STRANGER THINGS SEASON 4
I’m probably late to the internet when it comes to talking about Stranger Things Season 4, but I’m going to write about it anyway. I actually didn’t watch the first volume of Stranger Things Season 4 until a few days before Volume 2 came out. This was for two reasons. The first reason was, well, mom life. Secondly, I like to binge watch shows, and while I couldn’t do that because my baby wakes up early in the morning and I need sleep, but I didn’t want to finish volume 1 and have to wait so long for volume 2. Anyway, if you’re reading this you probably don’t really care much about any of that, so let’s get into it. Disclaimer, there will be spoilers!
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WHERE STRANGER THINGS SEASON 4 IS TAKING PLACE
Stranger Things Season 4 is taking place in three different locations. Hawkins, Kamchatka, and Lenora Hills. Hawkins is the obvious one, but Kamchatka is in Russia where they are experimenting on demogorgons and if you remember from the end of season 3, there’s an American there which we find out who that is in Season 4. Lenora Hills is where Joyce Byers (Winona Ryder) moved to with Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), Will (Noah Schnapp), and Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) who goes by Jane.
NEW CHARACTERS
There were a number of new characters this season, but the main ones that make a lot of appearances/have significant roles are Eddie, Argyle, Chrissy, Angela, Colonel Sullivan, Yuri, Jason, Victor Creel, Henry Creel, and Dmitri. There are some spoilers in this list of characters, so if you want to skip this part and read the rest of this post, then come back here to read more details about each character, you can.
Eddie Munson played by Joseph Quinn
This new character is by far one of my new favorites, and many others share this same sentiment. Eddie has a club called Hellfire that is all about Dungeons and Dragons. He’s also a musician and just interesting all around. Eddie’s the typical high schooler that doesn’t care about being popular. He knows he’s an outcast and he’s actually happy about that. However, even though it may not seem like it at first, Eddie is a really caring person.
As you’ll find out as you read through this post, he gets pinned as a cult leader of Hellfire, and an innocent club that plays D&D is dubbed some kind of a cult. In addition, the people of the town think that he’s guilty of the murders that have happened in Hawkins. Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? Unfortunately, Eddie does die (I go over this in further detail later), but I’m crossing my fingers that maybe they can somehow bring him back to life, or at least they could bring his body back to Hawkins and prove his innocence.
Argyle played by Eduardo Franco
Another fan favorite, just like Eddie, is Argyle. He is Jonathan’s new friend in California that works for Surfer Boy Pizza. Which is why he drives a van with Surfer Boy Pizza on it. He also smokes weed with Jonathan. Argyle is the stereotypical stoner character. He’s chill and responds very well to everything going on. It’s almost like some of the things going on around him don’t phase him whatsoever.
Chrissy Cunningham played by Grace Van Dien
Chrissy doesn’t make it past the first episode, but she’s a very important character to everything that happens in Stranger Things Season 4. She’s the head cheerleader and her boyfriend is the basketball captain. Chrissy’s the stereotypical popular girl in school. Within the first episode we learn that her home life isn’t what it seems. There was some kind of verbal abuse from her mom and because of her trauma, she becomes the first victim to be murdered.
Jason Carver played by Mason Dye
Jason is Chrissy’s basketball captain boyfriend. He’s the stereotypical jock who has some weird hero complex. After he finds out about Chrissy being murdered it’s almost like something awakens in Jason. All of the sudden he decides that he’s going to be judge, jury, and executioner. Jason is the reason why the town ends up thinking that Eddie is a freak and cult leader. Jason’s character was super annoying in my opinion.
Angela played by Eloise Grace Orkin
Since we’ve already gone over a bunch of high school kid stereotypes, Angela is yet another one. She’s the typical mean girl and a bully. She gives Eleven a hard time from the very beginning. The final straw for Eleven was when she was humiliated by Angela and her friends in front of Mike. So, since Eleven didn’t have her powers she decided smashing a roller skate into Angela’s face would suffice. What Angela and her friends did to Eleven kind of reminds me of the movie Carrie, minus actual pig’s blood.
