Think about your favorite Stranger Things characters, and then imagine the show without them. Horrifying, right?!
But if things had gone the way they were originally supposed to, that's exactly how the show would have ended up: with two characters not surviving season one. And one of them is... pretty major!
Stranger Things creators Matt and Ross Duffer recently published a campanion book to accompany the series, just in time for Halloween. Don't worry--no spoilers for the upcoming season, but it does reveal some fascinating details about the first two, including that good ol' Eleven was meant to be offed in the first season. "Eleven was going to sacrifice herself to save the day," Ross Duffer reveals in the book. "That was always the end game."
Originally, the show was going to be a limited series of just one season. But once it became clear the show would live on beyond the season one mark, it also became clear that the show wouldn't work without Eleven. "[W]e needed to leave it more up in the air," Duffer explains, "because deep down we knew the show just wouldn't really work without Eleven. And at that point, we knew how special Millie was. If there was going to be more Stranger Things, Eleven had to come back."
Seems like a solid choice!
Another fan favorite, Joe Keery's character Steve Harrington, was also slated to perish. The book reveals that "[H]e was just supposed to be this giant douchebag," but the Duffer Brothers were convinced to keep him around for the expansion of the series after he became so beloved by the show's fan base. Imagine the show without one of its key sources of comic relief! It would be a whole different feel.
But surprisingly, not everybody was convinced saving her was the right thing to do!
While others were more concerned about a certain other character:
Probably time to let that one go... although you never know!
@LeeMerrittesq/X
@bob_moss/X
@jelanijones/Bluesky
@Aurkayne/X
@sadcommunistdog; @froglok/Bluesky