The Duffer Brothers Just Set Up Millie Bobby Brown To Get Asked About Eleven's Fate For The Rest Of Forever

To say that Stranger Things’ series finale sparked debates is like saying the great Biblical flood caused some dampness. It’s now one of few TV shows with an ending so disputed that a chunk of the fandom conspiracy-theorized that their displeasure was the intent of creators Matt and Ross Duffer, and that a secret episode would be released with the”real” ending. That doesn’t seem to have panned out, but it seems clear that this will forever be in the much-discussed TV finale annals.

Considering its final season cemented Stranger Things as Netflix’s biggest domestic commodity, Millie Bobby Brown will likely always get asked about the show in interviews, regardless of what she’s promoting. But the Duffer brothers added some additional fuel to that fire by confirming Brown does indeed know the truth about Eleven’s fate, and whether or not Mike’s epilogue theorizing (which I take issue with) reflected reality or not.

Speaking on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, the co-creator siblings talked about a slew of topics regarding the finale and the franchise’s immediate future. Naturally, the conversation also turned to the mystery behind what really happened to Eleven, who seemingly sacrificed herself in the destruction of the Upside Down, with Mike later hypothesizing that she looped Kali in to keep her safe. Not that the Duffers actually clarified anything on that front, but they did confirm that there IS a hard answer, as opposed to an amorphous idea. As Matt Duffer put it:

In some ways, I fully understand where he's coming from, and I agree that shielding audiences from certain parts of the creative process is more or less necessary. Lots of truly great ideas come from truly stupid places, so knowing every inch of the ins and outs won't always add to one's enjoyment of a particular project. When it's about the unclear destiny of a Top 3 character, however, there should be more closure, more insight, more something that isn't just Mike's glass-half-full take shared with his friends that he'd literally just come up with that day.

Beyond fans' confused frustrations, though, the Duffers maybe should have thought about Millie Bobby Brown's own future before revealing that the actress 100% knows the answer. As Matt put it:

If only it were as easy as saying "Don't waste your time." IF ONLY. Don't get me wrong, I know that people would throw that question at her constantly even if Matt Duffer claimed that she didn't know the real answer, so just having a mysterious ending in and of itself is a double-edged sword in that way. But there's a big difference between a softballed "You really don't know what happened?" and a probing "Seriously, if you know, why can't you just say it?" One can only hope everyone's default mode will be "curiously polite."

When asked if Noah Schnapp might know anything, the brothers laughed, and then immediately went to work on making sure the answer to that was a resounding "Nope." Ross responded with:

As he was saying it, Matt was already pulling his phone out to text Brown to double-down on advising her to not share it with her good buddy, lest he also get hounded for the rest of time about what happened to Eleven.

All five seasons of Stranger Things are available to stream on Netflix, with the animated spinoff Tales from '85 hitting the 2026 TV schedule at a later point.