Colonel Jack Sullivan played by Sherman Augustus
Sullivan is a military figure and he’s on the hunt for Eleven. He believes that everything that’s happened in Hawkins is Eleven’s fault. In addition, he thinks that Dr. Brenner (Matthew Modine) made Eleven into what she is to use her as a weapon of sorts. I can see why he would think that if we’re looking at this from a different perspective. However, I can’t side with him because instead of doing more research he has it in his head that Eleven is the reason for all of the death in Hawkins.
He ordered a siege on the Byers house in California once he found that that’s where Eleven was living, thankfully by this point Eleven was already gone with Dr. Owens and some agents were left to watch after the other Byers kids and Mike (more about that later). The siege happened when everyone besides Joyce was home. Joyce was already in Russia at this point looking for Hopper. The kids (Jonathan, Will, and Mike) get a ride from Argyle who has perfect timing delivering a pizza and they flee the scene. Sullivan tortures Agent Wallace who was guarding the Byers home and finds out where Eleven actually is.
Dmitri played by Tom Wlaschiha
Dmitri is a prison guard at the Kamchatka prison in Russia. Luckily for Hopper (David Harbour) who is trapped there, Dmitri is actually helping Hopper get out. Well, not helping out of the goodness of his heart because he’s doing it for money, but in the end we get to see that Dmitri really is a nice person. He was just doing what he was ordered to do in the prison.
Yuri played by Nikola Djuricko
Yuri is a Russian smuggler who was in contact with Dmitri. He was supposed to take Joyce and Murray (Brett Gelman) to Hopper once they gave him money. However, Yuri decides that he’s going to trick Joyce and Murray because he’ll get even more money if he sells Hopper, Joyce, Murray, and Dmitri to the Russians. He has a change of heart and ends up helping in the end though.
Victor Creel played by Robert Englund (aka Freddy Krueger)
As I’ll go over in this post, Stranger Things Season 4 has to do with Vecna and the Creel family. Victor Creel was charged with the murder of his family as the only survivor, or as we are made to believe. When Nancy and Robin come up with a plan to visit him at the psychiatric hospital pretending to be psych students looking to write their thesis on Victor Creel, they find that Victor has massive scarring around his eyes because it looks as though he doesn’t have any eyes.
Henry Creel/Vecna/One played by Jamie Campbell Bower
Well, this season’s villain is Henry/Vecna/One. I won’t go over this character in this section, because Vecna gets spoken about through this entire post. To keep it short and simple for now, he’s a coward who goes after vulnerable and traumatized people, but mostly children. He’s an asshole.
THERE’S A NEW EVIL IN HAWKINS
We’re introduced to a new type of character in Hawkins that isn’t the mind flayer. This new entity seems to be some kind of monster. This monster will later be called Vecna, but Vecna seems to get into the minds of his victims. When he kills them, their physical bodies levitate into the air, their eyes and brains implode, and he breaks all of their bones. Vecna doesn’t just do this to anyone though. He goes after people who have lived through trauma and he uses this against them. In my opinion, I kind of think of him as a coward. It’s kind of like those stereotypical bullies in school that don’t know how to pick on someone their own size.
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VECNA’S FIRST VICTIM
Vecna’s first victim that we see is Chrissy. She’s seeing the school counselor, just like Max is. Chrissy goes to Eddie for some kind of substances to help her with these weird hallucinations she’s having, but it’s really just Vecna’s curse. While she’s at Eddie’s home, she goes into one of these trances and this is when Vecna takes her life. Eddie witnessed the entire thing and out of fear he ran away. Unfortunately, this makes him look guilty of murdering her.
Eventually because of this, the head of the football team convinces the town that Eddie is a cult leader who performs satanic rituals and Hellfire, the Dungeons and Dragons club, is a cult. However, with the time period that Stranger Things is based in, it’s not surprising. If you’re unfamiliar with what I’m talking about, Satanic Panic is definitely something worth reading about if you want to go down a rabbit hole. However, when Nancy (Natalia Dyer) talks to Eddie’s uncle he believes the person who murdered Chrissy was Victor Creel. Keep this name in mind because the Creel family murders will be talked about later.
