‘Stranger Things 5’ Finale Explained: Duffer Brothers on Eleven’s Fate, Spinoff Clues and All Those Real Tears

Note: This story contains spoilers from “Stranger Things 5” Episode 8.

“Stranger Things 5” ended not with monsters, mayhem or flickering lights, but with tears. Lots and lots of tears. And for creators/showrunners the Duffer Brothers, that’s exactly how they wanted to conclude the five-season journey of Netflix’s biggest series. On the emotional journey of the characters with whom audiences fell in love in the first place.

“The basement scene with our core group of kids we’ve known for eight years, that’s where the show was going to end,” Ross Duffer told TheWrap alongside his brother Matt over Zoom on New Year’s Day, just hours after the finale was unleashed upon the world.

“That whole scene is about them saying goodbye to their childhood, the memories are always going to be with them but they’re moving on, and there’s a passing of the torch to the next generation,” Matt Duffer added, revealing that the final scene was shot over two days, and the tears on the faces of Finn Wolfhard, Noah Schnapp, Caleb McLaughlin and Sadie Sink were very, very real.

Conspicuously absent from the final scene is Millie Bobby Brown’s Eleven, who seemingly sacrificed herself in the Upside Down but whose fate is left ambiguous as Mike offers an alternative hopeful scenario: Perhaps she faked her death, slipped away and is living out her life in quiet peace.

So, is Eleven really dead?

That’s one question the Duffer Brothers don’t intend to answer definitively — “We want to leave her fate up to the audience,” Matt said — but they acknowledged the character’s fate was the most debated plot point in the writers room for Season 5.

“Something that everyone agreed on was that it didn’t feel possible, really, for her to be there [in the basement], unless we invented some nonsense where her powers were somehow removed again or something like that,” Matt explained. 

Thematically, Matt said, Eleven represented “the magic of childhood” so her absence speaks to how the other characters are now leaving childhood behind. But practically speaking, from Eleven’s point of view, she had to decide whether she wanted to risk putting any other children in harm’s way with her existence, or take herself out of the equation — a debate made explicit through Hopper and Kali’s points of view, which the Duffers said mirrored the dueling sides of the writers room.

“Either way, Eleven’s choice is, I think, courageous and selfless, because even though she’s having to leave her friends behind, she’s protecting any other child from experiencing what she experienced,” Matt said. “Just look at what Kay was trying to do with all those pregnant women. All those pregnant women died because that blood did not work. But if that were to work, then you’ve got dozens of children who are going to grow up just like her and that are going to be turned into weapons and abused.”

On the subject of the planned “Stranger Things” spinoff that the Duffer Brothers will produce for Netflix, they were a little bit more explicit — but only just.

When asked what the rock is that gave Henry his powers and connected him to the Mind Flayer, the Duffers said that was a question they didn’t want to specifically answer “yet.” When pressed if that’s because it has to do with the spinoff, both smiled.

“The spinoff will connect and it will answer some of these lingering questions that were not actually answered fully in the finale, but it is very much its own story and its own mythology. So it’s not about the Mind Flayer per se. We’ve explored that about as much as we want to,” Matt said, though he declined to offer a timeline for when the spinoff takes place.

Regardless, there was plenty to unpack about how the brothers wrote and directed the thrilling and emotional two-hour finale.

Read our full interview below, in which the Duffers also discuss reworking one of their favorite finale scenes just hours before it was shot, why Henry/Vecna didn’t get a redemption arc and, of course, where all those demogorgons, demodogs and demobats went.

TheWrap: As you guys started plotting out this final season, what did you know about the series finale early on, and what were your North Stars?

Ross Duffer: The basement scene with our core group of kids, we’ve known for eight years that’s where the show was going to end. But when we started breaking the season, it really started there in figuring that out more in detail. We always knew that Eleven wasn’t going to be there, but exactly how that was going to play out was unclear. And of course, the sort of passing of the torch to Holly was discovered in those very early days in the writers room, which is one reason we wanted to add this new cast of younger characters like Derek and Holly.

It’s such a great sentiment in that final scene of the game goes on. We may grow up, but the next generation of kids is going to come along.

