After almost 10 years on our screens, Stranger Things wrapped up last week with the release of the season 5 finale. The Netflix series has become a global phenomenon, with a plotline inspired by research into psychic powers and a number of familiar real and fictional conspiracies, such as MK-ULTRA, Project Montauk and the Philadelphia Experiment.
Is that the end for Stranger Things, or could a sequel or spin-off series be in the works? Given the success of the show, it seems likely that Netflix would want to continue capitalizing on it in some way – and it’s worth noting that in their original pitch deck for the story that would become Stranger Things – written before Netflix even picked the show up –the Duffer Brothers explicitly sold it as a story that could continue in a future time period: The “hypothetical sequel”, they said, could take place “ten years later…our kids will now be young adults with new lives, new problems”. But “the re-emergence of horror” will mean “they will have no choice but to join forces again.”
This will allow us to explore many of the same characters, themes, and horrors from the original series, but with a new ensemble of actors and a fresh time period.
And in the finale of Stranger Things, we did see a few clues “for those with eyes to see” that possibly hinted at a future theme and location for a sequel; or, alternatively, perhaps they were just little ‘easter eggs’, fun tips of the hat, to some of the original ideas and locations that formed the basis of Stranger Things. RPJ and I sat down after the finale to discuss these clues/easter eggs – check out the video embedded below for our fun discussion.
What do you think – will we be seeing more of the Stranger Things universe in future?