The Stranger Things series finale briefly mentioned Montauk but why was that important to the show?
During the show’s conclusion, which aired on Wednesday, December 31, Hopper (David Harbour) told Joyce (Winona Ryder) about a job offer he received in Montauk, New York. Fans of the hit Netflix series might be surprised to know that Stranger Things was originally known as Montauk.
Creators Ross and Matt Duffer pitched the show as an “eight-hour sci-fi horror epic” set in Montauk and other locations in the Long Island area. According to the original pitch, Montauk was set in Long Island in 1980 and “inspired by the supernatural classics of that era, we explore the crossroads where the ordinary meet the extraordinary … emotional, cinematic and rooted in character, Montauk is a love letter to the golden age of Steven Spielberg and Stephen King — a marriage of human drama and supernatural fear.”
Montauk was chosen as the location due to other projects that inspired their writing including Steven Spielberg’s Jaws, which used Montauk as the fictional setting for Amity Island. They also leaned into actual conspiracy theories surrounding the village — specifically the Montauk Project.
Originated in Preston Nichols‘ Montauk Project book series, The Montauk Project is a theory claiming the United States government conducted secret projects at Camp Hero or Montauk Air Force Station in Montauk, New York, in an attempt to develop psychological warfare techniques.
Stranger Things was ultimately the title the Duffers settled on once the show started to go into production at Netflix. Despite Montauk being shelved as a setting, its mention in the series finale made some viewers wonder if that would be the focus of the Stranger Things spinoff.
“Ross wanted to put the Montauk thing in, and this is what I didn’t want to happen, is people thinking that there’s going to be a spinoff in Montauk,” Matt told Collider. “No, but I actually think it’s really cute. I’m glad we have it.”
The Duffer brothers previously confirmed that they were working on a spinoff.
“So we have an idea but the idea is to ultimately pass the baton to someone else who is hopefully talented and passionate. Even the idea of Ross and I doing a pilot and then leaving it, it just feels silly to me. You need to be there from the beginning to the end. We need to find a partner to help us with that,” Matt explained during an episode of the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast in July 2022. “I don’t want to do another decade in the Stranger Things universe. [But] we do want to be very involved.”
The writing duo added: “It is 1000 percent different from [Stranger Things]. It is not following [any of the main characters]. That is not interesting to me because I feel like we have done all that. It is very different. But it shares a connection with Stranger Things and the most connective tissue is the storytelling sensibility of it. There is story that connects to Stranger Things.”
Stranger Things is currently streaming on Netflix.
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