The upcoming Netflix’s Stranger Things Season 5 is the last and final season, but fans are hoping there could be spin-offs. Now, the creators have given an update on whether Eleven and the rest of the Hawkins gang could return or not.

The Duffer Brothers reveal if Eleven and her friends will be in Stranger Things live-action spin-offs

Stranger Things’ Ross Duffer confirmed to SFX Magazine that the upcoming Season 5 will officially close the book on the characters fans have grown to love since 2016. “This really is the end of the story of Eleven and Mike and Lucas and Dustin and Steve and all these characters, and Hawkins specifically,” he stated. (via GamesRadar+)

His brother and co-creator, Matt Duffer, echoed the sentiment, adding that keeping the story open for potential sequels would diminish its emotional weight. “There’s not really anything else worth exploring,” he said, adding, “The book is closed, and the ending wouldn’t be very impactful if we left it cracked open for some sort of sequel.” This means that no future Stranger Things live-action spin-offs revisiting Hawkins or the Upside Down are currently in development.

Furthermore, the creators even addressed the common phenomenon of cast reunions years after a show ends, dismissing the idea outright. Ross Duffer elaborated, “You don’t want to do something in 20 years where a bunch of characters are like, ‘Oh, we better get Mike back, he knew how to handle this!’ That’s not what we’re interested in.” They are committed to preserving the way it needs to be played out, ensuring that nothing they create later will “step on that.”

While Matt Duffer joked with the cast about a potential return, saying, “I would joke with our cast that in 20 years, if our careers have really floundered, if we need a paycheque, we can always crawl back, like another rift has opened in the Upside Down,” he was quick to confirm it isn’t a serious consideration. He insisted, “We’ve said everything we want to say about those characters and the Upside Down.”

Season 5 will come out in three parts, with Volume 1 releasing on November 26.