Stranger Things 4‘s emotional “Dear Billy,” the episode where Max escaped Vecna’s clutches, showed where the Upside Down came from. It’s not just a dark realm of monsters that exists on its own. It’s a mirror dimension of our world devoid of hope and warmth because it’s the tangible manifestation of human suffering. It exists—always has and always will—because human pain exists. That revelation was horrifying yet hopeful, because as I wrote, “ There cannot be light without darkness, nor pain without joy. We would not feel guilt like Max, or experience grief like Nancy, if we did not also feel love.” And if our negative emotions can physically materialize as the Upside Down, that means our positive emotions can materialize, too. What would that dimension actually look like? Stranger Things 5 might show us in the show’s series finale titled “The Rightside Up.”
On its own, the name “The Rightside Up” is enough to conjure up the idea of the Upside Down’s counterpart. That series finale title implies the show’s sinister mirror realm of darkness has an opposite utopian mirror dimension full of light. It especially seems conceivable, maybe even likely, because season four already raised that possibility. The show’s fourth installment marked the first time any characters even questioned where the Upside Down came from or why it exists. We got answers as we learned about Henry Creel/Vecna, Max’s own descent into his realm, and how “all evil must have a home.”
If all evil, in all its many forms, must have a home, so must all that is good. And if evil manifests as its own dimension in the Upside Down, good can/must also do the same, for you cannot have one without the other. Nothing can be bad if nothing is good. The place where good manifests might very well be The Rightside Up. Another mirror world created by humans who live in a plane where all emotions exist.
If that parallel world of goodness—a place of light created by mankind’s hope, love, dreams, joy, and gratitude—is as real as the Upside Down, we can imagine what it looks like. The Rightside Up might be everything Henry Creel rejected in life, a repudiation of everything his home in the Upside Down stands for. It might be where our idea of Heaven/Utopia/Paradise comes from. Or it might just be as simple and as lovely as Hawkins, Indiana on the most beautiful day of the year, only on that day the Sun never sets and no one ever feels pain. But it’s not what the Rightside Up looks like that could matter most to fans. It’s who we might find there.
The main cast heading into Strangers Things 5 has survived years of fighting demogorgons, the Mind Flayer, Russian soldiers, and their own government. But many of their friends, allies, neighbors, and loved ones have not. Benny, Barb, Bob, Billy, Chrissy, Alexei, Eddie, Eleven’s fellows students, and more have all died during this interdimensional battle brought on by Cold War enemies. Each death has made the world a little darker and a little sadder. Their losses have fed Vecna because each loss has increased human suffering for those left behind. And yet, all of the good they represented did not get consumed by the Upside Down. It couldn’t have, because those things can’t exist there. The best parts of them went somewhere else.
So where did all their love and goodness go? More importantly where did they go? The answer to both seems as lovely as a land of monsters seems terrible.
Stranger Things 5 will end the story of Hawkins, Indiana’s brush with the ultimate darkness. It might do so in the most hopeful way. It could show love and goodness manifest the same as hate and evil in a place defined by beauty and joy. And that might be where we learn the many characters who died didn’t see their own stories end. They might have left their loved ones feeling upside down when they left the world, but they ended up in a place that is rightside up.
Mikey Walsh is a staff writer at Nerdist who wants justice for Benny. Why Benny? The man made burgers for a living. Speaking of, you can follow Mikey on Bluesky at @burgermike. And also anywhere someone is ranking the Targaryen kings.