The creators of Stranger Things have revealed they originally intended to kill off some big characters at the end of season one.
In a new book called Stranger Things: Worlds Turned Upside Down, the Duffer brothers shared their original plans for the Netflix hit – including some that would have changed the following seasons completely.
Eleven (played by Millie Bobby Brown) was one of the main characters who was not meant to survive. “Eleven was going to sacrifice herself to save the day,” Ross Duffer said. “That was always the end game.
“But once we realised that the show was potentially going to go on longer than one season, we needed to leave it more up in the air, 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.”
Joe Keery’s character, Steve Harrington, was also meant to die in season one. “This Steve character, he was just supposed to be this giant douchebag,” Duffer said, adding it was the actor who changed the fate of the now-fan favourite.
Duffer also revealed that, while Bob Newby (Sean Astin) was always intended to die, he was meant to be killed off a lot earlier in the series. “Sean Astin proved so likeable that Bob’s death got pushed from episode four to episode eight because we kept wanting to keep him alive,” he explained.
“It was important to us and also to Sean to give him a bit of a hero’s death. We wanted him to accomplish something meaningful.”
Meanwhile, Stranger Things season three is currently in production. Finn Wolfhard, who plays Mike Wheeler, recently revealed the new episodes will be set in 1985, while Millie Bobby Brown has teased a blossoming romance between Chief Hopper and Joyce Byers.