WARNING: This article contains spoilers for the second season of Stranger Things, streaming now on Netflix.
Clearly Stranger Things creators the Duffer Brothers love to end each season with a worrying cliffhanger. The debut season of the hit Netflix drama concluded with Will Byers back in the real world but still connected to the Upside Down, while Season 2 ended with another ominous warning from that mirror dimension.
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After Eleven sealed the rift to the Upside Down, locking this season’s monster, the Mind Flayer, within, all seemed to be well once more in Hawkins, Indiana, only for the season to end with the creature enormous creature looming over a mirror version of Hawkins Middle School in the Upside Down.
“Yeah, we don’t end it on a totally happy note, do we?” Ross and Matt Duffer acknowledged with a laugh. “There were discussions about that, but then we went, ‘Nah, we have to hint at what’s to come.’ The hope we wanted people to get out of it is that this thing [is still out there].”
“They’ve shut the door on the Mind Flayer, but not only is it still there in the Upside Down, it’s very much aware of the kids, and particularly Eleven,” they continued. “It had not encountered her and her powers until that final episode. Now, it knows that she’s out there. We wanted to end on a little bit of an ominous note on that level.”
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The Duffers indicated they went the route of the creature looking for revenge because they didn’t want to be formulaic in terms of mystery endings as with Will’s situation as they chart a course for a third season.
“Last year, we had a lot of little cliffhangers at the end of the season. We didn’t want to do that again. We didn’t want to box ourselves in for Season 3. We wanted to be able to start season three on a very clean slate. It felt totally unnecessary, when we had the Snow Ball. Once we had the Snow Ball, we didn’t know [if we wanted to do] anything else as an ending.”
Now streaming on Netflix, the second season of Stranger Things stars Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Millie Bobby Brown, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Natalia Dyer, Charlie Heaton, Cara Buono, Matthew Modine, Noah Schnapp, Joe Keery, Sadie Sink and Dacre Montgomery.
(via Screen Rant)