Stranger Things

Stranger Things is an American television series created by the Duffer Brothers for Netflix. Produced by Monkey Massacre Productions and 21 Laps Entertainment, the first season was released on Netflix on July 15, 2016. The second and third seasons followed in October 2017 and July 2019, respectively, and the fourth season was released in two parts in May and July 2022. The fifth and final season was released in three volumes, including the finale, in November and December 2025. The show combines elements of horror, science fiction, mystery, coming-of-age, and drama.

Set in the 1980s, the series centers on the residents of the fictional small town of Hawkins, Indiana, after a young girl with psychokinetic abilities, named Eleven, inadvertently creates a wormhole known as the Upside Down, at a nearby secretive government research facility, connecting Earth to a hostile realm called the Abyss. The cast includes Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Millie Bobby Brown, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Natalia Dyer, Charlie Heaton, Cara Buono, Matthew Modine, Noah Schnapp, Sadie Sink, Joe Keery, Dacre Montgomery, Sean Astin, Paul Reiser, Maya Hawke, Priah Ferguson, Brett Gelman, Linda Hamilton, Jamie Campbell Bower, and Nell Fisher.

The Duffer Brothers developed Stranger Things as a blend of investigative drama and supernatural horror, infused with childlike wonder and references to the popular culture of the 1980s. Several thematic and directorial elements were inspired by the works of Steven Spielberg, John Carpenter, David Lynch, Stephen King, Wes Craven, H. P. Lovecraft, and FromSoftware. The show also drew inspiration from Cold War–era experiments and conspiracy theories involving secret government programs.

Stranger Things has received critical acclaim throughout its run, with praise for its characterization, atmosphere, acting, direction, writing, and homage to 1980s cinema, making it a touchstone of 1980s nostalgia. It has garnered many accolades and is widely regarded as one of the greatest television shows of all time. Stranger Things is a flagship series for Netflix, drawing record viewership with each season's release. The series has expanded into a media franchise, including an animated spin-off, Stranger Things: Tales from '85, and a prequel stage play, Stranger Things: The First Shadow. It has also inspired several books, comics, tie-in media, a pop-up shop, and a Dungeons & Dragons role-playing starter set game based on the series.

Overview

Stranger Things is set in the fictional rural town of Hawkins, Indiana, in the 1980s. Hawkins is described as "the town where nothing ever happens" in the second season. The nearby Hawkins National Laboratory ostensibly performs scientific research for the United States Department of Energy, but also secretly experiments with the paranormal and supernatural, sometimes with human test subjects. They inadvertently create a portal to an alternate dimension referred to as the Upside Down, whose presence begins to affect the residents of Hawkins in unusual ways.

The first season begins on November 6, 1983, when Will Byers is abducted by a creature from the Upside Down, dubbed the "Demogorgon". His mother Joyce, police chief Jim Hopper, and a group of volunteers search for him. A young psychokinetic girl named Eleven escapes from Hawkins Lab and is found by Will's friends, Mike Wheeler, Dustin Henderson, and Lucas Sinclair. Eleven befriends and assists them in their efforts to find Will. Mike's older sister Nancy and Will's older brother Jonathan learn about the Demogorgon and the existence of the Upside Down. Will is eventually found alive, while Eleven disappears after killing the Demogorgon.

The second season is set 11 months later, between October and November 1984. Joyce is dating her former classmate Bob Newby, but they discover that Will is still affected by a shadowy entity from the Upside Down. Will's friends and family learn that anything connected to the Upside Down is part of a hive mind known as the Mind Flayer. Lucas earns the affection of a new classmate, Max Mayfield, while Dustin teams up with Nancy's ex-boyfriend Steve Harrington to fend off a horde of adolescent Demogorgons—dubbed "Demodogs"—which kill Bob and threaten the rest of their friends. Eleven reappears and closes the gate to the Upside Down underneath Hawkins Laboratory.

The third season is set nine months later, in the days leading up to the Fourth of July celebrations in 1985. The new Starcourt Mall becomes the center of attention for Hawkins residents. Hopper adopts Eleven and becomes increasingly concerned about her relationship with Mike. Dustin, Steve and his coworker Robin Buckley, and Lucas's younger sister Erica discover that a secret Soviet laboratory beneath Starcourt is attempting to reopen the gateway to the Upside Down. Meanwhile, the Mind Flayer possesses Max's stepbrother, Billy Hargrove, and begins creating physical vessels made of melted flesh to carry out its will. Eleven loses her powers, Billy dies, and Hopper seemingly dies when the Soviets' gate is closed.

The fourth season is set eight months later, in March 1986. The Byers family and Eleven have moved to Lenora, California for a fresh start. In Hawkins, multiple teenagers are murdered by the Mind Flayer's partner and Hawkins Laboratory's first test subject—later dubbed Vecna—to open gates between Hawkins and the Upside Down. Vecna frames Dustin's friend Eddie Munson for the murders and targets Max as his fourth victim. To help Eleven regain her powers, Dr. Sam Owens takes her to a secure facility. Joyce and Murray Bauman learn that Hopper survived but was captured by Soviets, so they rescue him from a gulag in the Kamchatka Peninsula. Eleven regains her powers, but Vecna's forces kill Eddie, renders Max comatose, and open rifts throughout Hawkins.

The fifth and final season is primarily set in November 1987. The military puts Hawkins under quarantine and hunts for Eleven, while the group tracks down Vecna until he kidnaps Nancy and Mike's younger sister, Holly, alongside 11 other children. The Upside Down is discovered to be a wormhole between Hawkins and another dimension known as the Abyss; Vecna plans to use the children to merge the Abyss with Hawkins. The group ultimately rescues the captured children, kills Vecna and the Mind Flayer, and destroys the Upside Down. To prevent the military from creating new psychic test subjects with her blood, Eleven seemingly stays behind in the collapsing Upside Down. 18 months later, in May 1989, Mike, Will, Dustin, Lucas, and Max graduate from high school, and Hopper proposes to Joyce. Mike theorizes that Eleven faked her death, and the rest of the group chooses to believe him.