Stranger Things season 1: full recap, episode by episode, and ending explained
Season 1 · Recap · November 1983
November 1983, Hawkins, Indiana: a twelve-year-old boy vanishes on his way home from a Dungeons & Dragons game, a little girl with a shaved head comes out of the forest, and a federal lab hides a gate to another world. Here is the first season, episode by episode, and what its ending means.
The essentials
- Episodes: 8, released July 15, 2016
- Period: November 6 to 12, 1983, plus a Christmas epilogue
- Monster: the Demogorgon
- End: Will is saved, Eleven vanishes, the Upside Down remains
Contents
- Recap of episodes 1 and 2: the vanishing and the weirdo on Maple Street
- Episodes 3 and 4: Holly, Jolly and The Body
- Episodes 5 and 6: The Flea and the Acrobat, The Monster
- Episodes 7 and 8: The Bathtub and The Upside Down
- The ending explained
- The eight chapters, with who wrote and directed them
- Where this story comes from
- The in-world timeline, day by day
Recap of episodes 1 and 2: the vanishing and the weirdo on Maple Street
On November 6, 1983, Will Byers bikes home from a ten-hour game at Mike Wheeler's. A creature chases him all the way home; he vanishes from his shed in a burst of light. The next day, his mother Joyce alerts the police chief, Jim Hopper, while Mike, Dustin and Lucas go looking for him in the forest. They find a little girl in a hospital gown, her head shaved, an “011” tattoo on her wrist.
Mike hides her in his basement. Eleven barely speaks, but she closes a door with her mind and recognizes Will in a photo. Meanwhile, Joyce gets a call where she hears her son's breathing, and Barb, Nancy's best friend, disappears at the edge of Steve Harrington's pool, a few yards from a party.
The Hawkins 1983 T-shirt, to start at the beginning.
In the shopHawkins Middle School 1983 crop top34,90 €See the product
Episodes 3 and 4: Holly, Jolly and The Body
Joyce understands that Will is talking to her through the lights: she paints an alphabet on her wall, and the lights spell “R-U-N.” That same night, the police pull a body from the quarry. Hopper, who has spotted inconsistencies at the lab, finds out the body is a fake, stuffed with cotton, and forces his way into the lab: a torn wall, a gate to somewhere else.
Eleven, on the middle-school radio, lets the party hear Will's voice, alive. Nancy, for her part, shows Jonathan the photo he took the night of the party: behind Barb, a faceless silhouette.
Episodes 5 and 6: The Flea and the Acrobat, The Monster
Mr. Clarke explains the parallel-world theory to the boys: an acrobat on a rope cannot go through it, a flea can. Eleven flips the game board: Will is “hidden” on the other side, in the Upside Down, with the Demogorgon. Nancy and Jonathan pick up the monster's trail in the woods, and Nancy spends a few minutes on the other side, through a hole in a tree.
Lucas argues with Mike about Eleven, who lied about the location of the gate to protect them. The lab finds her trail, and Eleven, fleeing, kills two agents before collapsing.
The Flea and the AcrobatMr. Clarke's explanation is the only real rule the show gives about the Upside Down: it is a world stacked on ours, reachable through tears. Everything else, for ten years, will rest on that.
Episodes 7 and 8: The Bathtub and The Upside Down
Reunited, the kids build a sensory-deprivation bathtub in the middle-school gym, with salt and an inflatable pool. Eleven finds Barb there, dead, then Will, alive in Castle Byers, on the other side. Hopper and Joyce go to the lab and go through the gate in suits, while Nancy and Jonathan trap the monster at the Byers' with a plan and a nail-studded bat, Steve at their side.
At middle school, the lab corners the children; the Demogorgon appears, kills the agents, and Eleven disintegrates it before vanishing with it. In the Upside Down, Hopper and Joyce find Will, a vine in his throat, and revive him. A month later, at Christmas, Will vomits a slug in the sink and sees, for a second, his house in the Upside Down version. Hopper leaves Eggos in a box, in the woods.
The ending explained
| What the ending shows | What it means |
|---|---|
| Eleven vanishes with the Demogorgon | She is not dead: season 2 finds her again in the Upside Down, then in the woods |
| Hopper's Eggos | He knows she is alive and feeds her in secret |
| Will's slug | The Upside Down contaminated him; he is still tied to the other world |
| Will's vision | The first of his “episodes,” which will become the possession of Season 2 |
| Hopper gets into a black car | He made a deal with the lab to save Will |
Season 1 therefore ends in appearance on a return to normal, and in reality on three doors left open: Eleven, Will, and the lab. Each will give a season.
