The discussions surrounding Stranger Things season 5 and its finale find new ways to emerge from the abyss to haunt fans. The final season, which was released amid much hype on November 26, ended its three volumes and eight episodes on New Year's eve. However, millions of fans have collectively expressed their disbelief and disappointment on the fate of Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) and the rest of the cast members, leading to the 'conformity theory' conspiracy which was eventually confirmed as a hoax.
Now, with the release of the Stranger Things season 5 documentary titled, One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5, fans have been criticising the Duffer Brothers for completing the series without having a finished script in hand. The documentary that chronicles the making of the final season, reveals that the latest season took 237 days of filming, 6725 setups and 630 hours of footage, but Matt and Ross Duffer confessed that they were unsure of Eleven's ending until the last moment. The pressure of not wanting to disappoint fans was massive and they revealed that they were "terrified." Even Netflix and the series' production team had imposed the pressure on to them for completing the screenplay of finale episode 'The Rightside Up'
Matt Duffer said, "If we are going to sell it as she is gonna kill herself, and then she kills herself..." Writer Paul Dichter probed on his path, asking, "I think it's like, is she still deciding? Has she already decided?" Ross Duffer then expands on the tension they wanted to create, saying, "I think you have to keep toying with the audience and I think what works with [episode] seven is like 'Oh my god, is she really going to go through with this?'. And it's what everyone is gonna keep expecting."
Matt pushes back, adding, "We think she has made the choice to live... just kidding she hasn't, just kidding she has... like that's where I start to go..." Ross suggests another route altogether, proposing uncertainty as a tool rather than a flaw, explaining that they could "keep it ambiguous."
But what caught the eyes of eagle-eyed fans was the number of taps open on the Duffer Brothers' laptop. Screenshots of them have been widely circulating on social media with many users claiming to have spotted AI tool ChatGPT. As they went viral, fans accused the creators of using AI tools to write the finale.
The Stranger Things season 5 finale episode has been a centrepoint for several debates and discussions across social media platforms with millions of users expressing their disappointment on the manner in which the creators ended the series. Not many were happy with the show's ambiguous ending, while others demanded another set of episodes to wrap several character arcs.
While the Duffer Brothers are not coming back to the core plot of Stranger Things anytime soon, a spin-off is in early development.