ARE ELEVEN’S POWERS REALLY GONE?
As we found out at the end of season 3, Eleven’s powers seemed to be affected. Almost as if they’re completely gone. Her powers being gone were shown where Eleven tried to use them on Angela in the school yard. This was after Angela gave Eleven a really hard time and made fun of her for her presentation being about her dad aka Hopper.
Even though her powers didn’t work and this made things even worse for Eleven as seen at the roller rink, she ended up getting filled with rage and smashing a roller skate into Angela’s face. Angela was alive but her nose was definitely broken along with having a concussion. After that Dr. Owens (Paul Reiser) finds Eleven and tells her that if she trusts him he can help her get her powers back.
She trusts him and we end up finding out that Dr. Brenner aka papa is very much alive. He ends up telling Eleven that her powers aren’t gone but that when she over exerts herself, it’s almost as if she needs to recharge. Eleven needs to remind herself how to access her powers. While she’s in Papa’s care, I wouldn’t really call it care, more like a prison. Anyway, that’s when she remembers things from her past. That’s when she remembers what One did to all of the other children.
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ONE
In Stranger Things Season 4 we learn about the child that started it all; One. He appeared to be one of the employees at the hospital but he tended to gravitate towards Eleven. One said that they’re very similar, but never disclosed that he too had powers like the children. He told her that he could help get her out of the hospital.
When they go to make their break, One tells Eleven that Dr. Brenner inserted a chip into him and he needs her help getting it out because it’s a tracking device. Well, she trusted him. Once she gets this chip out, she later finds One has killed a majority of the people including the children. It seems as though the chip was a device to keep One’s powers in check. Once Eleven sees this, her and One fight. Eleven somehow unleashes this intense power where she forces One into what would become The Upside Down. This is where we learn how Vecna and The Mind Flayer even came about.
Let’s rewind to when One was Henry Creel. If you remember from earlier I spoke about Victor Creel. Side note, this is the same actor who played Freddy Krueger. He has been put in prison for the murder of his family and also mutilated himself as an attempt to join them. Victor was a WW2 vet who bombed the wrong home killing everyone inside including a baby. Because of his trauma, he was the perfect target for Vecna aka Henry, Victor’s own son. Henry killed his mom and sister the way he would kill his victims in Season 4. It’s unclear if Victor knows that his own son is the one who murdered his family.
HIVE MIND
Once we learn about Vecna, One, and Henry bring the same person, it’s obvious that we also learn how Vecna even came to be the monster terrorizing Hawkins and killing people. After Eleven forced him into the Upside Down we find out that One stumbled upon a new world. He stated that he thought Eleven had put him in his purgatory. However, he quickly realizes this is a world he can make his own. This is when we see him create the mind flayer which is something he used to draw when he was younger. While we know from previous Stranger Things seasons that The Upside Down operates with a hive mind, in volume 2 we really get to see how it all started.
Related: The Upside Down Inspired Photoshoot
HOPPER’S ALIVE
The American that is referenced at the end of season 3 that everyone speculated on was in fact Hopper. This is why part of Stranger Things Season 4 is located in Kamchatka. Hopper was brought to a prison there after he survived the explosion. The actor who plays Hopper, David Harbour, talked about how he had to lose 80lbs and that he was hungry a lot. However, with the conditions of the Russian prison it wouldn’t be very believable for him to stay the same size he was previously so I can see why he had to lose so much. I hope after filming ended David Harbour went out to eat his favorite food.
PAPA DIES
It was unclear if Dr. Brenner was still alive but most theories pointed to a yes. He was very much alive and he tricked Eleven and Dr. Owens. Eleven told Owens and Brenner that she wanted to go be with her friends because they needed her. Owens went to gather some things for him and Eleven to leave when they were both stopped. Dr. Owens ends up getting handcuffed while Eleven is locked inside the experiment room as I like to call it with Papa. She breaks out of the room but this sense of freedom is short lived when Eleven is injected with a sedative by Brenner. Eleven tries to hurt him while the sedative starts to kick in and she wakes up to having a collar on her and Dr. Brenner in her room aka her jail cell.
