The fourth season of Stranger Things took fans to California, back to Hawkins, a Russian prison, and the Upside Down. With so many locations, it made it the show’s most expansive season. Now, Stranger Things season 5 goes back to Hawkins. The show’s creators, Matt and Ross Duffer, told Collider that they will focus on the town with plenty of the Upside Down sprinkled throughout the final outing for the Netflix series.
“Yeah. It’s mostly in Hawkins, and there’s a lot obviously in the Upside Down,” Matt Duffer said, confirming Stranger Things focuses back on Hawkins for its final season.
The latest season spread out the main cast. Joyce (Winona Ryder) and Murray (Brett Gelman) spent most of their time in Russia to save Hopper (David Harbour). Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), Will (Noah Schnapp), and the newly introduced Argyle (Eduardo Franco) went out to save Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) from Brenner (Matthew Modine). Meanwhile, Steve (Joe Keery), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin), Nancy (Natalia Dryer), Max (Sadie Sink), Erica (Priah Ferguson), Robin (Maya Hawke), and the newest member Eddie (Joseph Quinn) had plenty to deal with from Vecna to an angry group of basketball players. By the end, the group is back together (except for Eddie, who died with a question mark on Max’s fate) in Hawkins for Stranger Things season 5. For the Duffers, it is time to reexplore these relationships.
“I think one of the things that’s exciting about Season 5 is [that] Season 4 was interesting to us because everyone was scattered to the winds,” Matt Duffer said on reuniting the Stranger Things cast in Hawkins. “That’s what was unique about it. But this is about everyone finally coming back. Coming back together, coming back to Hawkins. Hopper is back in Hawkins. The original group [is] back together—the original group of boys plus Eleven. The OG group. There’s something interesting to re-explore some of the season one dynamics again, except on this grander scale.”
Stranger Things Focuses on Hawkins for the Final Season
The finale will be written this August after a brief break for this month. The brothers have an outline and a clear idea of how it ends; they must put the pieces together to make a cohesive story.
From what we saw, Hawkins in Stranger Things is in poor shape after Vecna’s plan was initiated. The stakes have been raised higher than ever before with this past season, and now it will likely go higher as the whole town watches spores rain from the skies.
All episodes of the series are available on Netflix.