Don’t fear, season five of Stranger Things is nearly here. Fans of the show have been anticipating the newest season since the fourth season was released three years ago.
According to Comicbook, the show’s creators, the Duffer Brothers (Hidden, Vessel), have announced that the show will be released later this year. They are even ahead of schedule. The brothers accepted the Variety Showrunners Award at the SCAD TVfest where they made the announcement. Variety reported that Ross Duffer told SCAD TVfest attendees “We’re focused on visual effects sequences right now, which started back in January…It’s going well. We’re actually ahead of schedule, which is rare for us.”
The season will be 8 episodes, although the release order is still up in the air. The prior season was divided up until two volumes with seven episodes released in volume one and two episodes released with volume two.
At a recent press event Next on Netflix Matt Duffer described the season as “eight blockbuster episodes”, stirring anticipation among fans.
“Ross and I do love blockbuster films, we do love big special effects sequences, but at the end of the day, it’s about the character work,” he continued. “What I do love about television, even though we were film guys growing up, that we’re able to do these huge cinematic special effects, but then we also have a lot of time to spend with the characters… the goal is you’re so invested in the story, and that’s what I found good TV does really well.”
Season four left off with lots of unanswered questions. According to Comicbook, at the 2022 Netflix Geeked Week the Duffer brothers revealed “We’ve punted a couple of those to have some big reveals in season 5. And that’s really going to affect what season 5 is about.”
The returning cast members will be joined by Jake Connelly (Between the Silence), Nell Fisher (Bookworm, Evil Dead Rise), Linda Hamilton (The Terminator, Dante’s Peak), and Alex Breaux (Depraved, Joe Pickett).