We’re now almost two weeks removed from the premiere of the series finale of Stranger Things, and the discussion around that final episode has shifted multiple times in that short window. To start, some fans were satisfied, thinking the ending fit the show as it had been the entire decade it was around. After that, it was about the larger fallout; other fans were displeased, perhaps believing that not enough characters died or that there were lingering plot holes they couldn’t reconcile. It didn’t take long for that to shift to conspiracy theories, though, with the belief that there was a secret series finale that would surprise drop on Netflix.
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As we know, that didn’t happen. Stranger Things ended with the exact episode they always said it would, and there was no secret episode. That said, Netflix did have one last trick up its sleeve, delivering the documentary One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5 to subscribers today. Though it encompasses the making of the entire season of television, it does have some surprising revelations, including quotes from the creators that may reveal exactly why the finale didn’t sit well with some fans: it wasn’t done when they started making it.
Stranger Things Started Filming the Series Finale Without a Finished Script
It’s not uncommon for major productions in the modern era to begin filming without a script. Many of Marvel Studios’ movies have been doing this for years, though the distinguished competition has a rule against this. Stranger Things Season 5 apparently got cameras rolling without completed scripts for the entire season, which is also common for television. The key difference with the ending of Stranger Things Season 5, though, is that they did know what the ending of the series would be….it just wasn’t written down. Matt Duffer even admits this on camera at one point during the One Last Adventure documentary, noting: “It’s not like we don’t know what the ending is. It’s all plotted out…I have to write it, and we’re just low on time.”
Halfway through filming on the entire season, which arrived at production day 117, revealed that the script for the finale still hadn’t been completed. Filming on the series finale of Stranger Things eventually arrived, and still no completed script in sight. Montana Maniscalco, the key set production assistant for the series, admits in the documentary that filming has begun on the finale without a completed script, adding, “We don’t even fully know what’s going on.”
The key reason that these scenes from the finale were shot out of sequence is that the production was still in the summer, and they wanted to maintain that look for the scenes. A later scene revealed that even though scenes for the finale were shot, the cast hadn’t read the full script because, naturally, it hadn’t been written.
“I’ve never done anything like this before. This is so weird jumping to eight,” Matt Duffer revealed on set for the sequence. “Don’t love it. Don’t love it.”
Later, in a sequence shot in the writer’s room away from production, Matt Duffer noted that the team “were getting hammered constantly by production and by Netflix for episode 8,” with Ross admitting that the series finale was “the most difficult writing circumstances we’ve ever found ourselves in.” The pair noted that they spent more time on this episode than on any other individual episode in the series. In the end, that time on the finale may have paid off for some fans, but others remain disappointed, even convinced by false, viral pretenses. As eye-opening as the One Last Adventure documentary is for the means of a giant production like Stranger Things Season 5, some of the details revealed will convince fans on both sides why they are justified in feeling how they do.
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