Stranger Things Season 5 Part 2 is set to release right after Christmas, and while the rest of the story of Netflix’s hit show is a mystery, we already know how one project will serve as a key to understanding more about the show.
What key to Stranger Things Season 5 Part 2 might have been hinted at already?
The first four episodes of Stranger Things Season 5 set the stage for what promises to be a chaotic final four episodes. However, in a surprise that fans didn’t see coming, the Stranger Things Broadway play, Stranger Things: The First Shadow, seems to be play a large role in the last season, and might serve as a big key for the future of Season 2.
The stage show, which is currently running on Broadway, tells the canonical history of Henry Creel, who Stranger Things fans will know as the child who later becomes the big bad Vecna. The play chronicles him moving to Hawkins in the 1950s, discovering his latent powers, and killing his family, with his father Victor Creel (who was played by Robert Englund in Season 4 of the show) being blamed for it.
The play also dives into the history of Doctor Brenner and explains how Creel came to gain his powers, through a meeting with the Mind Flayer thanks to being teleported to “Dimension X,” the world of the monsters in Stranger Things. Without diving too deep, the play reveals that the reason why Creel is taken in by Brenner and branded as Number 1 is due to Brenner trying to gain access to Dimension X/The Upside Down again.
As for Stranger Things Season 5, this all comes together when Max (Sadie Sink) shows up in the show’s third episode. After being thought dead, Max appears to a kidnapped Holly Wheeler inside of the mind of Vecna. There, she explains that she’s been trapped inside of Vecna’s mind and has seen many of his memories. This includes a mysterious moment where she was Henry in school and saw a flyer for a Sadie Hawkins dance that also included the names of Jim Hopper and more.
Max also finds out that Creel has a strong aversion to caves, as this is where Max has been holed up after failing to escape back into the real world. While Creel’s fear of caves isn’t explained outright, it once again connects to the play, which dives into Creel’s family life in Nevada before they moved to Hawkins and his brief encounter with The Upside Down, which came as Creel was playing in the desert.
Whether this means that Creel’s human side is still intact enough to be reached, or whether or not they’ve found a way to hurt Creel, remains to be seen. With four episodes still to go, the mystery of Creel, Vecna, and his connection to The Upside Down (and especially the Mind Flayer) has a lot left to be uncovered.
The Duffer Brothers themselves have also noted that there is going to be “more overlap” with the play. Speaking to Variety, the pair said that they purposely had to try and not reveal too much in the play, but that more will be connected as we get closer to the final episode.
Just what means remains to be seen, but for fans looking to know more about Stranger Things, the Broadway play has suddenly become a major key in understanding some big aspects of Season 5.
