Featured Image Credit: Netflix
With one final roll of the dice, Strahd von Douchebag has been bested, and with it, Stranger Things has come to an end.
As Mike and co. finish their epic Dungeons & Dragons campaign, their defeat of the vampire lord is symbolic for what went down in Hawkins, with epic final battles and tragic goodbyes – although there was a glimmer of hope.
We could sit here all day to try and unpack what actually happened in the Stranger Things finale, but ultimately, only the Duffer Brothers and Millie Bobby Brown are apparently privy to the 'real' ending.
Even though Netflix firmly shut down those 'Conformity Gate' theories about a secret ninth episode, that didn't stop hopeful viewers from being left with egg on their faces as they held out hope they were being tricked.
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We know that Netflix isn't done with its golden goose yet, but while we wait for the animated Tales from '85 and the Duffer Brothers' mysterious live-action spin-off, there are plenty of Reddit threads to keep us busy.
Even as the dust settles, eagle-eyed viewers are going back with fresh eyes and giving us enough wild theories to warrant a whole new show.
Over on Reddit, one person questioned the significance of one key date and whether season 5 pulled the rug from beneath us all.
In a July 2022 interview, the Duffers told Deadline there's a reason the Upside Down is stuck on the specific date of November 6, 1983. Although the simple answer is that November 6 is when things all kicked off when Will Byers was kidnapped, as well as being when Eleven escaped the Hawkins lap, and the Upside Down intersected with the real world, the OP questions why this wasn't expanded on and why the date is so important to Vecna.
Someone else noticed that Henry Creel's Boy Scout badge was 1106 (November 6), but again, it wasn't really wrapped up.
Previous seasons helped us keep track of the sometimes confusing timeline by putting years after specific dates, but this unravelled in season 5. Episode 6 ("Escape From Camazotz") opened with November 6 but stopped short of adding a year.
One wild theory claims that the group's meddling has led to them no longer being tethered to a specific year, but is this just more clutching at straws? There have been complaints that Stranger Things: The First Shadow was seemingly essential background viewing despite it being a limited stage play. This has only been hammered home by the fact that November 6 features prominently as the date when Joyce was putting on a production of Oklahoma!.
The play also revealed that it's the date that Brenner took Henry to his lab and started his Rainbow Room process.
Trying to debunk more swirling theories, one person said: "It's the date the rift was created and the upside down is essentially frozen in time. It probably has something to do with some sort of cosmic symmetry or something.
"Might have been explained in a deleted scene that they had to cut for time or something. I think they're planning (or at least were planning) a few spinoffs and probably more books so it might be explained later."
One disgruntled critic concluded: "Plot holes that could have been turned into a really cool ending to the show. Real shame they expended that creativity to troll fans who caught all these plot holes with a radio station, instead."
While we're sure there are some Stranger Things theories worth a visit, this could be another one for the reject pile.
