Welcome to Derry enriches the films without contradicting them. It closes its first season not with answers, but with memory; and in Derry, memory is often the most dangerous thing of all.