Stranger Things Season 1
Overview
Stranger Things Season 1 is set in 1983 in the small town of Hawkins, Indiana. 12-year-old Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) mysteriously disappears after leaving his friends' house. His mother Joyce (Winona Ryder) becomes convinced he is communicating with her through the lights and the walls, as she can hear him speaking from somewhere. The local police chief, Jim Hopper (David Harbour), initially dismisses her as a hysterical mother but begins to investigate when he discovers something strange about the circumstances of Will's disappearance. Meanwhile, Will's friends — Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) — discover a strange, bald girl hiding in the woods while searching for Will. She calls herself Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown), and she has powerful telekinetic abilities that she can barely control. She escaped from the nearby Hawkins National Laboratory, where she was raised as a psychic weapon by the mysterious Dr. Martin Brenner (Matthew Modine). The lab is also responsible for tearing open a rift to another dimension called the "Upside Down," a dark, decayed mirror of Hawkins inhabited by a monstrous creature called the Demogorgon, which feeds on human flesh. The first season follows the group as they try to find Will, fight the Demogorgon, and close the gate to the Upside Down. The season also introduces Jonathan Byers (Charlie Heaton), Will's older brother, and Nancy Wheeler (Natalia Dyer), Mike's older sister, who investigate the disappearance on their own. The season is a love letter to 1980s pop culture — E.T., The Goonies, Stephen King, and John Carpenter — and a thrilling, emotional adventure about friendship, courage, and the power of believing in each other. The first season was a massive hit for Netflix, becoming a cultural phenomenon and launching the careers of its young stars.
