At a Glance
- The “Stranger Things” creators started filming the final season without finishing the last script
- Writing episode eight under production pressure was “the most difficult” they had faced
- Eleven’s fate sparked the biggest debate in the writers’ room
- Why it matters: Fans learn how the beloved series nearly stumbled at the finish line
The creators of “Stranger Things” have admitted that bringing the Upside Down to a close was far tougher than anyone outside the production realized. In a newly released documentary, Ross Duffer and Matt Duffer describe racing to finish the fifth-season finale while cameras were already rolling.
Production Without a Script
According to News Of Philadelphia, the brothers began shooting the last installment before the finale had been written.
“We went into production without having a finished script for the finale,” Matt says in “One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5.” “That was scary because we wanted to get it right. It was the most important script of the season.”
The 41-year-old show-runners felt the weight of a massive crew waiting on their pages.
“We were getting hammered constantly by production and by Netflix for episode eight,” Matt recalls. “It was the most difficult writing circumstances we have ever found ourselves in. Not just because there was the pressure of we had to make sure the script was good, but there’s never been so much noise at the same time.”
Beat-by-Beat Rewrites
To keep quality high, the writers spent extra hours dissecting every moment.
“It was the longest time we spent with the writers on a single episode,” Matt notes, “just breaking it down beat by beat, pushing that thing to get as good as it could, just being honest and truthful with the show has always worked out for us.”
Despite the chaos, the Duffers insist they always knew the destination.
“It’s all plotted out,” Matt emphasizes. “I just have to write it. We are just low on time.”
Family life added pressure. Matt, who shares two children with fiancée and series hair-department head Sarah Hindsgaul, says marathon writing weeks are no longer possible.
“I used to be seven days a week,” he says of earlier seasons. “I can’t do it anymore. I have two kids now and I just – it’s a tough career to have with kids.”
The Eleven Dilemma
The biggest creative hurdle involved deciding what happens to Eleven, played by Millie Bobby Brown. The finale leaves viewers questioning whether the teen sacrifices herself to wipe out the Upside Down.
“God, I don’t know how to play this,” Matt admits in the documentary. “The longer it goes, the more stories you have to tie up and the more character arcs you have to end. The more expectations there are with the audience. How do you meet those expectations but surprise the audience still?”
The brothers understood that a weak ending could undercut nearly a decade of storytelling.
“It’s terrifying because you see these shows that people love and adore and the ending falters,” Matt says. “They just discard the rest of the show.”
Shooting Blind
As the schedule tightened, scenes had to be filmed before the final pages existed. Ross grew uneasy watching crew members block shots for material he had yet to approve.
“I haven’t read eight through and we are shooting it,” Ross tells the crew during filming of a summer-set sequence in which Holly Wheeler (Nell Fisher) leads classmates away from the Creel house. “I have never done something like this before. I don’t love it.”
A Thank-You on the Last Day
When production finally wrapped, the Duffers recorded a message for their team.
“This is, without a doubt, without hyperbole, the best crew we’ve ever worked with,” Matt says. “We felt your love and passion every day. We came in here not knowing what the hell we were doing and I learned from the crew. We made a lot of friends.”
The documentary, now streaming, offers fans a behind-the-scenes look at how the series reached its conclusion after nearly ten years on Netflix.
Robert K. Lawson reported this story for News Of Philadelphia.
