‘It: Welcome to Derry’ Creator Breaks Down Episode 7’s Black Spot Fire and That Big Death: ‘The Kid Had to Go’
Note: The following story contains spoilers from “It: Welcome to Derry” Season 1, Episode 7.
After weeks of build-up, the penultimate episode of “It: Welcome to Derry” finally brought The Black Spot fire to life – and not all of the main characters made it out.
Before episodes were even released, the first season of “Welcome to Derry” was often explained by fans of Stephen King’s doorstop novel as the one with The Black Spot. The book takes time away from the story for interludes exploring Pennywise’s past cycles in Derry – which represent the framework for the HBO series – and one of the most memorable is the fire at The Black Spot.
The series finally reached this pivotal moment in the town’s history with Episode 7 — when a group of citizens show up at The Black Spot club looking for Hank Grogan (Stephen Rider), and when they’re turned away at the door, they board up the many Black soldiers partying inside and set the club on fire. Executive producer Andy Muschietti directed the episode and explained to TheWrap how they wanted to expand on the little that appears about the tragedy in the book while still remaining faithful to the text.
“We started with The Black Spot being the big climatic moment of this arc of this story, even though there’s a third act after,” Muschietti said. “But this was a very important event so we built around it. We had to abide by everything that we built before that leads to that – to see what The Black Spot really was. So that’s how it differs in several ways from the book.”
He added: “In the book, it’s very devoid. It’s very sparse. We don’t really know a lot of details about the circumstances. We know just what is needed to know for the story, for the investigation of Mike Hanlon, and the information he could get. But I really wanted to be respectful of the spirit of The Black Spot and the tragic nature of the atrocity that happened there.”
Another focal point for Muschietti while directing the episode was to capture the chaos of being trapped in a burning building, but also upping how deadly this moment could be even compared to the books. In the books, there are windows and places for those trapped inside to climb out, but in “Welcome to Derry’s” iteration not only is the bar on fire but the men outside are shooting up the place. The director wanted things to be as dire as possible for added chaos in his opening oner.
“In the book, I think the situation – as horrific as it is – it’s not as dangerous,” Muschietti said. “People could open windows and get out. So we created, really a very bad situation where all these a–holes are around and shooting people that are coming out of the windows.”
While the show took some liberties and expanded on the horrific fire, one element from the book that Muschietti focused on was Dick Hallorann’s (Chris Chalk) involvement. Dick also appears briefly in the Black Spot interlude in the novel but is far less involved than he is in “Welcome to Derry.” What Muschietti loved about Dick’s part in the book was how he helps the soldiers and their guests find a way out of the fire, and he wanted to ensure that remained in the penultimate episode.
“From the book, the outstanding thing is Dick Hallorann tried to help people with his Shining,” Muschietti said. “Dick has a lot of layers. We know that he’s not a guy that is super interested in caring about anyone but himself. His participation in The Black Spot is sort of tainted with that selfless selfishness. He tries to save his ass, but at one point he has that moment where he is confronted with the choice, with the decision, ‘Should I save myself, or should I find the others?'”
Not all the main characters come out unscathed. “Welcome to Derry” continues to rack up its kid death count—this time, fan-favorite Rich (Arian S. Cartaya) dies saving Marge (Matilda Lawler) from the flames and smoke. The EPs and showrunners knew there had to be a major death tied to such a pivotal moment in the series and Derry’s history, but it wasn’t always Rich who drew the short straw. His budding romance with Marge, however, put that target on his back in the writer’s room.
“We were trying to figure out who. We knew that somebody had to go,” Barbara Muschietti said. “That was an important thing. We just didn’t know who it was going to be, and everybody was on the table.”
“Rich is like this character that is so pure and innocent and so full of life,” Andy Muschietti added. “It’s the tragic element, you know, of great love stories, like ‘Titanic,’ or ‘Romeo and Juliet’ or ‘Doctor Zhivago,’ where this beautiful love story just doesn’t have a great end … Everybody loves him. So it’s hard, but the kid had to go.”
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