After the dramatic Volume 1 conclusion, the cast and crew promise it's just the tip of the iceberg. Stranger Things 5 stars preview what's ahead in Volume 2 and series finale: 'It does not scale down' After the dramatic Volume 1 conclusion, the cast and crew promise it's just the tip of the iceberg. By Nick Romano :maxbytes(150000):stripicc()/NicholasRomanoauthorphotoadc9b60763e34711935cbf7b3d768d24.jpg) Nick Romano is a senior editor at with 15 years of journalism experience covering entertainment. His work previously appeared in Vanity Fair, Vulture, IGN, and more.

After the dramatic Volume 1 conclusion, the cast and crew promise it's just the tip of the iceberg.

Stranger Things 5 stars preview what's ahead in Volume 2 and series finale: 'It does not scale down'

After the dramatic Volume 1 conclusion, the cast and crew promise it's just the tip of the iceberg.

By Nick Romano

Nick Romano is a senior editor at ** with 15 years of journalism experience covering entertainment. His work previously appeared in *Vanity Fair*, Vulture, IGN, and more.

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November 27, 2025 1:00 p.m. ET

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Finn Wolfhard, Caleb McLaughlin, Natalia Dyer, Joe Keery, Charlie Heaton, and Gaten Matarazzo in 'Stranger Things 5'. Credit:

Courtesy of Netflix

- The *Stranger Things 5* cast and creators tease what's ahead in Volume 2 and the series finale.

- "It gets very big," Matt Duffer says of the back half of the season.

- Shawn Levy on directing Volume 2 episodes: "There's a lot of ambitious sequences in it, but also some really juicy, emotional character work."

**Warning: This article contains spoilers from *Stranger Things* season 5, Volume 1. **

It's hard to imagine what the rest of *Stranger Things* season 5 is going to look like after Volume 1. The first four episodes arrived Wednesday night on Netflix and, collectively, they feel like their own contained season of television, complete with full character arcs, intense event set pieces, and one shocker of a cliffhanger. Now, fans await Volume 2, which will bring episodes 5-7 on Christmas Day, and then the 2-hour series finale come New Year's Eve.

How much bigger is the final season going to get? "It does not scale down, I will say that much," series co-creator Ross Duffer tells ** of the back half of *Stranger Things 5*. "This is one reason it's taken so long to get out and why we were filming for so long."

The final season filmed over a calendar year from January-December 2024. Ross' brother and creative partner, Matt Duffer, calls the episode 4 Demogorgon battle "the most challenging sequence we shot for the entire season" from a logistics perspective. From there, "it gets very big," he teases.

"I would say Volume 2, though, more than scaling up on the action, visual effects front, the emotional aspect of it is really what gets bigger and more impactful," Matt continues. "Obviously, we're barreling towards the end and the final episode is, in fact, the end of this story for these characters. So it's highly emotional — and much more emotional than Volume 1."

The Upside Down scene from the back half of 'Stranger Things 5'.

The stars echo a lot of the same sentiments. "I haven't even seen the Volume 2 episodes yet, but from what I remember, it just keeps getting bigger, or you keep up that stamina," Sadie Sink, our resident Max Mayfield, says. "What's smart about the volumes, too, is that it's all building to episode 4 in the first one, and we start on a higher note [in Volume 2] but then build to episode 7 and then the series finale."

"You thought Volume 1 was crazy..." Noah Schnapp, who plays Will Byers, begins, while his costar and bestie Millie Bobby Brown, who stars as Eleven, finishes that statement: "Get ready."

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The first Volume of *Stranger Things 5* left viewers with the remains of a massive Demogorgon battle, featuring a Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) appearance, that laid waste to the military base in Hawkins. As the Duffers confirmed to EW, Will was able to channel the big bad's psychic powers and destroy the monsters about to harm his friends, which adds what Matt Duffer calls a "new chess piece on the board in the battle for Hawkins."

Eleven also discovers her "sister" Kali/Eight (Linnea Berthelsen) is the thing hidden behind mystery door No. 1 in Dr. Kay's Upside Down laboratory. Meanwhile, the mind of Max has been trapped in Vecna's "mindscape" (essentially his memories) all this time while her body remains in Hawkins. Mike (Finn Wolfhard) and Nancy's (Natalia Dyer) little sister, Holly (Nell Fisher), remains with Max, while Vecna continues his hunt for the 12 children that he needs to fulfill some mysterious mission.

"The end of this volume is like a finale in itself," Charlie Heaton, who plays Will's older brother Jonathan Byers, comments. "If that was a long movie, it would end there and there'd be another one."

Joe Keery, who plays Steve Harrington, describes the later episodes as a "big swing."

Finn Wolfhard's Will and Jamie Campbell Bower's Vecna on 'Stranger Things 5'.

Shawn Levy, a longtime *Stranger Things* producer, typically directs episodes 3 and 4 of every season. Thanks to his commitments making *Deadpool & Wolverine*, he shifted gears for season 5, instead directing episode 6 and then co-directing episode 7 with the Duffer Brothers.

"I have to be cautious of spoilers. Let's just say there's a lot of ambitious sequences in it, but also some really juicy, emotional character work," Levy says of episode 6, titled "Escape From Camazotz."

For episode 7, "I'd never gotten to do one of those classic late-season 15-character scenes in a room, breaking down the plan, explaining the mythology," he points out. "I've always loved those scenes 'cause it's so satisfying. We wait all season for the characters to intersect and come up with that plan. So I got to direct some of those days, 14-15 of our series regulars in one room. It was chaos, very hard to get anyone to pay attention. Felt like a boisterous family reunion, but very fun to get to direct that kind of scene."

Levy, a filmmaker who regularly references the works of Steven Spielberg, further teases how "certain sequences are particularly Spielbergian in their inspiration" in the episodes he directs. "Every episode [in season 5] is ambitious storytelling, but there are some sequences in episode 6, for instance, where for something to feel event-y, it needs to be more than just big and complicated. It needs to be an ambitious set piece that is also rooted in key themes or key character growth moments."

Mike (Finn Wolfhard) walks the gang through the plan of attack in 'Stranger Things 5'.

It applies to the budgets, as well. Season 5's episodes don't just look expensive, "they are!" Levy exclaims. He came to *Stranger Things 5* after directing *Deadpool & Wolverine*, and he's now busy shooting *Star Wars: Starfighter* with Ryan Gosling. By comparison, "These episodes might as well be called movies," he says.

He describes one sequence in episode 6 he wishes he could spoil.

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"I remember when I read a first season outline from the brothers and I said at that time, 'Oh my God, whatever poor son of a b---- has to do this sequence, dead meat. I wouldn't even begin to know how to figure out how to do that,'" the filmmaker recalls. "I begged them to actually change the idea. Couldn't it be something that's a little more doable? And they're like, 'No, it'll be awesome.' And then cut to, my calendar has me doing that episode and that sequence. I was the poor son of a b---- who had to figure out how to pull it off."

Wolfhard's advice is to savor it all. "I know that's stupid because I think a lot of people are gonna binge it. That's what streaming is and that's why it can be great," he says. "But also because it's the last season, my advice, if you can, try to make it last as long as you can."

It helps when there are two more episode drops through the new year.

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Source: Sci-Fi

Published: December 01, 2025 at 01:38PM on Source: MARIO MAG

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