Spoilers below.

Since Netflix’s Stranger Things premiered in 2016, one specific mystery has remained unanswered. But after nine years of theories and smokescreens, season 5’s first batch of episodes , which released on November 26, finally revealed the “why” behind the kidnapping that started it all: the reason Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) was Vecna’s (Jamie Campbell Bower) first victim. In doing so, the series introduced a massive twist that will completely change the trajectory of the final four episodes, set to drop next month .

But we’ll get to that in a bit.

Let’s take a moment to process what went down in episodes 1–4. The town of Hawkins, Indiana, is under military-enforced quarantine after Eleven’s (Millie Bobby Brown) showdown against Vecna literally tore apart the commu

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