Ross Duffer: Exactly, yeah.

Filmmaking is an iterative process. It’s not like you write the script and it’s all done, things change throughout production and post-production. For you guys, what’s the latest best idea you came up with? Something that happened late in the game that was an “ah-ha!” moment?

Matt Duffer: That’s a good question. One of the things that we discovered in editorial was the Vecna death scene, the axe-chopping with Joyce. That was originally supposed to just be an f-you moment, and then she was going to chop his head off. It just felt somewhat anti-climactic, and then we explored the idea of making it cathartic and emotional and employing those flashbacks, and it just took it to a whole other level. In fact, a lot of the flashbacks that are scattered throughout the episode weren’t in the script. Correct me if I’m wrong, Ross, but I think when Eleven’s talking to Hopper, those flashbacks are always very emotional to me, when you’re seeing Hopper and her as father and daughter, and that was not scripted. So those were really, really nice discoveries that we had in editorial. 

Ross Duffer: It’s hard, I mean for so much of the finale, everything has been built in a way to pay off in the finale. So there was a little less room to maneuver, ultimately, because it was all sort of set. The challenge for us actually was in writing, it was just making sure that it could all fit in. We wanted it to be around two hours. We were trying to not have another two and a half hour finale. We wanted to give our time for an epilogue that felt appropriate, and to spend time with these characters one last time. So I think just just fitting it all in there, and making sure that we hit every moment, that was the big challenge, not making it five hours. 

Matt Duffer: Oh, I thought of another one though, the teen rooftop scene, which is now one of my favorite scenes ever in the show. It’s got that “Big Chill”-like vibe to it, which I love. In the initial script that we had written for that, it was like 70% of what you saw. We were shooting this scene of Dustin reuniting with Steve in the flash forward, and we were going to shoot the roof scene the next day. We got a call from some of the teens and they just told us, “Listen, I think we can get this a notch better. I think we can get more specific.” 

So we just started to throw out ideas about what Jonathan was doing specifically at NYU, the idea of the cannibal film, the consumer, Smith College. It just got so much more specific. We were collaborating with the actors and the scene went from a good scene to a great scene. It was like the morning-of. It’s stressful, but I think we had just been doing it for so long, the level of comfort we had it’s almost like a play in that we just sat, everyone was in the room, it was freezing cold, the sun wasn’t even up, and we just worked it. People kept throwing in new ideas until we all landed in a place where everyone felt right about it. So there was something very fluid and freeing about it. It was a great experience. 

Ross Duffer: That is a scene where there is probably an extended version of that, there’s like five more minutes. Which is fun, but at a certain point it was like, “OK, this, this is starting to feel a little bit too indulgent.”

I mean, you could just point to Peter Jackson and be like, the guy won all the Oscars for “Return of the King” and that was over three hours.

Matt Duffer: (Laughs) We did talk about “Return of the King,” I’ll defend that epilogue.

Let’s talk about the very end of the episode. You said the final image you’ve had in your head for a long time. What does the shot of the door mean to you guys?

Matt Duffer: It’s Mike closing the door on his childhood. I mean that whole scene is about them saying goodbye to their childhood, the memories are always going to be with them but they’re moving on, and there’s a passing of the torch to the next generation. And as Mike is looking down at his sister and his friends playing D&D, it reminds him so much of what him and his friends look like, and he’s flooded with all these happy memories, and that’s where you see his expression change from something sad to something very happy, because he knows he’s always going to have those memories, and they’re always going to stay with him, but ultimately, he is going to have to leave that basement behind and go into adulthood.

I think those flashbacks are so well used throughout the whole finale. It really hits you hard. So obviously Eleven isn’t there and you never intended for Eleven to be in that scene. Can you tell me about her choice and why it didn’t feel right to have Eleven there?

Matt Duffer: I think it was probably the most debated thing in the writers room, and we just turned it around and debated it ad nauseum. But I think something that everyone agreed on was that it didn’t feel possible, really, for her to be there, unless we invented some nonsense where her powers were somehow removed again or something like that. For us, it was two things. Thematically, she represents, at least to us, the magic of childhood. She possesses these incredible powers. It’s all fantastical. So you’re leaving that behind, even though it’s always going to be a part of you. She’s the fantasy aspect of the show in so many ways, and you’re closing the door on Narnia, right? That’s what it is in a lot of ways. 

