Lorin Williams December 22nd, 2024 - 5:45 AM
According to CNN, the highly anticipated final season of Netflix’s Stranger Things has wrapped production. The 1980s sci-fi series that launched the careers of its young cast first premiered almost eight years ago. Now, the Duffer Brothers’ story of friendship in Hawkins is closer to ending.
Stars of the series posted tributes on social media as last week marked their final days on set. CNN reports Noah Schnapp, who plays the series center protagonist, Will Byers, saluted the show on Instagram. Will’s disappearance in season one flooded the small midwestern town and his three best friends into the mysterious grasp of the Upside Down. Schnapp’s post captures moments from the past eight years, including a tribute to the Duffers who created the series.
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In the post, he credits Matt and Ross Duffer with teaching him that, “the creative process takes time and it’s okay to be meticulous about creating perfect moments.” He ended his post by saying, “Stranger Things’ was more than a job; it was a lifelong dream. A dream made reality thanks to the Duffers. Thank you for taking a chance on me when I was just a 10 year old kid and entrusting me with something so important to you both. Together, this cast + crew has built something so very special, and I couldn’t be any more excited for the world to see the final chapter. Stranger Things is a never ending story for me – it’s in my heart forever.” via CNN.
Another tribute came from co-creator Ross Duffer. He mentioned how they’ve been telling this story for almost a decade.
“Many of our cast members joined us when they were kids, just ten or eleven years old,” Duffer stated in the post. “It wasn’t just a show for them—it was a defining part of their childhood. They’ve grown up before our eyes, becoming more than actors—they’ve become family,” he stated on IG via CNN.
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Stranger Things follows a group of friends in Indiana discovering a dark, parallel universe, and the forces it inhabits. In season one, Will Byers’ disappearance was the catalyst to awakening this force, which was stirred by science experiments involving orphaned children. In a fight to save Will, his friends Lucas, Mike, and Dustin meet the strange girl, Eleven, who is tied to the happenings.
Since season one, the group of nerds whose only dangers were the ones they created during Dungeon & Dragon sessions has encountered body-snatching monsters, Russian spies, blood-thirsty Demoagorgans, and the nightmare-inducing Vecna, who killed several teens in season four and left their dear friend, Max, in a coma.
The Emmy-winning series’ cast includes Finn Wolfhard (It, The Turning), Millie Bobby Brown (Damsel, The Electric State), David Harbour (Marvel’s Black Widow, Violent Christmas), Winona Ryder (Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, girl, interrupted), Caleb McLaughlin (The Deliverance, Concrete Cowboys), Gaten Matarrazo (Honor Society, Prank Encounters), Joe Keery (Free Guy, Fargo), Priah Ferguson (My Dad the Bounty Hunter, The Oath), Natalia Dyer (Yes, God, Yes, Based on a True Story), and Charlie Heaton (The New Mutants, Marrowbone). The series has added Sadie Sink (The Whale, Fear Street Part One: 1994), Maya Hawke (Do Revenge, Inside Out 2), and Jamie Campbell Bower (Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Horizon: An American Saga – Chapter 1).
Linda Hamilton (The Terminator, Dante’s Peak), Jake Connelly (Between the Silence), Alex Breaux (The Dead Don’t Hurt, Waco: The Aftermath), and Nell Fisher (Evil Dead Rise, My Life Is Murder) are new additions to the season five cast. Rumors have also stirred that Joseph Quinn’s (Gladiator 2, A Quiet Place: Day One) beloved Eddie Munson could return.
While the flagship series is ending next year, the franchise will exist in other properties. The theatre stage play, Stranger Things: The First Shadow, began in the UK and will soon make its stateside debut on Broadway.
All four seasons of Stranger Things are available to stream on Netflix.
