Stephen King’s Quote In It: Welcome To Derry’s Ending Is Heartbreaking
Although Stephen King's It has many memorable quotes, one of the most heartbreaking ones is:
"Maybe there aren't any such things as good friends or bad friends - maybe there are just friends, people who stand by you when you're hurt and who help you feel not so lonely. Maybe they're always worth being scared for, and hoping for, and living for. Maybe worth dying for too, if that's what has to be. No good friends. No bad friends. Only people you want, need to be with; people who build their houses in your heart."
On the surface, Stephen King's It and its adaptations, including It: Welcome to Derry, are about an overarching cosmic being that terrorizes the children of a town in the most disturbing ways possible. However, beneath the cosmic terror lies an emotional core that confronts the pains of growing up and the bittersweet realization about the true value of friendships. Given how there have been many different iterations of the Losers Club on the screen, some viewers may not have liked the dynamic between the young characters in It: Welcome to Derry. However, one cannot deny that the HBO show perfectly captures the essence of the above quote in its final moments and makes it more poignant than ever.
Marge Recites The Heartbreaking Quote From Stephen King’s It During Rich’s Funeral
Marge and Rich holding hands in It Welcome to DerryImage via HBO
Marge recites the above quote during Rich's funeral in It: Welcome to Derry's ending moments, and it perfectly fits the scene. In the show's opening arc, Marge is portrayed as one of the most flawed characters. She struggles to stay loyal to her own best friend, Lily, and even betrays her to get along with the more popular crowd. She also seems to be completely unaware of Rich's existence. Owing to these aspects, she initially comes off as a "bad friend." However, as her closing speech during Rich's funeral highlights, "there are no good friends or bad friends" as long as they stand by you and make you feel less lonely. Marge seems to realize this as she forgives herself for initially being complicit in her own silence, for mistaking endurance for strength and survival for love. She understands that even though she stumbled and struggled to acknowledge who her true friends were, her actions were driven more by a learned response to fear and not moral failings.
This explains why, in the speech, she accepts that true friends are worth being "scared for, and hoping for, and living for." By "scared," she not only refers to the fear of a cosmic being like Pennywise but also the far more intimate terror of vulnerability and not being able to fit in. The speech reveals that after living in the shadows of these fears for long and mistaking "fitting in" for acceptance, Marge finally sees the light. This understanding comes with a terrible cost, though, which makes it bittersweet.
Rich’s Arc & Heartbreaking Death Makes The Quote Even More Hard-Hitting
When Marge says that friends are "maybe worth dying for too," she clearly refers to Rich, who sacrifices himself to save her. Marge's grief seems to make her question why Rich would do something like this for her, and she struggles to accept what happened. This is, perhaps, the reason why she adds the "maybe" to the "worth dying." She does not question Rich's sacrifice or look down on it, but remains in disbelief that someone could value her life more than his own. Marge's final line about friends building "their houses in your heart" perfectly fits the show's ending. It highlights how even though most of them will likely forget about Derry as they grow up, a part of them will always know what happened in the town. Marge might even forget about Rich's sacrifice because Derry has its own way of making people forget its biggest tragedies. However, as the Pennywise time travel twist in the Stephen King show confirms, she will still name her son after Richie, proving that, deep down, he built a "house in her heart."