The Eleven figure, shaved head, as in the woods.
In the shopLego Will Byers mini figure on skateboard14,90 €See the product
The eight chapters, with who wrote and directed them
| Chapter | Original title | Direction | Screenplay |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Vanishing of Will Byers | The Duffer Brothers | The Duffer Brothers |
| 2 | The Weirdo on Maple Street | The Duffer Brothers | The Duffer Brothers |
| 3 | Holly, Jolly | Shawn Levy | Jessica Mecklenburg |
| 4 | The Body | Shawn Levy | Justin Doble |
| 5 | The Flea and the Acrobat | The Duffer Brothers | Alison Tatlock |
| 6 | The Monster | The Duffer Brothers | Jessie Nickson-Lopez |
| 7 | The Bathtub | The Duffer Brothers | Justin Doble |
| 8 | The Upside Down | The Duffer Brothers | The Duffer Brothers, from a story by Paul Dichter |
The eight chapters came out the same day, July 15, 2016. The Duffers direct six, Shawn Levy, executive producer, the two in the middle. The eight-episode format was a choice: the creators wanted the season to “look like a big movie,” with time to build the characters before unleashing the monster, which a 22-episode season would not have allowed.
Where this story comes from
The starting point, according to the Duffers, is the 2013 film Prisoners: the ordeal of a father whose daughter has been kidnapped, which they wanted to stretch over eight hours of television. Focusing on the missing child, they added a child's sensibility and a monster able to devour humans. To anchor that monster in science rather than the supernatural, they drew on real Cold War experiments, including Project MK-Ultra.
That is what fixed the year: 1983, a year before the release of Red Dawn, in the thick of Cold War paranoia. The show was then called “Montauk,” after the Long Island town tied to legends of secret experiments. The planned November shoot making Long Island too cold, production looked for sets around Atlanta, in Georgia, and Montauk became Hawkins, in Indiana.
The pilot script, accompanied by a twenty-page dossier, was turned down by many cable networks, which asked either to make it a children's show or to remove the children and follow Hopper's investigation. In early 2015, Shawn Levy's company bought the rights, then the platform bought the whole season on a read of the pilot.
The internal timeline, day by day
-
November 6, 1983
Will disappears on his way home from his Dungeons & Dragons game. The same night, Eleven escapes from the lab.
-
November 7
Mike, Dustin and Lucas find Eleven in the rain. Barb disappears that same evening at Steve's, while Nancy is upstairs.
-
November 8
Joyce buys the lights. Will talks to her through the lights in the house.
-
November 9
A fake body is fished out of the quarry. Joyce refuses to believe it.
-
November 10
Will's funeral. The children understand that the monster is attracted by blood.
-
November 11
Hopper walks into the lab and finds the gate. Eleven and Mike fight, Eleven runs.
-
November 12
The bathtub, the middle school, the fight against the Demogorgon. Joyce and Hopper bring Will back from the Upside Down.
-
December 1983
A month later, Christmas dinner. Will spits a slug into the sink.
The Season 1 poster, lights included.
In the shopHawkins 1983 Strange School sweatshirt70,90 €See the product
TakeawayEight episodes, from November 6, 1983 to Christmas. Will is found in the Upside Down by Hopper and Joyce. Eleven disintegrates the Demogorgon and vanishes. The ending opens three doors: Eleven alive, Will contaminated, the lab complicit.
Frequently asked questions
How many episodes does Season 1 have?
Eight, released on the same day, July 15, 2016.
What becomes of Eleven at the end of season 1?
She disintegrates the Demogorgon and vanishes with it. Season 2 reveals that she survived in the Upside Down and lives hidden at Hopper's.
Why Will throws up a slug
Because the Upside Down contaminated him during his week of captivity. It is the sign he remains tied to the other world.
Is Barb dead?
Yes, killed by the Demogorgon in the Upside Down. Eleven finds her body in the bathtub; her death is confirmed in season 2.
Who directed the season 1 episodes?
The Duffer Brothers for six chapters, Shawn Levy for chapters 3 and 4. All came out the same day, July 15, 2016.
Why is the show set in 1983?
Because the Duffers wanted a year of Cold War paranoia, just before the release of the film Red Dawn, and a monster rooted in the real experiments of the era, like the MK-Ultra project.