🔗 Share this article

The clown's influence on the young residents of Welcome to Derry shapes them long into adulthood, twisting them into the exact individuals who keep the town's pattern of hatred alive. The creature finds easy targets on kids from fractured households — youngsters who frequently mature to replicate the same patterns as their parents. But, the Hanlon family distinguishes itself as a rare example of a households that remains intact, which may explain why Mike Hanlon, even after electing to remain in the town, remains the sole member who doesn't completely succumb under Pennywise's sway.

Hanlon Household's Unique Resilience

In the fourth installment of Welcome to Derry, Leroy finally becomes increasingly conscious of the supernatural forces enveloping the neighborhood, especially when the entity starts haunting his child, Will Hanlon, during their angling excursion. The Hanlon family comprises some of the few grown-ups who are aware that things are not right with the town, especially the father, who was shown to be receptive to the Shining when he was able to detect a fellow psychic's employment of it in the third episode. Later, Leroy sees one of Pennywise's signature balloons outside his residence. This gift, coupled with his inability to experience terror, along with the base of his household, may be why he's able to see Pennywise's hauntings. However, consider if that shining is generational, and one of the reasons Mike is one of the only individuals in the town who resisted succumbing to the town's malevolence?

Will is part of the group of children at his school being tormented by Pennywise. All his school friends hail from broken homes, with caregivers who don't believe they're being haunted. The cause Will is being haunted is due to the cruelty of the community, combined with his potential sensitivity to shine, which makes him susceptible. The Hanlons are fundamentally strangers in the town during 1962, which lends itself towards the household feeling something is off about the locality from the onset. They also have a solid base that remains unbroken, in contrast to the folks who come from the town, with bonds that have deteriorated within.

Backstory Connections

Based on the original book, we understand the young Will will end up at the Black Spot, where the psychic will save him from a fire that the local KKK members of the community will ignite. In the recent movie, we see that he has a son named Mike and that Will eventually perishes in a configration, with his father outliving his own son and taking his grandson in. The public account in the motion picture is that the parents were on substances, but now that we see Will in Welcome to Derry, that's difficult to accept. Maybe the timid youth, once he grew up, leaned into alcohol to free himself of the torments, or perhaps the rotten town got to him first, with the KKK ultimately completing the task it started long before. Whether through the terror of the entity or through the malice of the town, instigated by It, the creature eventually gets the last laugh on Will.

The Father's Evolution

This chain of events would clarify how the elder Hanlon changes so drastically from what we witness in It: Chapter 1 and the prequel. In his later years, he seems bitter and much harsher with his discipline. Since he survived his own son, it's understandable to see such a drastic change. However, his statements carry more weight since we are aware he's witnessed Pennywise's hauntings and the effects they had on his child. In the initial sequence of It, we observe Mike pause to use a bolt gun on a animal at Leroy's farm. Leroy chastises him for delaying and offers an metaphor that results in a kill-or-be-killed situation.

“You have two options you can be in this existence. You can be in the open like us, or you can be trapped inside,” he says as he points to the creature. “You waste time indecisive, and another is going to make that choice. Except you won't know it until you experience that bolt in your head.”

Looking back, this could be a piece of prediction, a lesson he wishes he had told his own child. Perhaps he desires he had acted differently in his past, but for certain factors, he was unable to avoid the sickening allure of the town.