Stranger Things Season 4 jumps between Hawkins, California, and a Russian prison as a new Upside Down villain, Vecna, starts murdering teens and tearing open Hawkins to a full-on invasion. By the end, the group hurts Vecna but fails to stop him from opening massive gates that begin merging the Upside Down with the real world.

Main storylines

• In Hawkins, a metalhead named Eddie Munson is blamed when cheerleader Chrissy is gruesomely killed, but the gang discovers the real killer is Vecna, a powerful creature from the Upside Down who targets traumatized teens and kills them via visions. Max becomes one of his targets but escapes his curse once by focusing on her favorite song, leading to the famous scene of her running from Vecna.

• In California and Nevada, Eleven has lost her powers and is bullied at school, then is taken to a secret facility by Dr. Owens and Dr. Brenner to undergo the “NINA” program to regain her abilities. Through flashbacks there, she learns that friendly “Orderly” 001 is actually Henry Creel, the boy who massacred the Hawkins lab kids and became Vecna when she blasted him into the Upside Down years earlier.

• In Russia, Hopper is revealed to be alive but imprisoned in a Soviet camp where he’s forced to fight a Demogorgon. Joyce and Murray travel to Russia, stage a wild rescue involving a crooked smuggler named Yuri, and eventually reunite with Hopper before helping him destroy Upside Down creatures in the prison.

The final battle and ending

• The teens devise a multi-part plan: Max will act as bait to trap Vecna in her mind while Lucas protects her body; Nancy, Steve, and Robin attack Vecna’s physical form in the Upside Down; and Dustin and Eddie draw away swarms of demo-bats. Eddie dies heroically buying time, while Nancy, Steve, and Robin badly wound Vecna with fire and gunshots, knocking him out a window before his body vanishes.

• Max lets Vecna in to distract him but is overwhelmed; Lucas fights off jock Jason, whose interference breaks Max’s music and protection. Vecna fatally injures Max, and although Eleven enters her mind and jump-starts her heart, Max is left comatose and blind, with her consciousness seemingly gone.

• Vecna succeeds in killing four victims, which rips four huge gates through Hawkins and causes an earthquake-like disaster that kills many residents and devastates the town. In the closing scenes, Hopper returns to Hawkins, the core group reunites, and they look out as ash and dark clouds from the Upside Down pour over the fields, signaling that Vecna is still alive and the final war for Hawkins is coming.