‘Stranger Things’ Creators Confirm Eleven’s Fate After Series Finale

Major spoilers ahead for the Stranger Things series finale!

The Stranger Things series finale has raised some questions, including Eleven’s fate, and creators The Duffer Brothers are confirming what happened.

In Volume 3 of the fifth and final season, Millie Bobby Brown’s Eleven stayed in the Upside Down as it was being destroyed.

While it seemed like that was the end of it, Mike (Finn Wolfhard) shared during the group’s final Dungeons & Dragons campaign that she might have gotten away by way of her sister, 008/Kali (Linnea Berthelsen), who was able to make her invisible before succumbing to her gunshot wound in the Upside Down. Eleven was able to slip away and get far away so she wouldn’t be caught by the government. It’s not exactly known what became of Eleven, if she truly did get away or if she was destroyed along with the Upside Down. Luckily, Matt and Ross Duffer spoke to Tudum about El’s fate.

“What we wanted to do was confront the reality of what her situation was after all of this and how could she live a normal life,” said Matt. “These are the questions that we’ve been posing this season that Hopper just doesn’t even want to think or talk about. Mike’s obviously talked about it a lot, but it’s sort of this fantasy version that would never work. There are two roads that Eleven could take. There’s this darker, more pessimistic one or the optimistic, hopeful one. Mike is the optimist of the group and has chosen to believe in that story.”

Ross admitted there was never a version of the story where “Eleven was hanging out with the gang at the end.” He continued, “She represents magic in a lot of ways and the magic of our childhood. For our characters to move on and for the story of Hawkins and the Upside Down to come to a close, Eleven had to go away. We thought it would be beautiful if our characters continued to believe in that happier ending, even if we didn’t give them a clear answer to whether that’s true or not. The fact that they’re believing in it, we just thought it was such a better way to end the story and a better way to represent the closure of this journey and their journey from children to adults.”

“And the reality is, if Eleven is out there, the most that they could hope for is a belief that it’s true because they can’t be in contact with her,” added Matt. “Everything falls apart if that were the case. So if that’s the narrative, this is really the best way to keep her alive. And it’s about Mike and everyone finding a way to move past what’s happened.”

Basically, the ending seems to be up in the air when it comes to Eleven. Fans seem to be divided on social media in terms of whether she’s alive or not. 18 months had passed between the Upside Down and possibly Eleven being destroyed, and Mike telling everyone this new version of Eleven’s story, so who knows what truly went down. The real question is, do you believe that Eleven’s story isn’t quite done? Watch the series finale of Stranger Things and the record-breaking finale season now on Netflix and decide for yourself.