More than any other season, season 4 of Stranger Things was full of plot-propelling twists and heartwrenching turns that will have lasting repercussions going into the fifth and final season.
While some twists have been mind-blowing (can you say Henry Creel/One/Vecna anyone?) others have been subtle, but still important. One such twist was the discovery of a seemingly frozen-in-time Upside Down.
In “Chapter Seven: The Massacre at Hawkins Lab,” Nancy, Steve, Eddie, and Robin travel through the gate in Lover’s Lake — affectionately named the “Watergate” by Dustin — that Vecna created when he killed Lucas’ teammate, Patrick. There, they went to Mike and Nancy’s house to gather guns so they could kill Vecna. Except when they got to Nancy’s house they couldn’t find any guns, at least not where Nancy left them in the real world.
Even more confusing than the absence of guns was the presence of things that Nancy had thrown out years earlier. While rummaging through her belongings, she found old study cards from sophomore year, old wallpaper that had long been replaced, and most damning of all, journal entries that stopped on November 6, 1983.
“I think the reason that my guns aren’t here is because they don’t exist yet … This diary should be full of entries, it’s not. The last entry is November 6, 1983 — the day Will went missing; the day the gate opened. We’re in the past.”
Why is the Upside Down frozen in 1983 and not in 1979?
Why are we assuming the Upside Down should be frozen in 1979 and not 1983, if it must be frozen at all? Well, that’s the year Eleven blasted Henry Creel/One through the crack in the wall in the Rainbow Room. Whether or not that created the parallel dimension remains to be seen, but that has been the assumption. However, the fact that it’s stuck in 1983 means its supposed creation is hardly as important as the day it became intrinsically linked to Hawkins.
Eleven didn’t actually create a gate to the Upside Down in 1979
A possible explanation for the Upside Down being stuck in 1983 could be that Eleven didn’t actually create a gate when she blasted Vecna into the dimension in 1979. A gate implies two-way travel, but the crack in the wall in the Rainbow Room suggests it was more of a shove and less of an opening. That crack never widened into a gate, at least not as far as we know, so it was more like a small opening that shut itself behind Vecna.
Eleven’s creation of the first gate is more important than Vecna’s banishing
It’s possible that when Eleven contacted the Demogorgon and created the first permanent gate in season 1, that action froze the Upside Down. As we saw, the Demogorgon that escaped was wrapped in a slimy cacoon when Eleven happened upon it. That could be a metaphor for the birth of the parallel dimension that we know; i.e. a dimension that mirrors Hawkins.
Stranger Things production designer Chris Trujillo corroborated this in a featurette, saying that Eleven’s creation of the gate is directly tied to the Upside Down being frozen.
“The moment that the Upside Down was quote-unquote ‘created’ inadvertently by Eleven, the set dressing and the world of the Upside Down is frozen in that moment. So like when we’re in Nancy’s room, we’ll discover in the Upside Down that Nancy’s room is as it was season 1 when we first were introduced to it.”
The Upside Down wasn’t the Upside Down yet in 1979
Thirdly, and even more confusingly, is the possibility that Upside Down as we know it is just a manifestation of Vecna’s mind. It didn’t look like Hawkins when Vecna first arrived; it looked like a barren wasteland. That would suggest it isn’t a parallel dimension at all, and instead is shaped by Vecna’s own perceptions. Eleven opening the first permanent gate and Will disappearing might point to two potential weaknesses helpful in killing Vecna, as both played a part in the day the Upside Down froze in time. If so, that could have big implications for season 5.
It all comes back to Will
The Duffer brothers have said time and time again that Will is a vital piece of the Stranger Things puzzle. In the season 4 finale, Will clearly still has a connection to the Upside Down — when he senses the Upside Down’s presence, he gets goosebumps on the back of his neck. That is no measly detail. When season 5 rolls around, we can likely expect some big plot twist to blow the whole storyline wide open, and my bet is that Will will be at the center of it. The Duffer brothers have already confirmed that Will will have a big part to play in season 5.
Will we ever get an answer to why the Upside Down is stuck in 1983?
The Duffer brothers confirmed that while season 4 leaned heavily into the Vecna storyline, season 5 will mostly be about the Upside Down itself. “What we haven’t really discussed is exactly what the Upside Down is,” Ross Duffer told Collider. “The big reveals that are coming in Season 5 are really about the Upside Down itself, which we only start to hint at.”
The Duffer brothers also said that season 5 is “setting up us coming full circle back to Season 1.” So, while there may not be a clear answer to why the Upside Down is frozen in 1983 yet, you wouldn’t be gambling too fiercely to assume it has something to do Eleven opening the first gate, and Will’s disappearance and subsequent infection.
When season 4 ended, the Upside Down had completely spilled over into Hawkins, so it makes sense that the alternate dimension will become the central focus going forward. We’ll have to wait a bit longer to have our questions answered, as season 5 is still in the early stages of production, but as soon as we learn the answer to this perplexing question, we will let you know.