Well, it took a couple of days, but here's my recap and review of the series finale of Stranger Things.
The two-hour-and-eight-minute series finale of Stranger Things wasn’t just an episode of television; it was a cultural event. “The Rightside Up,” the Duffer Brothers delivered a sweeping, cinematic conclusion that abandoned any remaining “monster of the week” impulses in favor of something far more intimate: a story about sacrifice, memory, and the painful, necessary transition out of childhood.
The finale opens with the group scattered across dimensions, executing a desperate, multi-pronged plan to sever Vecna’s grip on the world once and for all. Eleven, Hopper, Murray, and Kali (Eight) infiltrate the lab so Eleven can reenter Henry Creel’s mind via the tank. Their mission is violently interrupted when the military, led by the ruthless Lt. Akers, storms the facility. In the episode’s most shocking turn, Kali is fatally shot while shielding Eleven. Her death becomes the emotional catalyst that propels Eleven into her final psychic confrontation, grief and rage fueling her power.
Meanwhile, Steve, Dustin, and the rest of the group defend the WSQK radio tower. Here, Will Byers’ arc reaches its long-awaited resolution. Drawing on his lingering connection to the Mind Flayer, Will turns Vecna’s power against him, paralyzing the villain from within and reclaiming agency that was stolen years earlier.
As Eleven weakens Vecna in the mindscape, Joyce delivers the decisive strike in the real world, decapitating Henry Creel with an axe. It’s brutal, cathartic, and fitting, a victory earned through years of survival rather than supernatural strength alone.
With the rift still open, Eleven realizes the Upside Down can only be sealed permanently if she stays behind. As Hopper’s C-4 detonates, set hauntingly to Prince’s “When Doves Cry", Eleven vanishes into the collapsing light, leaving Hawkins saved but shattered.
18 Months Later: The story jumps ahead to the summer of 1989. Hawkins is rebuilding, and the Party is finally allowed to move forward. Steve Harrington has found unexpected purpose as the town’s Little League coach, and, hilariously, its reluctant sex-ed teacher. Nancy moves to Boston to write for the Herald, while Jonathan heads to NYU to pursue film school. Miraculously recovered, Max is seen laughing with Lucas, reclaiming the life she nearly lost, and graduates with Lucas, Will, and Mike, with the scene anchored by Dustin, who delivers a heart-wrenching final speech to the Class of '89. And Hopper and Joyce embrace their future as empty-nesters, celebrating their engagement and planning a move to Montauk.
The series closes where it began: a D&D game in the Wheelers’ basement, now led by a new generation — Holly Wheeler and her friends. Watching from the sidelines, Mike offers a theory: that Kali used her final illusion to hide Eleven, and that she is alive, living peacefully near a remote village with three waterfalls. The final image — an older Eleven walking through a lush landscape- is deliberately ambiguous, leaving viewers to decide whether she survived… or lives on through memory and myth.
Did It Stick the Landing?
“The Rightside Up” is a beautiful, emotionally devastating, and occasionally uneven finale that chooses character over lore and is stronger for it. Millie Bobby Brown and Noah Schnapp deliver career-defining work. Will’s confrontation with Vecna provides the catharsis fans have been waiting for since Season 2. “When Doves Cry” underscores the finale with aching irony, perfectly marrying the show’s ’80s DNA with its emotional climax. While poetic, the uncertainty surrounding Eleven’s fate may frustrate viewers who hoped for firmer closure after such a long journey; they didn't need to explain to us whether she lives or dies, that's our decision as much as it is Mike's and others.
The Duffer Brothers didn’t give us the ending we expected, but they gave us the one Stranger Things was always building toward. This wasn’t a story about defeating monsters; it was about outgrowing the world where monsters made sense. Childhood ends, the dice get packed away, and what remains is memory, connection, and the stories we tell to survive. The Upside Down is closed, but the legacy of Hawkins, and the kids who saved it, is firmly etched into television history. Overall, I give it a 9/10.
What did you think of the series finale? Now that the journey is over, do you believe Mike’s theory that Eleven is still out there, or was her sacrifice the only way the world could truly be saved? Leave a comment.
You can catch Stranger Things on Netflix.
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