But from a character perspective, from Eleven’s perspective, we kind of use Kali and Hopper to represent the dueling points of views, and those were the point of views that were being discussed in the writers room, which is Eleven has been through so much and she deserves to live. And then Kali saying, yes, but if you do, these are the consequences, and is there a middle ground to be found? 

We don’t explain whether that is a choice that she made or not, I mean, we’re not explicit about it. Mike and his friends choose to believe that there is and that she still continues to exist. But either way, Eleven’s choice is, I think, courageous and selfless, because even though she’s having to leave her friends behind, she’s protecting any other child from experiencing what she experienced. Just look at what Kay was trying to do with all those pregnant women. All those pregnant women died because that blood did not work. But if that were to work, then you’ve got dozens of children who are going to grow up just like her and that are going to be turned into weapons and abused. So that was sort of where we landed. A lot of it was just looking at it from Eleven’s point of view as much as possible.

So, is Eleven dead?

Ross Duffer: I mean ultimately we leave it up to the audience. Obviously, we say what our characters believe. But we want to leave her fate up to the audience, and what do they think? 

Matt Duffer: I love the idea that people — and I’m already seeing it — are analyzing that moment where you don’t see her for a bit, and then she’s in the gate, and there’s the kryptonite and is it possible? Is it not possible? Could Kali be alive? Could she not be alive? Those are exactly the questions that we like that you’re asking. But at the end of the day, the audience is really in the same shoes of the characters, and it’s up to them to decide, just as it’s up to Mike, Lucas, Max and Dustin to decide.

Are you ready to be asked that question for the rest of your lives?

Matt Duffer: (Laughs) Yes!

Ross Duffer: (Laughs) “Is Tony Soprano dead or alive?”

Where did Mike’s revelation come from? As you guys were sussing out in the writers room whether Eleven lives or dies, did you hit upon Mike’s story as a kind of bridge between both ideas? Because I thought his speech and this idea that he’s telling a story was really beautiful.

Matt Duffer: It was early on in the writers room when we cracked Mike telling this story via the D&D campaign and the “I believe” moment where it really cracked open. So even though she was never there, once we came up with that, we’re like, “Well, now we have our ending,” and the rest of the season was really built from that moment on. We knew we had an ending that we felt confident in, and then it was just trying to build to that moment.

Finn is so good in that scene too.

Ross Duffer: He’s so good.

Matt Duffer: I think Finn is unbelievable. I mean, Finn’s great the entire episode. I think it’s the best he’s ever been. But I particularly love him in the basement scene. He just really brought it. But everybody’s fantastic in that scene because no one’s really acting. That’s real. Everybody came to set crying, so those emotions are genuine. We did it over two days. The first day was them doing the campaign, it was the fun part. So everybody was having a good time. Then day two was him talking about what their futures were going to look like and what potentially happened to Eleven and then saying goodbye. That was the most emotional day of shooting ever. 

I wanted to ask about Henry, because you could have gone the Darth Vader route with full redemption at the end. But instead, it’s revealed that Henry really embraced the Mind Flayer’s evil. How did you hit upon that ending for him?

Matt Duffer: We obviously discussed a moment of redemption for him, and could he overpower this, and what we landed on was even if there is a part of him inside that is still good, even if he wasn’t corrupt before the Mind Flayer took him — and we leave that a little bit up to the viewer’s mind — but even if there’s this goodness in his heart, he’s gone so far at this point. I mean, he can’t live in a moment where he was not in control of these actions or the actions he did were wrong. He has to believe. So you see Jamie, who I think is just incredible in that scene, he becomes childlike for a moment when Will is talking about him, but then when the moment comes where he could take a turn, he just shifts because he can’t. He can’t accept a world where anything that he did was not the right thing.

What was the rock that he touched that connected him to the Mind Flayer? Where did it come from and how did the scientist know what it did? Has the Mind Flayer been working with other people before it hit upon Henry? 

