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The fifth episode of It: Welcome to Derry is loaded with new information, offering the most vivid glimpse yet at Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise. However, with so much baked into one episode, a subtle reveal might have been missed entirely, and it's a point that deserves attention.

After Leroy Hanlon uncovers that Derry is essentially a supernatural containment for an ancient evil, he promptly gets his family out of town to the military installation on the outskirts. We also learn that Hank Grogan's bus to Shawshank State Prison was ambushed. Later, viewers find him in the back of Madeleine Stowe's character car. At first, it looks like he's seized control as a means of getting out of town. However, once in the woods, the two embrace with a kiss.

Hank asserts the bus was assaulted (presumably by the sinister clown), allowing him to break free. He then requests Ingrid to find someone who can help him prove he was framed for the cinema killings.

At the conclusion of the installment, Ingrid reaches out to meet with Leroy's mother, who is already intrigued in Hank’s case. It is at this moment that Ingrid looks directly into the camera and reveals her full name.

“Mrs. Hanlon, my name is Ingrid Kersh. You aren't familiar with me, but we have a mutual friend,” she says.

If that last name is familiar, it’s because a character named the elderly Mrs. Kersh appears in the It novel, as well as both the It miniseries and It: Chapter 2 film. She’s the elderly lady that one of the Losers' Club mistakenly visits, who is later revealed as one of Pennywise’s many forms. However, Welcome to Derry implies that the character was a real person, not just a manifestation of Pennywise. Whether Ingrid is the daughter of this character or the character itself is unconfirmed, but it's quite plausible that Ingrid and Mrs. Kersh identical.

In It: Chapter 2, which shares the same continuity as Welcome to Derry, the character portrayed by Joan Gregson has a couple of clues: the way she enunciates the word “father” and the line “no one truly perishes in Derry,” both of which Ingrid has said, in turn, throughout the season, in a similar cadence to the film.

If Mrs. Kersh is indeed an actual person and not just a disguise of the entity, it will spell trouble for Ingrid, especially as she attempts to unravel the mystery behind the theater murders. Of course, we are aware that It is responsible for the killings. That means the likelihood is high that she — along with her companions — will likely cross paths with the otherworldly being.

In a earlier discussion, Stephen Rider noted how pleased he feels about the latest story developments and that Hank is being given more depth. "I play roles as a Black actor on screen, and a lot of times you aren't provided with substantial material, you just deliver background information," he says. "For him to have that internal secret --- as actors, we have to develop those nuances independently. [...] But Hank has that."

With only a trio of installments remaining, expect more narrative threads to intersect as the season barrels toward its finale. After the disclosures from the latest episode, the real identity of Ingrid shouldn’t be far off. And if she really is Mrs. Kersh, Ingrid will join the extensive roster of doomed characters fated to become entwined with Pennywise for years into the future.