IT: Welcome to Derry Episode 2 recap: Lilly and the pickles that weren’t real 

IT: Welcome to Derry is back with its second episode, and boy oh boy, it is weird, scary, and a little sad too.

The episode is titled The Thing in the Dark, and trust us, the title fits perfectly.

We finally learn more about Lilly, the brave girl who survived the creepy baby monster at the theater by 'ducking and covering' (according to Bert the Turtle) and we also meet a bunch of new people trying to figure out what's wrong with the town.

So, what's up with the pickles that weren't real in Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry? Well, let's just say Derry is not done playing tricks on people's minds - especially Lilly's.

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When nightmares don’t end - Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry

Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry starts with one of the surviving characters we left off with in Episode 1. Lilly wakes up, sweaty and scared, from a terrible dream. She dreamed about that creepy monster baby again. Yep, the same one that attacked her classmates back in episode 1.

For a second, she hopes that all of it could perhaps be just her imagination. But no. Outside, there are police cars parked near apartments. They're watching Ronnie's dad, Hank, who worked at the Capitol movie theater. The cops think he did something terrible and poor Hank just sits inside while his old mother throws a fuss.

Then we meet the Hanlons. Leroy Hanlon, his wife Charlotte, and their son Will. They're new to Derry, and you can tell right away that this town does not make newcomers feel welcome. Will's eyes light up when he sees his room as his dad gifts him a telescope, joking that he can use it to spy on his neighbors. And Will, being sweet and serious, says, "We shouldn't do that".

Back at school, everything feels strange, for obvious reasons. Lilly is still shaken up, while Marge tries too hard to ditch Lilly and hang out with the cooler kids. Ronnie shows up and people start to whisper all about her but not Lilly. Lilly talks to her, after all, they are sort of trauma-bonded after the happenings of episode 1 from IT: Welcome to Derry.

Now, this is the scene where we get to see Will again. He walks into class late, and some mean kid pulls out his chair to racially bully him. Everyone laughs when Will falls to the ground, except a kid named Rich, who seems genuinely nice. You can already feel that this small group of kids might just end up being Derry's new set of heroes.

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The Hanlons try to settle in… but Derry isn’t all that nice

Leroy, who works at the military base, is trying to start life fresh. But Derry does not like people who look and think differently. When Charlotte goes out for errands, she comes across a bunch of boys beating up another child in broad daylight. Nobody comes forward to help.

Charlotte steps up and tries to stop the bullying but instead of the people thanking her, they only give her a stare as if she's done something wrong. Later that night, she has a conversation with Leroy about how upset she is but he simply tells her to stay out of any kind of trouble.

Meanwhile, Leroy's day isn't all jolly and unicorns either. His boss, General Shaw, tells him something chilling. Remember the attack Leroy went through in Episode 1 of IT: Welcome to Derry? Yep, turns out that the man arrested for the attack is not the real culprit. Shaw admits to Leroy that the attack was a setup, rather than a test.

A test that was designed to see how Leroy would react under fear and pressure. Shaw admits that he's looking for someone calm who can face most of the terror because there is something strange buried under Derry, something that indeed feeds on fear.

And now, far away from all of this military stuff, Ronnie is having a nightmare of her own. Her bed starts moving and her blanket wraps around her like a monster's skin. Then, her dead mother is also seen. She's whispering things that are terrible. This scene acts like one of those IT: Welcome to Derry moments that make you want to simply close your eyes and what's crazy is that we aren't even halfway through the season.

When Ronnie lets out screams, her dad comes rushing in and poof! Just like that, everything has been set back to normal. Like nothing ever happened. Almost like IT wanted to remind her that it's never really gone.

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Friends, fights, and a whole lot of fear in Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry

The next day, life goes on but weirdly. At school, Lilly tries her best to act okay, but we know that her world feels tilted. Ronnie talks about the nightmare, and you can see and sense how scared she is. Lilly does not understand or know what to say because she's terrified too.

This time, she's not terrified of the baby demon monster, but of people. The police. Chief Bowers, the mean one, calls Lilly in for questioning and we se him trying his best to twist her words and he tries to scare her into saying something she doesn't even mean.

She isn't sure if she saw Hank at the theater, but her hesitation is enough for Bowers to have him arrested. This changes everything. Ronnie finds out and runs straight to Lilly's house, furious and angry and heartbroken. The friendship that they had built up? Its not cracked and smacked right down in the middle.

While all this is happening, Will and Rich's friendship starts to grow in this episode of IT: Welcome to Derry. Both of the boys are lonely, both of them are are little too awkward, and see the world in a different and curious way. They meet in detention and spend their time talking about books and stars.

Back at the army base, when Leroy finds out about the attack on him being a test, Shaw makes him understand that he is the perfect person to hunt down the thing buried in Derry, the thing that is fear itself.

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The pickles that weren’t real - Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry

And now comes the part that has everyone on a hook - the scene with Lilly and the pickles! Poor Lilly goes out grocery shopping alone, trying her best to feel normal in a town that isn't. After all, nothing in Derry stays normal for too long, does it? One minute she's walking through the aisles, and the next minute everything starts to crumble, fall apart and change.

The shelves twist themselves and come closing in, almost like she's in a maze. A creepy voice is heard on the loudspeaker and it calls out her name. There are boxes of cereal that suddenly seem to have the faces of her dead friends torn apart from the demon baby. And then, she sees it - a jar of pickles. Only inside, there's a rotting face staring back at her. Her dad's face.

The jars all fall, break open, and there are tiny pieces of him that start crawling together, like they want to become whole again. The very sound of the glass breaking apart and the flesh of her father scraping through the floors flills the store.

Lilly is now frozen, shaking and trapped in a nightmare that somehow looks way too real to be fake. But then, she blinks and the shelves are back to being at their normal designated places. The floor is clean. There is no dead friend on the cereal box. The only thing that is left behind is her own fear.

The grocer looks at her like she's crazy and that's how she sadly ends up being sent back to Juniper Hill, the mental asylum. This is how Derry wins yet again.

Meanwhile, back underground at the base, things are starting to get even weirder in Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry. The military digs up something that looks like an old and rusty car from the 1930s, filled with bones and skeletons. It's creepy and wrong.

Leroy, Shaw, and a man named Dick Hallorann (yep! shout out to The Shining and head chef at the Overlook Hotel) are present there and are watching. Shaw is seen grinning and Hallorann just seems to say "we're close."

Close to what, though? That's the question Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry has left us with. Close to maybe IT? Or perhaps maybe to the start of all the horror Derry's ever known.

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Episode 2 of IT: Welcome to Derry is like a fever dream you cannot seem to wake up from. It gives us the horror, the gore, the fear, the lies, and pickles that aren't really pickles at all.

Lilly's mind is cracking under Derry and its weight and every adult around her seems to be blinded by the evil that has been creeping in.

The Hanlons are also quick at picking up on Derry's darkness and they seem to understand that there might just be evil here. Maybe the monsters here (so far) don't have the teeth. Sometimes, maybe they simply wear badges, sell pickles, or ignore the happenings of the town.

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Stay tuned to SoapCentral for more updates on IT: Welcome to Derry.

Also Read: IT: Welcome to Derry Episode 3: Release date, time, streaming details and more