Stranger Things star hints spinoff could skip decades into the future

As Stranger Things closes the book on its final season, star Gaten Matarazzo has hinted a potential spinoff could showcase what the characters will be up to decades into the future.

Stranger Things Season 5 is almost done filming, which means Netflix’s biggest original series will be coming to an end eight years after it premiered in 2016.

While fans will have to say goodbye to their favorite citizens of Hawkins, show creators Matt and Ross Duffer have been candid about wanting to keep the franchise going with various spinoffs.

And one of those branches could follow one of the core group of kids into adulthood as Matarazzo told RadioTimes, “I would love to see, potentially, if there’s a continuation of Dustin after [Season] 5, if any of us make it up to that point. I would love to see what would happen, what Dustin would be like as a 30-year-old. It could be a lot of fun.”

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He continued, “I’d be interested in seeing what their concept would be, but yeah, I’m absolutely open to anything.”

There’s a chance Matarazzo is playing coy about his character’s future in the upcoming season, as there’s a huge possibility that some major characters may not make it to the series finale.

When Stranger Things fans last left the group, Max Mayfield was left in a coma on the brink of death after a tense face off against the series’ main antagonist, Vecna.

And, as the final season will follow the group as they try to save both Hawkins and the world from the clutches of the Upside Down demon, the show could see its first real batch of main character losses.

Millie Bobby Brown, who plays Eleven, has been very vocal about wanting the show to kill off people in the main cast, telling The Wrap during a May 2022 interview, “We need to have the mindset of Game of Thrones. Kill me off! They tried killing David [Harbour] off and they brought him back! It’s ridiculous…The Duffer Brothers are sensitive Sallies who don’t want to kill anybody off.”

Matt Ross then refuted Brown’s claims during a July 2022 appearance on the Happy Sad Confused Podcast in which he explained that every death up until Season 5 served a “thematic” and “narrative purpose”, as they didn’t want to exploit any significant loss.

However, as the fate of everyone’s favorite group of teens/tweens is still up in the air, there’s a chance a Dustin spinoff may not be in the cards.

But, fans don’t have to be disappointed about the lovable goof’s arc ending in a disappointing way, as Matarazzo explained, “It definitely will be a bookend. I think it will wrap up really nicely.

“And I don’t think Matt Ross will want to approach anything like that for a long time. So if you were to ask me a year from now if I wanted to come back, I’d probably be like, ‘I’m gonna do some other stuff for a bit initially’, but who knows what it’s going to be like.”

As you wait for Stranger Things Season 5, check out our list of the best TV shows of 2024 so far and keep up with the new TV shows streaming this month.