Ross Duffer: (Smiles) It’s a good question.

Matt Duffer: (Smiles) That is a good question. That’s one question we really wanted to leave for audiences. We didn’t want to give an answer to that yet, to exactly what the rock is and where it came from and how that scientist got a hold of it.

So those looking for clues about the spinoff may want to pay attention to the rock?

Matt Duffer: They might. They might. I don’t want to say we’re making a spinoff about a rock.

“Geologists in Space!”

Matt Duffer: (Laughs) That’s what it is. No, I do want to emphasize, just to not set up false expectations, the spinoff will connect and it will answer some of these lingering questions that were not actually answered fully in the finale, but it is very much its own story and its own mythology. So it’s not about the Mind Flayer per se. We’ve explored that about as much as we want to.

Are you able to say if it takes place before, during or after “Stranger Things?”

Matt Duffer: No. I want to keep some of it secret. We’re still working on it and I’m excited to announce more details when Netflix allows us to.

Fair enough. Another question I had that other people have been asking is once they get to The Abyss, where are all the creatures? Where are the demogorgons, the demodogs, the bats? Are they hiding?

Matt Duffer: Mainly it’s just that Vecna was not expecting this sneak attack on his home turf. Never in a million years could he even imagine that. They’re there somewhere. We obviously discussed having a demo battle on top of the Mind Flayer battle, but it felt more right to us that why does he need the demos when the Mind Flayer is this giant thing and can attack them? He doesn’t need his little ant army to attack, he’s going to take care of this himself. It’s a giant, desolate planet. If you recall, you see Henry wandering the planet back in Season 4 and at some point in his journey, he does see a demo far in the distance, but it’s not like they’re hanging out in little huts. There’s not like a giant civilization of demos up there.

There’s not a cantina bar for demos.

Matt Duffer: (Laughs) No. We did at some point have that they were going to come across a giant field of demo eggs in kind of an “Aliens” thing, but you can’t get all your ideas in there. You remember the eggs? 

Ross Duffer: Yeah that’s in the three-hour version of the finale, which was never written.

Matt Duffer: Were they going to come out of the eggs? I can’t remember.

Ross Duffer: Yeah.

Matt Duffer: One of the other things we talked about was just demo fatigue. I felt like we did everything we wanted to do with them in “Sorcerer,” and wanting to keep the focus on Vecna and the Mind Flayer, who’s been absent this season.

I also wanted to ask about the intimate character scenes in the epilogue. The performances are so great, and each one really nails the landing. Can you talk about putting those together?

Matt Duffer: I think one thing we love about this show is that yes there’s sci-fi and adventure and there are monsters. But ultimately for us, it’s a coming of age story, and so it was satisfying at the end to actually be able to spend the time with these characters. They kill Vecna like an hour in because ultimately, we wanted to be able to actually sit down and spend time with our characters and see how much they’ve grown over the years. And I think for us, each of those scenes was so emotional writing it because we knew these are the last lines that our characters were ever going to say. So every time we sat down to write one of those last scenes, it was really, really challenging. But I mean, the scenes themselves actually came pretty easily. They were far from the scenes we spent the longest on. They came very naturally. It was just challenging on an emotional level. 

But I’m proud of the whole episode, and all the action I’m really happy with in the final battle and the head chop, but my favorite part of the episode is actually just the epilogue, to take a breath and spend time with these characters for the last time. I’m proud of the actors, because I do think they give just incredible performances, and so much of their performance is almost not even acting. I was talking to Maya about this where she is acting, but she described it as like a wire connecting where Robin and her performance as Robin connected directly with what she was experiencing emotionally in real life. She was able to tap into that in a serious way. And I think all the actors were able to do that, and that’s why they feel so raw and so vulnerable.

I mean, when they’re crying, they’re crying. The rooftop scene, I had never seen Joe cry in my life, and he arrived on set crying. That’s how emotional it all was.

“Stranger Things” is now streaming on Netflix.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

The post ‘Stranger Things 5’ Finale Explained: Duffer Brothers on Eleven’s Fate, Spinoff Clues and All Those Real Tears appeared first on TheWrap.