Then the alarms sound off and the military has found them. Brenner carries Eleven and they go running out another entrance/exit and when they get out while part of the military is inside the lab, there is a helicopter with military shooting at Brenner and Eleven. Brenner does get hit multiple times and Eleven finally comes to after the sedative wears off. She obviously takes down the helicopter which causes it to explode and at the same time Mike, Will, Jonathan, and Argyle come to take Eleven with them.
ATTACKING VECNA & THE UPSIDE DOWN
Of course everyone has something to do with trying to take down Vecna. Max (Sadie Sink) says she’ll pretty much be the bait for Vecna and that she’ll hide in a happy memory. They found out earlier in the series that if they have Max listen to her favorite song (which is Kate Bush’s 1985 song Running Up that Hill) it helps her get back to her body and out of the trance. While she keeps Vecna occupied, Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo) and Eddie will go into the Upside Down and distract the demobats. Oh yea, there are bats that guard Vecna’s house which is his childhood house.
While the bats are being distracted, Nancy, Steve (Joe Keery), and Robin (Maya Hawke) plan to go to Vecna’a house and kill him while he’s in his trance. Just like how Eleven has to sit and cover her eyes to “travel” so does Vecna, well he doesn’t do the same thing as Eleven, but kind of. Eleven decides that she’s going to remotely help Max from a bath at a pizza place. They create a salt bath from a freezer and Eleven fights Vecna remotely. While she fights Vecna in the trance that they’re in, Nancy, Steve, and Robin throw Molotov cocktails at Vecna and Nancy shoots him. Thinking they killed him, he ends up running off. Once this happens, an earthquake, or rather what seems like an earthquake to the people of Hawkins (really it’s the Upside Down bursting), happens.
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EDDIE DIES A HERO
Sadly, during the fight, Eddie dies. Because he ran from Chrissy after she violently died at the hands of Vecna, he didn’t want to run again. He decided to buy more time because the demobats started going back to Vecna. The demobats unfortunately got to Eddie. Dustin goes back for Eddie and he dies in Dustin’s arms. In my opinion, this was a super emotional scene and I’m not ok. Netflix will be getting my therapy bill after this. Anyway, Eddie was made out to be a cult leader but ends up dying a hero. I just really hope that in Season 5 they can prove his innocence.
MAX DIES, BUT COMES BACK
While Eleven was fighting Vecna, Vecna did start taking Max’s life. Her eyes started bleeding, bones were broken, but she was able to come back. When Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) caught her from the levitated state (he was fighting Jason because he was trying to get Lucas to wake Max up), Max had said she couldn’t see anything and she died. Eleven watched all of this happen remotely so she brought Max back to life. Unfortunately, Max ended up in a coma and later Eleven tried to go in her mind at the hospital and found nothing. Side note, Jason also died when the “earthquake” happened.
THE UPSIDE DOWN LEAKS INTO HAWKINS
Stranger Things Season 4 ends with particles from The Upside Down in Hawkins and a dark cloud with red lightening. This happened after everyone was reunited, including Hopper. This was a great way to end Season 4 because it leaves for a lot of theories.
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THEORIES
I’ve decided to collect a few theories (and some questions) I’ve seen circulating and also give my own opinions about it. Each theory will have a link to the original article as well. I’ll also only be including some of my favorite theories, so the links I leave will have even more theories if you want to go down a rabbit hole!
Max’s Soul
Some people are speculating that Max isn’t completely gone. I actually agree with this, because I think part of Season 5 is going to be spent looking for Max. Theories online have stated that Max’s soul is trapped in Vecna’s mind. If this is the case, will Eleven have to go into Vecna’s mind and get Max? The reason why people are thinking Max is in Vecna’s mind is because of something he said after he killed all of the children at the hospital very many years ago. He said, “They aren’t gone, Eleven, they are right here, with me,” and after he said this, he tapped his head. Another theory (source) states that maybe Max will come back with powers. Will they be like Eleven and Vecna’s powers, will they be stronger or weaker than their powers?
Is Dustin next?
