Almost six months after the finale aired on New Year’s Eve, Stranger Things‘ final season continues to be a point of pain for some fans. Over-hyped (what major series finale isn’t these days, though?), and built up over an extended production schedule somewhat unhelpfully, Stranger Things‘ ending will forever be viewed as just not quite enough. That it ended with the cliffhanger around Eleven’s fate didn’t exactly help matters, but it at least left the doors open for those who want to see more of the show in future. Now, we have some idea of how long we might have to wait to get a definitive answer.
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Ahead of their next Strangers Things-like Netflix project, The Boroughs landing this week, The Duffer brothers (who exec produce the new show) appeared on Josh Horowitz’s Happy, Sad, Confused to offer a belated post-mortem on that notorious ending. Interestingly, when asked about whether Eleven survives, Ross Duffer referenced The Sopranos creator David Chase answering about Tony Soprano after 20 years. Horowitz countered to ask if that’s how long Stranger Things fans should expect to have to wait: “If we’re talking to you in 20 years about Stranger Things, in 20 years… I mean I hope so. I hope people still care. That would be great, and then I’ll say everything, yeah. At that point, 20 years from now.”
Is Eleven Still Alive After Stranger Things?
There may well come a day before those twenty years are over that we find out what really happened to Eleven, if Netflix decide to cash in on one of their biggest franchises ever, but for now, ambiguity was always the intention. As Ross Duffer told Netflix in the wake of the finale, the open endedness of those last moments were intentional and always planned:
“There was never a version of the story where Eleven was hanging out with the gang at the end. For us and our writers, we didn’t want to take her powers away. She represents magic in a lot of ways and the magic of childhood. For our characters to move on and for the story of Hawkins and the Upside Down to come to a close, Eleven had to go away. We thought it would be beautiful if our characters continued to believe in that happier ending even if we didn’t give them a clear answer to whether that’s true or not. The fact that they’re believing in it, we just thought it was such a better way to end the story and a better way to represent the closure of this journey and their journey from children to adults.”
Matt Duffer also offered the pretty harsh reality check for Netflix or anyone who hopes we’ll get some sort of concluding extra chapter or special event: it wouldn’t be possible: “The reality is, if Eleven is out there, the most that they could hope for is a belief that it’s true because they can’t be in contact with her. Everything falls apart if that were the case. So if that’s the narrative, this is really the best way to keep her alive. And it’s about Mike and everyone finding a way to move past what’s happened.”
For Millie Bobby Brown, the ending was fitting too, no matter what happened: “I kinda love that ending, that there is just such a bigger purpose to Kali’s powers. Everything has a purpose, and everything is there for a reason.” Crucially, her analysis of the finale suggests it doesn’t even matter whether Eleven survived, just that she made the decision to sacrifice her life: “As a young girl, I couldn’t find my inner voice, and I could relate to Eleven in that way. I think this season she is able to find her voice and make a decision that’s far greater than any she’s ever made before.” That’s almost too powerful to want to mess with, but the will of the audience rarely stops story expansions if studio power comes into play.
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