Stranger Things Season 5 is only a few weeks away, but fans already have a time travel theory that might completely change the franchise (and Hawkins) forever.
The final season of the show will take place 18 months after the end of Season 4, where Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) managed to break down the barrier between Hawkins and the Upside Down. It will find Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) and the gang on the backfoot as the military have locked things down to try to prevent further destruction.
The main Stranger Things Season 5 trailer showed Eleven training to make her powers stronger while the teens scrambled to figure out a way to fight the big bad, and Vecna had set his sights on Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) for the final time.
But fans discussing Will’s original kidnapping has led to a time travel theory for Stranger Things Season 5, and it would permanently change the entire show.
Stranger Things Season 5 time travel theory
The time travel theory emerged on TikTok, with fans taking cues from the trailer where Vecna tells Will that he’s going to help him “one last time.” Many guessed that Vecna met Will in 1983 when he was originally kidnapped by the demogorgon and wound up in the Upside Down.
Will’s kidnapping happened shortly after Eleven had accidentally created the Upside Down by blasting Vecna/Henry Creel into the other dimension, as seen in the flashbacks during Season 4. The theory suggests that because the Upside Down was frozen when Will was originally taken there, he was essentially trapped in a time loop.
The theory continues that Eleven might be able to use her powers to help Will find his younger self and guide him out of the Upside Down, saving himself from Vecna and the Mind Flayer in the process, which would potentially stop the villains from ever gaining access to the real world. It says:
“Older Will reaches back across time… Guiding his younger self through the nightmare of November 6, 1983. With Eleven’s powers amplifying his reach, together they could rewrite history, outsmart Vecna, and prevent the Upside Down from ever taking hold. Could this be the moment that finally saves Hawkins before it all begins… and closes the loop forever?”
Fans in the comments love the idea, but one of them pointed out a major issue with the theory. They wrote: “Grandfather paradox. When something happens in the past, that brings you in the future back in time to save your grandfather, and you change it, then there is no reason in the future to travel back to change it.”
Another added an emotional caveat to the time travel theory: killing young Will instead of saving him.
“What if they realize the problem is that Will survived, so he finds his young self in the Upside Down and convinces him to die instead of talking to Joyce and trying to go back home… so then both young and old Will die and the story never happens”
It’s quite an out-there theory, but considering this is a show with telekinetic powers, monsters, and alternate dimensions, it’s surely not out of the realm of possibility that time travel and time loops could play a part of the story.
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