Stranger Things Star Says the Series Aims to "End With Will"

In the series premiere of Stranger Things, Noah Schnapp's Will Byers goes missing in a small Indiana town, igniting a complex and mysterious journey into other dimensions, with Schnapp himself claiming that the series will conclude with a focus on Will. With each season of the series, the world of the narrative grows and expands, uncovering all-new figures and unexplained events, though with only one more season of the sci-fi adventure to go, Schnapp is just the latest to hint that the storyline will embrace its intimate origins. Stranger Things Season 5 is expected to start shooting in 2023 for a potential 2024 release date.

"I can just tell you that I'm very very excited for what's to come. I think they did a great job with Will's character this season, and beautifully addressed everything they needed to," Schnapp shared with Forbes. "The way they closed the show is just perfect -- the story started with Will, and it'll end with Will."

Will has surely had one of the more complex trajectories over the course of the series, as the first season largely saw him absent from Hawkins as he was trapped in the Upside Down, while the second season saw him trying to recuperate from the lingering effects of his time in the alternate dimension. Seasons 3 and 4 focused on Will's attempts to gain some sense of normalcy, but with his friends bonding so strongly in their quest to find him, he also had to cope with feelings of inadequacy and detachment from the people he used to be closest with.

Creators of the series Matt and Ross Duffer shared similar sentiments earlier this year about circling back to where it all began.

"[Season 5], the way we see it, is kind of a culmination of all the seasons, so it's sort of got a little bit from each," Ross Duffer shared at a FYC event. "Whereas before each season was so distinctly... [Season] 3 is our big summer blockbuster season with big monsters, and [Season] 4 was the psychological horror. I think that what we're trying to do is go back to the beginning a little bit, in sort of the tone of 1."

"Just as important as the supernatural, we have so many characters now, most of whom are still living," Ross added. "It's important to wrap up those arcs because a lot of these characters have been growing since Season 1. So, it's a balancing act between giving them time to complete their character arcs and also tying up these loose ends and doing our final reveals."   

Stranger Things Season 5 is expected to start shooting in 2023 for a potential 2024 release date.

Are you looking forward to the final season of the series? Let us know in the comments or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars!