Welcome to Derry Review: Episode 5 — 29 Neibolt Street

Rating: 9.2/10

TYLER, Texas (TXAN 24) — Episode 5 finally delivers on several teases that have been simmering since the early chapters of the season.

29 Neibolt Street brings back a character most viewers assumed was long gone — and the episode plays that return with just enough uncertainty to make you wonder whether it’s a blessing or another trap laid by the creature beneath Derry.

What makes this episode click is how the kids’ plans and the military’s mission collide almost perfectly by accident. Both groups are moving toward the same truth from different angles, and their paths crossing raises the tension in ways that feel organic instead of forced.

Meanwhile, the native community around Derry is already preparing for what’s coming, sensing the escalation long before the town’s authorities do. Their caution becomes a subtle undercurrent running through the whole episode.

The pacing is deceptive. The first half of 29 Neibolt Street feels like another slow-burn setup — quiet, investigative, full of dread sitting just beneath the surface. But somewhere around the halfway mark, the episode ignites. The second thirty minutes hit with a momentum the series has been building toward, finally revealing the moment teased back in Now You See It. It’s the kind of reveal that shifts the entire tone of the story, giving the season its most defining scene yet.

At the center of it all is Dick Halloran. This episode pushes him into the role many Stephen King fans have been waiting for, allowing him to step fully into the clairvoyant potential that defines his legacy in the King universe. Watching him reach that level, without spoilers, is one of the episode’s strongest payoffs.

29 Neibolt Street feels like the first major turning point of the season. It takes the slow, deliberate groundwork of the middle episodes and detonates it into something bigger, stranger, and far more dangerous. It’s the moment where the story stops whispering and finally starts roaring.