How Many of These 6 Stranger Things Facts Do You Know?

The fact is, there are a lot of Stranger Things facts, from how the show was created to certain 80s references found in it. However, I’m only going to explore six facts about the series, its creators, and its stars.

But pay attention, because there are more Stranger Things facts layered in each fact description, nerds.

1. The Duffer Brothers created Stranger Things.

I’m always trying to memorize Stranger Things facts because I love playing trivia and I know one day the question will come up, “Who created it?”

Die-hard fans know Matt and Ross Duffer created the series, but did you know that before Stranger Things they wrote four episodes of M. Night Shyamalan’s series, Wayward Pines?

Side note: It seems with all the 80s stars they’ve worked with, from Matt Dillon to Winona Ryder and Matthew Modine and beyond, that you could almost play a Kevin Bacon kind of game with the Duffer Brothers, doesn’t it?

2. The Duffer Brothers are identical twins…or are they?

According to an interview they did with Vulture, the Duffer Brothers don’t actually know if they truly are identical twins or not from a genetics standpoint.

Does anyone else find it interesting they’ve never had a test done to determine that? It seems like with their preference for sci-fi subject matter they would have wanted to put science to work to find out.

Or maybe because they look enough alike to qualify as identical that’s all that matters to them?

I’d also like to know which one was born first, but that doesn’t seem to matter either because I haven’t found that in any information about, or interviews with, them yet. But if you know, please Check-In below with that info!

3. Stranger Things was not only originally titled Montauk but it was also going to be set there.

The Montauk Project, an alleged government psychological warfare experiment that’s likely a conspiracy theory, provided inspiration for Stranger Things, but lots of 80s pop culture also influenced it. Harper’s Bazaar reported the idea for the series was actually born from the “premise, ‘What if Steven Spielberg directed a Stephen King book?’

Here’s how Ross Duffer explained the rezoning decision to Vulture:

It was set in Montauk. We always loved that idea of the Amity feel in Jaws, in a coastal town. For production reasons and other reasons we ended up moving it. We needed to shoot in Atlanta. We ended up falling in love with this idea that it’s more Anywhere, USA, and also, just being in Atlanta, doubling as Indiana, it reminded us of our childhoods and our homes.

4. Speaking of books and influences, Stephen King’s Firestarter influences a couple of aspects of Stranger Things.

The font for the Stranger Things logo looks so familiar to 80s horror fans and so Stephen King-ish because it is. According to Time, the Art Noveau-inspired ITC Benguiat was created by “legendary typographer Ed Benguiat.”

The logo was designed to look like the one on Stephen King’s novel, Firestarter.

Oh, and Eleven…her characters is a nod to the pyrokinetic little girl in King’s book.

5. “Eleven” was not the first strange girl actress Millie Bobby Brown played.

Before landing her role on Stranger Things, Brown played Madison O’Donnell on the BBC America series, Intruders.

And here’s an ironic connection between Brown and King: the Master of Horror noticed Brown’s performance in Intruders and Tweeted about it long before the Duffer Brothers had even cast her in the part. (Had they even finished the script yet?)

Millie Brown, the girl in INTRUDERS, is terrific. Is it my imagination, or are child actors a lot better than they used to be?

— Stephen King (@StephenKing) September 28, 2014

6. Stranger Things Day is on November 6.

Netflix created Stranger Things Day in 2018 in honor of the day Will Byers went missing in 1983. (Well, they created the day to celebrate the series, but that’s the reason they picked that date.)

Check-In

How many of these Stranger Things facts did you already know? Anything new you learned?