The Hellfire Club Catch-Up: A Summer Cram Session for Stranger Things
Welcome to io9’s summer cram session for Stranger Things, the Duffer Brothers’ Netflix phenomenon, which will return this November to Netflix for its final season. To honor the Hawkins gang’s late, great, guitar-shredding Dungeon Master Eddie (Joseph Quinn), this rewatch shall be coined the Hellfire Club Catch-Up. With part one of season 5 a few months out, it seems fitting to get started now. Read on for io9’s guide to everything you need to remember from the show’s 2016 debut.

A Look Back at Season One
Season one of Stranger Things was straightforward, a lean and mean horror binge. From the jump, the Amblin and Stephen King vibes by way of John Carpenter are all over the DNA of the ’80s-era show. I would shy away from calling this gateway horror because season one in particular really went there in building up the horror with the Demogorgon hunting down Hawkins youth. Violence was not in short supply.

At the center, we have the events unfolding around Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) when their friend Will (Noah Schnapp) goes missing and a mysterious girl turns up with telekinetic powers. Rewatching this made me feel so old because they were so little when the show started—and let me tell you, the show really hits different now that I’m a parent.

Key Takeaways
Right off the bat, those are my biggest takeaways: the horror and story really hold up and are even more terrifying watching as a mom. Joyce (Winona Ryder), I get it now—I thought her extremes to find Will were a little off-kilter almost 10 years ago. I was so wrong, and everything she did for those kids with Hopper (David Harbour) was absolutely justified.

And there are so many details that I completely forgot about, some of which we’ll go over, like Will’s fake body or the fact that Hawkins has a huge bully problem. For the purposes of our club, though, here are the main things that happened that we should keep in mind as we work our way to season five.

Image: Stranger Thing Season One Netflix Squad

1. Will’s Fate Might Be Tied to His Dungeons & Dragons Game

When Mike, Dustin, Lucas, and Will end their campaign in episode one, it comes down to a big choice to save them all. Will has the option to either protect his crew or attack the Demogorgon (game version), but his move to fireball backfires. It’s clear he should have made the move to protect his friends, and that makes us wonder if Will’s story might come down to a similar choice—where he may need to make the ultimate sacrifice.

2. Joyce Takes Action

Will is barely gone for the morning period of school, but that doesn’t stop Joyce from taking matters into her own hands. While other parents err on the side of thinking Will ran away, his mother knows better. Her inclination to feel something sinister is afoot lays the groundwork for her and Hopper tuning into the suspicious presence of Hawkins Lab, located near to where Will disappeared.

In Stranger Things: The First Shadow, the stage prequel to the events of Stranger Things the series, audience members have shared it’s now established canon that back in high school, Joyce and Hopper investigated an unusual happening in their town involving Victor Creel (Henry Creel’s father), the real truth of which was left unsolved. Hopper went on to leave to become a big city cop, and in his flashbacks we see his tragic backstory of having lost his daughter to cancer. Seeing Joyce’s relentlessness to find out what happened to Will is something Hopper recognizes and shares—seeing finding Will as a path to do what he couldn’t and save her kid.

3. No One Cares About Barb’s Disappearance Except Nancy

It seems that as things get worse, the rest of the grownups in town would just rather keep ignoring the bad things happening around them. Barb (Shannon Purser) goes missing, and there’s no rush to look for her from anyone but Nancy (Natalia Dyer), who, like her brother Mike, gets the sense that something is off about her friend’s disappearance after Will’s.

Image: Stranger Thing Season One Netflix Eleven

4. Hawkins and the Secret Government Lab

Could the Upside Down already be feeding off the energy to expand beneath their feet? It seems likely that this is what leads to the fabric between both worlds getting ripped so the Demogorgon can feed on the most vulnerable. Eleven’s (Millie Bobbie Brown) escape from Hawkins Lab as Will is taken sets her up as the hero the town needs.

5. Will’s Fake Body

The Hawkins Lab agents, led by Brenner (Matthew Modine), attempt to cover up Will’s death by staging a fake dead body that gets all the way to the morgue. Hopper gets in and cuts it open to find it’s stuffed. Joyce already knows, because by then she’s been in touch with Will through Christmas lights from the Upside Down.

6. The Truth About Baby Jane

Hopper and Joyce uncover that the kid who was described as having a shaved head near the scene of a crime could have been the child of a pregnant woman who was experimented on during Brenner’s time with MK Ultra. When El/Jane was born, Brenner took the child back to Hawkins Lab, presumably to see how the psychedelics affected her child.

7. Nancy Not Drew but Close Enough

Nancy and Jonathan (Charlie Heaton) piece together that Barb’s blood is what the Demogorgon caught the scent of to pull her into the Upside Down. In Jonathan’s photography, they see its slender and misshapen face lurking behind Barb, and it matches Joyce’s description of the creature coming through the walls.

8. The Kids Are All Right, Even Steve with the Good Hair

The jock in question, Steve (Joe Keery), surprisingly goes from leading the crowd of disaffected youth to abandoning it when he begins to listen to Nancy. His lines deliver clues to the idea that the town exists in this sort of fog and when he turns on his bully friends, it’s because he realizes that Nancy cares about others—and he wants to, too.

Image: Stranger Thing Season One Netflix Eleven V Demogorgon

9. The Demogorgon vs Eleven

Joyce and Hopper find Will, and he’s absorbed onto a wall by the tendrils of the Upside Down’s alternate reality Hawkins. The consequences of Hopper’s trade to be let into the Upside Down from the lab give up Eleven’s location at the school. There the kids had helped her tap into the Upside Down to look for Will and Barb.

10. Will Is Different Now

Will’s recovery after his ordeal seemingly goes well for a few months after his rescue. He gets caught up on everything he’s missed and seems like a normal boy. Jonathan goes over to Mike and Nancy’s to escort him home, but things aren’t what they appear. Will hacks out a small slug and keeps it secret that he’s still somehow tethered to the Upside Down through his mind.

Are there any details we missed that you think will come back around in season five? Let us know in the comments below. In a month we’ll be back with the next Hellfire Club Catch-Up, digging into Stranger Things season two.

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