Everyone Who Died In Stranger Things Final Season

Aside from certain narrative choices, one aspect for which “Stranger Things’” makers often get criticized is their unwillingness to kill off major characters. Which is also why in the fourth season, Eddie’s death felt so tragic and left such an impact on the overall story. For the final season, viewers had anticipated that some of the fan-favorite characters would not make it to the end. The Duffer brothers had also asked viewers to expect surprises for the final season, while making their stance clear that their series will not replicate the violence and death counts of shows like “Game of Thrones.” Still, there is a significant number of characters who meet their end in the final season, so let us take a look at the circumstances of their demise.

Spoilers Ahead

Wolfpack Sergeant Luis Ramirez

A member of Dr. Kay’s military police faction, Wolfpack, who had the entire town of Hawkins in their vice grip in the fifth season and tried to hunt down El, Sergeant Luis Ramirez appeared to be the only morally upright soldier in the faction. Ramirez couldn’t align himself with the ideology of the sadistic, ruthless Dr. Kay, who wanted to lure El using the captured teenagers. Ramirez proved that, unlike most others in the Wolfpack, he is not a mindless order-following machine, confronting Kay about her heinous actions. During Vecna’s vicious attack in MAC-Z in the final episode of part one of the fifth season, Ramirez tried to defend the kids from the monstrosity and sacrificed his life as Vecna brutally killed him along with the other Wolfpack soldiers. 

Kali’s Gang

Technically, Kali’s gang—which consisted of edgy, troubled teenagers Funshine, Dottie, Mick, and Axel—perished long before the events of the fifth season, but it is during the last episode of the first volume of the fifth season that their final fate is revealed by Kali. The teenage ruffians led by Kali went on a lifelong pursuit exacting revenge on people who ruined their lives, and at some point, they were hunted down by Dr. Kay’s militia. Kay wanted to continue what Brenner left unfinished—create more psychokinetic human weapons by using Number One’s blood, and for this reason, Kay was in pursuit of Kali, aka Number Eight. Members of Kali’s gang, who were more like siblings to her, met their tragic end as Kay’s lust for power resulted in their demise. 

Kali Prasad And Lieutenant Akers

Eight aka Kali herself didn’t survive till the end of the story, and her death was quite anticlimactic in my opinion, unless Mike’s theory about El’s survival is true. In the series finale, Kali and Hopper were captured by Wolfpack Lieutenant Akers, who tried to force them into revealing El’s location by holding Kali at gunpoint. A timely explosion caused by Murray distracted Akers’ unit and gave El a chance to take down the lieutenant, along with his soldiers, but a stray bullet caught Kali, and she didn’t recover from her fatal wound. Previously, Kali had surmised that both she and El need to meet their end alongside the Upside Down, Abyss, and the rest of its creations so that Dr. Kay or anyone like her never gets to exploit their abilities to torment future generations. This didn’t align with Mike or Hopper’s idea of saving El. Expectedly, it was assumed that a final confrontation would happen, with Kali playing a vital part. However, Kali perished even before Vecna and his horrors were wiped out of existence, and tragically enough—the military, who tortured, abused, and exploited her for the last few years, are the ones who took her life at the end. However, if Will’s theory is to be believed, then Kali had one final trick up her sleeve, and Hopper’s love for El made her see things differently in the final moments. Will believes Kali remotely conjured a decoy El, who is seen being dragged inside the temporal/spatial vortex created by the unstable Exotic Matter energy. While the world believed El met her tragic end, the real El settled somewhere peaceful. Kali probably wanted her sister to have a life she herself could never have and backed down from her crude decision for the greater good. 

Vecna and the Mind Flayer

After terrorizing the denizens of Hawkins for so long, Henry Creel, aka Vecna, finally met his end following an epic showdown with El and Mike in Abyss. Inside the physical manifestation of the Mind Flayer known as the Pain Tree, Vecna had created his lair, where El fights him while the rest of the team of teenage heroes fight the gigantic monstrosity outside. Will uses his newfound psychokinetic abilities to control Vecna’s body, which allows El to fatally impale him. Given Vecna and the Mind Flayer were connected in a symbiotic bond, Vecna’s death results in the behemoth biting the dust as well. The twelve abducted kids are rescued from Vecna’s lair, and Joyce delivers the final blow by decapitating Vecna. With the Upside Down and the Abyss destroyed following the explosion of the Exotic Matter, there is no chance that Vecna can exist, even as a remnant of his physical or non-physical form. 

Is El Alive?

Finally, the most tragic moment of the episode arrived in the form of El’s sacrifice. Adhering to Kali’s advice, El decided to stay behind in the collapsing Upside Down, as her family and friends, surrounded by Kay’s military, watched on helplessly. Leaving behind her past and living a normal life was never on the cards for El; she knew even if she chose to be with Hopper and Mike, trouble would find her sooner or later. Turning her back on the faint chance of peace and happiness, El sacrificed herself for the greater good. But the makers left El’s final fate ambiguous, as they too couldn’t deny the chance for her to have a happy ending at last. Mike’s speculation is pretty on point—El’s power would have been dampened by Wolfpack’s sonic weapons, which means El wouldn’t have the ability to conjure a psychic space where she had her final meeting with Mike. Mike believes that Kali conjured a decoy El and the psychic space to perfectly fake her sister’s death, while the real El disappeared forever into seclusion. Dustin, Will, Lucas, and Max choose to hope and believe in Mike’s version of El’s ending, and I think most of the viewers will do the same as well. 

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