STRANGER THINGS: SEASON 5. Vecna in Stranger Things: Season 5. Cr. COURTESY OF NETFLIX © 2025
Stranger Things is officially over, but the franchise will continue to endure thanks to various tie-in media, an upcoming animated spinoff, and, of course, the requisite live-action spinoff series. The latter is being kept firmly under lock and key at the moment. What do we know so far?
When it comes to the Stranger Things universe, there’s one certainty: nothing happens quickly. The series made its Netflix debut back in 2016, going on to release 5 seasons in just under a decade. Television doesn’t come fast nowadays, but that pace is particularly slow. Granted, the team had both a global pandemic and industry strikes to contend with. All things considered, the final season did stick the landing. Not everyone was completely satisfied, but on the whole, it wrapped up everything pretty well.
While (spoiler!) Vecna was defeated and the Upside Down was ultimately destroyed, there’s certainly more than enough scope for more stories. In fact, Stranger Things will return to our screens later this year with animated spinoff Tales From ’85, which chronicles the unseen adventures of the kids, bridging the gap between seasons 2 and 3. We’ve covered the upcoming animated series extensively here. As for what the future has to offer in the live-action space, there’s good news and bad news. The good? A live-action spinoff is officially in development. The bad? We know very little about it, and it’s still some time away.
Let’s get the obvious out of the way: the live-action Stranger Things spinoff is still very early in development and doesn’t have a title nor any sort of plot details. Despite this, creators Matt and Ross Duffer have been dropping hints on their season 5 press tour. They won’t be showrunners on the spinoff, although they are heavily involved.
Fans can expect something quite a bit different. It won’t continue the stories of characters we’re already familiar with, but rather, it’ll tell its own self-contained story, far away from Hawkins, in a different decade, with new characters and a new mythology. The gateway to the Upside Down is closed off permanently.”We’re really closing the door on that,” Matt Duffer told Screen Rant in a recent interview following the season 5 finale.
In addition, Ross Duffer further doubled down on the spinoff’s unique storyline. It’s not a case of resting on the winning formula, but reinventing the franchise with something fresh. “It really is a completely different story, in a completely different location with completely different actors and characters. So it’s really its own entity. ” With all of that said, however, he did backtrack by saying the spinoff “relates in some ways” to the original series. It wouldn’t be a spinoff if it didn’t relate, after all.
The Duffer Brothers won’t tell us what the spinoff is, but they have confirmed what it is not. “It’s not Hopper mentioning Montauk. There’s no Montauk spinoff,” Ross Duffer told Deadline. “It’s obviously not Holly and the kids or anything like that. It’s something much smaller than that,” he added. “We’ve said this before, the spinoff idea we have, it is early days.”
The Stranger Things finale contains one key detail for the spinoff.
The season 5 finale gave us the biggest tease of what’s to come, and it sounds like the spinoff could be a prequel, chronicling the rise of Henry Creel, who would become the all-powerful Vecna.
Image: Netflix
In the finale, the show digs deeper into Creel’s descent into Vecna. In one flashback, taking place inside his mind, we see him as a young boy in a cave. He comes across a scientist holding a briefcase. As young Henry Creel approaches the wounded scientist in innocence, he is shot in the hand. In shock, he brutally beats the man to death. Covered in blood, he opens the briefcase and uncovers an otherworldly artefact — a little rock — which appears to infect and infuse inside him. It could well be how Henry Creel initially came in contact with the Mind Flayer.
The show shows us a bit, but it doesn’t tell us much. It’s explored in the official Stranger Things play, The First Shadow, too. Still, the larger history surrounding Henry Creel is something that could certainly be explored — and it will. “The spinoff is going to delve into that and explain that, and you’re going to understand it,” they told Variety. “But it’s a completely different mythology. So it’s not a deep exploration of the Mind Flayer or anything like that. It’s very fresh and very new.”
Ross Duffer also revealed that work on the spinoff is already ramping up.” We’re going to start working on it again on Monday. We’ve been working on it on and off. We’ll take a few days off.”
As for Matt Duffer, he’s very excited to get started on the all-new project:
“My favorite part of the show is working on it. It’s not releasing it — that’s just stressful, no matter how it goes when you release it. It’s maybe my least favorite part of the process. I like the creative part. I like making it. So, we’re actually really excited, and it’s very exciting to work with a clean slate: completely new characters, new town, new world, new mythology.”
As for a release date, these are very early days. Let’s give it a couple of years at least. In the meantime, Stranger Things isn’t going anywhere. Animated spinoff Stranger Things: Tales From ’85 debuts later this year, and at least two other unnamed projects (sort of) we’ve got to stay mum on.
The Stranger Things Universe will continue to expand through novels and comics.
A live-action Stranger Things spinoff is still some time away, but there’s a ton of excellent tie in media to check out while you wait. Over the years, the franchise has expanded into comics and novels in a big way, building out the lore of the Upside Down and developing beloved characters. These novels have bridged seasons, elaborated on loose ends, and more.
Such spinoff novels include Suspicious Minds, which dives deeper into the history of Eleven’s mother. Then there’s Flight of Icarus, a novel telling the unseen story of fan-favorite Eddie Munson. Other tie-in novels are The Darkness on the Edge of Town (2019), Runaway Man (2019), Rebel Robin (2021), Lucas on the Line (2022), The Dustin Expermiment (2024), and One Way or Another (2025).
There’s comic books aplenty, too. We recommend The Other Side, a series that chronicles Will Byers’ early days in the Upside Down, as well as Tales From Hawkins. Plus, of course, there’s the official stage play, The First Shadow.
If you’re looking for additional content to bridge the gap before the requisite live-action spinoff, there’s plenty enough out there.
Rating: TV-MA
