By this time next year, the fifth season of Stranger Things will have (hopefully) premiered! And just as quickly ended, since it’s also the final season. It’s the most anticipated batch of episodes (eight of them, all of them “very long”) for a Netflix show in the streamer’s history, so no pressure, the Duffer Brothers!
Here’s everything we know about Stranger Things season 5, including plot details, the cast, and the show’s “best episode” yet.
Plot
Stranger Things season 5 is eight episodes long, and the journey to the series finale will be “heartbreaking,” “bonkers,” and “completely insane.” It also might make you cry. “The end of this episode when we were reading it — just us reading it — about halfway through, people started crying,” star David Harbour said about the finale on the Happy Sad Confused podcast. “Then about the last 20 minutes, it was just uncontrollably crying, waves of different people.” He added that it’s “the best episode they’ve ever done.”
Specific plot details are tough to come by, but there’s almost certainly going to be a time jump in the “biggest, darkest, scariest” season yet.
It’s also going to be a “full-circle” season, as Will, who has been relegated to the sidelines since season 1, is “going to be a big part and focus,” Matt Duffer told Collider. “We’re starting to see his coming of age, really. Which has been challenging for a number of reasons, some of which are supernatural. But you’re starting to see him come into his own.” Ross added, “[It’s] setting up us coming full circle back to season 1. I think you’ll see that with a couple of the character arcs, not just with Will. But also with Steve and Nancy, and her relationship with Jonathan where things are not fully resolved. The characters have maybe made steps, like in the case of Will, but that journey isn’t over yet. All of that is going to play a huge role as we try to wrap this thing up.”
Stranger Things will take a page from another popular genre show’s book (forgive the mixed idiom) by enlisting Frank Darabont to direct an episode. It’s his first time behind the camera in over a decade. “What really dragged me out of retirement was that my wife and I really love this show,” The Shawshank Redemption director told The Daily Beast. “Our content now is so filled with horrible people doing horrible things for greedy reasons but Stranger Things has so much heart. That positivity is something I really responded to.”
And I’m positive that Stranger Things will nail the ending.
Cast
Almost everyone will be back (too many!), albeit three years older than the last time we saw them. The confirmed season 5 cast includes Millie Bobby Brown (Eleven), David Harbour (Jim Hopper), Winona Ryder (Joyce Byers), Finn Wolfhard (Mike Wheeler), Noah Schnapp (Will Byers), Gaten Matarazzo (Dustin Henderson), Caleb McLaughlin (Lucas Sinclair), Sadie Sink (Max Mayfield), Charlie Heaton (Jonathan Byers), Natalia Dyer (Nancy Wheeler), Joe Keery (Steve Harrington), Maya Hawke (Robin Buckley), Brett Gelman (Murray Bauman), Priah Ferguson (Erica Sinclair), Jamie Campbell Bower (Henry Creel / Vecna), Cara Buono (Karen Wheeler), and Amybeth McNulty (Vickie).
Newcomers to the Stranger Things universe include The Terminator / Terminator 2: Judgment Day legend Linda Hamilton. “I don’t know how to be a fangirl and an actress at the same time,” she said about appearing on the show. “I’m gonna work on that.” As for Joseph Quinn, he has a “feeling” that he’ll return as Eddie Munson. “Or maybe I don’t,” the Gladiator II star teased. “Who knows? I don’t know! Who knows? Maybe I do.”
Release Date
An exact date hasn’t been revealed but Stranger Things season 5 will premiere sometime in 2025. It’s unknown if every episode will be dropped at once, or if the season will be split into two “volumes,” like in season 4.
Trailer
Still no trailer but you can watch a behind-the-scenes video.