The Stranger Things Finale Fallout Keeps Getting Worse

You know, to some degree, I gotta feel for the Stranger Things creators. Matt and Ross Duffer just wrapped up a decade-long streaming phenomenon that has certainly received a fair bit of praise from critics and fans over the years but, with its finale, has absolutely flopped in the eyes of some very loud viewers who weren’t pleased with how the show wrapped up. And now those creators have to do a press tour in which everything they say is picked apart by people ready to tear them to shreds for a final season they feel didn’t land. So I guess it’s not too surprising that Matt Duffer maybe regrets doing postmortem interviews at all, though I’m surprised he said that out loud and on the record.

In an interview with Josh Horowitz, both Duffers talked for about an hour about the Stranger Things finale, and at roughly the 25-minute mark, while the two are talking about soliciting input from actors about how they saw their characters ending up, , Matt asks, “Did Maya (Hawke) want to die, Ross, or am I making that up?” to which Ross responds that he might be making that up. Horowitz asks why he would have fabricated such a thing, and then Matt admits that he’s not been happy with how these interviews have been going, saying his brain is “fried.”

“I really shouldn’t have done any of these postmortem interviews,” he said. “I’m not in a good place. Like, why the hell we did any of them yesterday is beyond me. I’m like, fried. I’m getting over the flu, you know. So anyone mad at any answers we gave yesterday, just give me a break. cut me some slack.”

I get it. As someone who has interviewed many creatives who are dealing with an onslaught of questions from several journalists in rapid succession, I know it can be exhausting work. At a certain point it’s entirely possible that the mental spend becomes enough of a burden, you start being less practiced with your responses. And given the nature of Stranger Things and the fandom around it, the interviews the Duffers have been doing have spent a lot of time on fan theories and unanswered questions, with the Duffer brothers readily handing out answers.

Unsatisfied fans are hanging onto these interviews as if they’re going to possibly redeem Stranger Things or at least give them closure on some threads the show seemed incapable or unwilling to make good on. Several of the interviews the two have given since the show ended have only stirred the pot further, and some fans are hopping on Matt Duffer’s comments and interpreting them as just the latest evidence that they are justified in feeling that the bros didn’t approach the finale with the proper care and forethought.

https://t.co/HjX29ZUkOz pic.twitter.com/Q9KhHdrW1l

— agnes ⋆𐙚 ̊. (@elsbestie) January 4, 2026

No one should cut them any slack. The lack of attention to detail in a show built off detail is insane. And then to say stuff like “well I guess it happened off screen” is unacceptable when you have a budget of $400M.

Just admit the ex-wife was the GOAT writer and yall aren’t.… https://t.co/9ussAmh1tm

— Jake Franklin (@jake_theviking) January 4, 2026

"I am not in a good place." https://t.co/iQQ4L8AetW pic.twitter.com/WunYoK5yvO

— bee (@palladric) January 4, 2026

grown ass men when you ask them to write a finale that makes some sense because they had 4 years to do so😭 & when you ask them to elaborate on the horse shit they made they use the sniffles as an excuse pic.twitter.com/PRRmxZ1s2z https://t.co/ZHvU2coCOV

— will byers shady facts ᯓ★ (@jegulusmoony) January 4, 2026

You aren’t someone producing this stuff in a small apartment with pennies to their budget.

You’re millionaires getting paid millions to produce media that should be of the highest quality. The slack you’re allowed should be minimum given the amount invested in you.

If this was… https://t.co/uL7seEY0Wx

— J. Y. Song (@Critical_Scribe) January 4, 2026

is this a fucking joke?? lmfao they cannot be serious… imagine this is how you respond to fan criticism of not just the generational fumble that was season 5, but the really nonsensical and dumb answers you yourself gave about your own story. embarrassing. https://t.co/XGrYHpqwjq

— hellshee (@_hellshee_) January 4, 2026

It took ten years for ppl to realize they're just bad writers https://t.co/pItaEfTzZn

— 🎃𝙼𝚊𝚛𝚔𝙰𝚏𝚝𝚎𝚛𝙳𝚊𝚛𝚔🎃 (@MerkDEnglish) January 4, 2026

acting like it’s our fault they know nothing about the show they wrote https://t.co/tfqBdPkomN pic.twitter.com/CCeA5wHgZD

— sofia (@miwiseven) January 4, 2026

the duffers after retconing the show in interviews then retconing the interviews about the show: pic.twitter.com/RhwvZH9Zua

— alex (@willelmax) January 4, 2026

duffers, when asked to explain plot holes pic.twitter.com/IBU2YqV4yQ

— 𝔼𝕤𝕚𝕕𝕪❤️‍🩹 (@SugaD_0) January 4, 2026

Frankly, the hostility gives Mass Effect 3 ending fallout to me, particularly when I found out there’s a conspiracy theory stating that the current ending is actually a complete fake-out and the “real” ending is still coming. I don’t have any horse in this particular race, but I sure don’t think there’s much reason to believe that all that time, money, effort, and hype was devoted to a false finale. Sometimes things just end in a way you don’t like.