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• Shocked by the end of IT: Welcome to Derry episode 1? The show's creators explained why they had to do it (and how HBO execs reacted)

Major spoilers for IT: Welcome to Derry's pilot episode follow.

Didn't see that coming, did you, IT fan? 

It wasn't that surprising when, during the first ten minutes of IT: Welcome to Derry's pilot episode, poor young Matty Clements got demon-babied. After all, we've seen kids and innocents die pretty brutally before in the IT-verse, as both of the Andy Muschietti-directed films begin with shocking deaths themselves. But what was super surprising, at least to the assembled Stephen King fans online today, was the ending of the pilot episode, when three of the children who we thought would be the focus of the series also got demon-babied.

And that shock we felt watching it, say the series's creators, was exactly the intent.

Now that the pilot is out and folks have seen the brutal deaths of Teddy, Suzie, and Phil at the end of the episode, the creators who brought the bloody scene to streaming were happy to talk about it. 

"It was important for us to tell a very unpredictable story," explained IT: Welcome to Derry producer Barbara Muschietti, who also co-produced the IT movies, to Variety "Because we couldn’t repeat the movies. [...] We needed the kids, because there’s no IT without kids, and we needed them to become friends and fight this monster together. But we needed to subvert the story somehow."

Well, you sure as hell did, Barbara. In case you need a quick refresher - Teddy, Suzie, Phil, Lilly, and Ronnie were the kids who the pilot episode of IT: Welcome to Derry seemed to set up as the 1962 version of the Loser Club. They go into a movie theater investigating the last-known whereabouts of their friend Matty, only to meet his exact same fate in a shockingly gory encounter with the entity that will eventually become Pennywise the Dancing Clown, leaving only Lilly and Ronnie alive. It's unmooring to say the least, and you aren't the only one who felt that way.

According to the pilot's writer, Jason Fuchs, HBO's executive decision makers were just as jaw-dropped when the team pitched them the episode.

"The network didn't know that was going to happen in the context of the pitch," Fuchs told Entertainment Weekly. "We had a wall with headshots of child actors who would've played the kids in [episode] 101. Andy [Muschietti, co-creator and pilot director] theatrically stood up as I was pitching. I got to the part where all of them, other than Lilly and Ronnie, being eaten. Andy pulled the paper down, and there was a whole other group of kids [headshots] under there. I'll never forget seeing their faces and feeling like, 'If we can replicate their reaction in the room with audiences at home, we'll have a really interesting, exciting, satisfying way to end episode 1.'"

Well Jason, we'd say you pulled it off. 

IT: Welcome to Derry airs new episodes every Sunday night on HBO Max, save for episode 2, which airs Halloween Night, October 31.

Gotta hand it to this show - it knows how to keep you guessing.

Another Pennywise feeding cycle is upon us as HBO drops new episodes of IT: Welcome to Derry every week. Make sure you're prepared for the horror with:

• How to watch the It movies & TV series in order
• TheStephen King Must Reads
• Popverse's latest issue of Lore Corner - Welcome to Derry edition!