Dustin is my personal favorite character within the Stranger Things series. There have been theories that maybe he’s Vecna’s next victim. Vecna goes after people with trauma and that are vulnerable. Eddie died in Dustin’s arms and this was a very emotional scene. Will Eddie come back to mess with Dustin’s head just like Billy did to Max? We know this is Vecna doing this, but I think you know what I mean.
What happened to Dr. Owens?
When the military finally found Eleven where she took down and blew up a helicopter, we saw Dr. Owens handcuffed inside. We never found out what happened to him. Colonel Sullivan asked Dr. Owens about Eleven when they found him, but when he walked outside he didn’t have Dr. Owens with him. Does this mean that Owens will play a role in helping take down the Upside Down? Will we find out what happened to him? Could he possibly be held hostage and tortured by Sullivan and his minions to find out more information about what’s going on? Or, maybe Sullivan will blame the Upside Down coming into Hawkins on Eleven. He seems to have a hatred for Eleven, so I wouldn’t be surprised if we see him trying to kill Eleven again in season 5.
The grandfather clock
If you watched Stranger Things Season 4, you would know that it’s believed the grandfather clock that chimes 4 times means Vecna has carried out his plan. Some people have theorized that maybe this clock is a key for Vecna to see the past and the future.
Will and Vecna
It’s clear that Will has some kind of connection to the Upside Down/Mind Flayer. He can sense things that the others can’t, and this has been happening since he came back from The Upside Down in Season 1. Could this mean that because Will can sense the Mind Flayer, which we know was created by Vecna, that Vecna will use Will’s body to come into the regular world?
Is Henry/One/Vecna Eleven’s biological father?
This is something that I can definitely see being true. We don’t know much about Eleven’s biological father, besides a name, Andrew Rich. We’ve only met Eleven’s mother in the series. One user on reddit stated (u/kevinr1990) “Doing some quick math, if Henry Creel was 11 in 1959, that means he was around 31 years old during his showdown with El at Hawkin’s lab, when she blasted him into the Upside Down. El was 9 when this happened, so it’s totally plausible from a sheer timeline/age standpoint that Henry Creel could be Eleven’s biological father.”
Why did time stop in The Upside Down?
If you remember during Stranger Things Season 4, Nancy realizes that the stuff in her room within The Upside Down is in the past. She checks a journal/diary entry and realizes that the last entry was the day that Will was abducted into The Upside Down. This isn’t really a theory, but more so just a question that people have for the Stranger Things series. I’d love to hear your input on this, and really any other theories you may have in the comments!
What’s with the Russians having a demogorgon?
I’m not sure if maybe it’s because of the time period that Stranger Things is based in, but why do the Russians in particular have a demogorgon? Why did we see those black particles in Stranger Things Season 4? Could this possibly mean that Hawkins and the Soviets will have to work together to take down the Upside Down?
The final monster in the series
We’ve seen each Stranger Things season have a particular monster. From Demogorgons, to the Mind Flayer, and Vecna. The series likes to take characters and names from D&D, so some reddit users have speculated if there will be a final monster. If we look at the painting Will made for Mike that shows them fighting off some kind of 3 headed dragon, could this be the final monster in the series? Could this be Vecna’s final form?
STRANGER THINGS SEASON 5
There is no release date yet, but it’s been said that when the Duffer Brothers pitched Netflix the final season they cried (source). Whether that’s true or not, I can see why they would want to stop after one more season. Netflix probably cried because they realize how much money they aren’t going to be making in the future with Stranger Things coming to an end.
However, I do think the Duffer Brothers want to end Stranger Things on a good note. What I mean by this is, look at The Walking Dead for example. How many seasons are we up to now? I think it’s 11. I stopped watching that show a long time ago. If done right a show can definitely stay on for that many seasons, but there is only so much you can do with a zombie apocalypse. Plus, it’s been done how many times? I know it’s based on a comic, but come on, all of this has been done before. That’s definitely just my opinion, but I think the Duffer Brothers don’t want Stranger Things to turn into a joke so to speak. Am I making sense here? While I will be sad to see Stranger Things come to an end, I think the Duffer Brothers will do the series justice.
