8 Greatest Horror Easter Eggs in 'Stranger Things,' Ranked

Image via Netflix Published Oct 9, 2026, 8:02 PM EDT Michael John Petty is a Senior Author for Collider who spends his days writing, in fellowship with his local church, and enjoying each new day with his wonderful wife and precious daughters. At Collider, he writes features, reviews, recaps, interviews, and breaking news on select occasion. In addition to writing about stories, Michael has told a few of his own, from supernatural thrillers to historical fiction. His Western short story, The Devil's Left Hand, received the Spur Award for "Best Western Short Fiction" in 2025 from the Western Writers of America, of which he is a member. Michael currently resides in North Idaho with his growing family. Sign in to your Collider account Stranger Things was always a fun blend of interdimensional science fiction, '80s coming-of-age adventures, and horror. However you feel about the way the Netflix drama concluded, the rest of the ride offered plenty of thrills, chills, and nods to some of the horror genre's greatest works. Looking for some of the best Easter eggs that the Duffer Brothers peppered throughout Stranger Things? We've got you covered. From obvious nods to some of horror's most frightening offerings to clever "blink-and-you'll-miss-it" inserts that pay tribute to the show's biggest influences, Stranger Things was never been a stranger when it came to referencing pop culture. Indeed, the show was sometimes a bit too referential for its own good, but when it came to these horror flicks, the show was right on the money. Here are some of the greatest horror Easter eggs to grace the streaming screen. 8 Nancy and Robin Reenact 'Silence of the Lambs' Image via Netflix A more overt callback that virtually everyone recognized when they saw it, Season 4's "Chapter Four: Dear Billy" sent an undercover Nancy Wheeler (Natalia Dyer) and Robin Buckley (Maya Hawke) to Pennhurst Mental Hospital to visit a character we'll get around to talking more about later. Upon arriving at this inmate's cell, the pair wander down a hall structured remarkably similar to the one that Anthony Hopkin's Hannibal Lector resides in at the beginning of The Silence of the Lambs. And yes, it's just as creepy. Of course, no bodily fluids are tossed as the ladies the same way they were at Clarice Starling (Jodie Foster) in the 1991 film, but the horror nod is as clear as day. From the basic way the cells are structured to the overall blocking of the entire sequence, it's obvious that Stranger Things wanted its audience to know exactly what it was trying to do. As one of the most influential thrillers of all time, this callback doesn't come as a shock. 7 Betelgeuse's Tombstone Image via Netflix Okay, maybe calling Beetlejuice a horror movie rather than a dark fantasy comedy is a stretch, but if what happened to the Maitlands in the Tim Burton classic happened to you, you'd think you were living in a horror movie too. That said, if you look back at Season 2's "Chapter Three: The Pollywog," you'll remember that Joyce (Winona Ryder, who obviously starred in Beetlejuice) visited Mr. Clarke (Randy Havens) to better understand her slipping magnets. While there, we see a small miniature just beneath Clark's coiled device. That's right, a small model of Betelgeuse's tombstone is nestled in right there, just about the same size it is in the actual movie. It's a quick thing — if you didn't catch it, you'd never know it was there — but it's a fun reminder of the late '80s classic that helped kickstart Ryder's career in the first place. If only the show could have brought in Michael Keaton too. 6 Vecna Is Basically Pinhead From 'Hellraiser' This one won't come as a shock to fans of Hellraiser, but the entirety of Jamie Campbell Bower's Vecna is a reference to the horror icon Pinhead. Both horror antagonists have bodies that were mutilated after entering another dimension, boast deep and ominous voices that create a sense of presence, and love to torment curious teenagers who wandered into his domain. They may not look identical, but there are clear similarities to the way that both characters were constructed. In fact, Bower wanted the references to go even further. The actor had already modeled his voice after Pinhead, but he wanted the Season 4 finale to conclude with a visual nod to Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth, per Syfy Wire. The problem was, when they tried to make it happen, it looked terrible. While that reference was scrapped, Vecna as a whole was still crafted to partially resemble the Hellraiser villain — and that certainly comes across in Bower's performance. 5 Will's Possession Looks Like 'The Exorcist' Image via Netflix The second season of Stranger Things took things in a dark, new direction when Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) was possessed by the Mind Flayer. Not unlike what happened to young Regan MacNeil (Linda Blair) in The Exorcist, Will begins to experience symptoms that not even medical science can rightly diagnose. By the season finale, "Chapter Nine: The Gate," the interdimensional demon is eventually expelled from the boy's body, but only after several events that feel ripped from the iconic horror film. From the Mind Flayer's demands to keep the Byers home cold to a fierce mother standing up for her child no matter what the "experts" say, much of Will's possession arc mirrors that of The Exorcist. In the finale, Will is even tied to the bed, violently thrashing, before the Mind Flayer is eventually expelled from him. Of course, when you consider The Exoricst to be on the Mount Rushmore of horror movies, it's a no-brainer that Stranger Things pulled its possession from the best. Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes What Is Your Biggest Horror Nightmare? Elm Street · Chucky · Scream · The Conjuring Four horror franchises. Four completely different ways of scaring you. One waits until you fall asleep. One makes sure nobody believes you. One is already in your group of friends. And one is in the house with your family. Answer eight quick questions about how you actually watch horror, and find out which nightmare was built for you. 😴Elm Street(Freddy Krueger) 🧸Chucky(Child's Play) 📞Scream(Ghostface) 🕯️The Conjuring(The Warren Files) FIND YOUR NIGHTMARE → 01 Which horror scene makes you cover your eyes? Four classic images. One of them is worse than the others for you. ASomebody falling asleep when they really should not. BA toy that has moved, and nobody touched it. CA phone ringing in an empty house. DA child talking to somebody who is not there. NEXT QUESTION → 02 You are home alone and you hear a noise. First thought? Everybody has one. It arrives before you have decided anything. AI am exhausted and my mind is playing tricks on me. BSomething in this room is not where I left it. CSomebody is in here with me. DThis house has never felt entirely right. NEXT QUESTION → 03 Which horror movie rule would you break first? Everybody thinks they would survive. Almost nobody actually does. ANever fall asleep. BNever leave it out of your sight. CNever answer the phone. DNever go down to the basement. NEXT QUESTION → 04 Something genuinely frightening happens. What do you do? Not in a film. In your actual living room, tonight. AConvince myself I imagined the whole thing. BTell someone, and brace for them not believing me. CWork out which person I know could be behind it. DGet everybody in the house into one room. NEXT QUESTION → 05 How do you actually watch a horror film? Be honest about this one. Nobody is checking. AFine during. Wide awake at two in the morning. BShouting at the screen that nobody is listening. CCalling the twist out loud before it lands. DThrough my fingers, holding on to something. NEXT QUESTION → 06 Somebody offers you serious money. Which do you still refuse? The amount does not matter. There is one on this list you are not doing. AFall asleep in a room I have never been in before. BKeep an old doll on the shelf facing my bed. CAnswer every unknown number that calls after midnight. DSpend one night alone in a house with a history. NEXT QUESTION → 07 Which feeling stays with you a week after the film? Good horror does not stop when the credits do. ANot wanting to turn the bedroom light off. BNot trusting one particular object in my house. CLooking twice at people I have known for years. DFeeling like something came home with me. NEXT QUESTION → 08 Something wakes you at 3am. What is the worst possibility? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides your nightmare. AThat I am still asleep, and it knows it. BThat the thing nobody believed me about is here. CThat somebody with a key is downstairs. DThat something is in the doorway, watching us sleep. REVEAL MY NIGHTMARE → The Lights Just Went Out Your Nightmare Is…Four franchises, four completely different ways of getting underneath your skin. This is the one built out of your particular fear, why it works so well on you, and what it would leave behind. Elm StreetYour nightmare does not wait outside the door. It waits for you to close your eyes, which you are going to have to do eventually, because nobody has ever won that particular argument. Freddy is horror's cruellest idea: a threat that lives in the one place you cannot guard, cannot lock, and cannot avoid forever. You are the one who is fine during the film and wide awake at two in the morning. Your own head is where this does its damage. These films understood exhaustion as a horror engine. The kids on Elm Street do not lose because they are weak. They lose because they are tired. You can lock every door in the house. You still have to sleep. ChuckyYour nightmare is not really the doll. It is the face of the person you tell, and the way they decide, very kindly, that you have imagined all of it. Chucky works precisely because he is absurd. That is the trap: the more accurately you describe him, the less anybody is going to believe you. You are the one shouting at the screen because the characters are not listening. You know that feeling from real life too. The franchise is at its best when the adults in the room are the real obstacle, and you have met those adults. By the time somebody finally believes you, you will have handled most of it on your own. ScreamYour nightmare has your number, knows your name, and has almost certainly been inside your house before. The worst part is that you already know them. Scream is the only one of these where the killer takes the mask off and turns out to be somebody who was at the party. You are the person who calls the twist out loud before it lands. You watch people the same way you watch films. The franchise made the rules of horror part of the plot, which means the survivors are the ones paying attention. You would be paying attention. Everybody is a suspect, including the person who just offered to walk you home. The ConjuringYour nightmare is not really about you. It is about the people asleep down the hall, and the feeling that whatever is here is not interested in leaving. The Conjuring films are domestic horror. The house, the family, the perfectly ordinary room that quietly stops feeling ordinary. Your instinct is to get everybody into one room. Your fear is protective rather than personal, which is rarer than it sounds. This is the one franchise where belief is the weapon. The people who come through it are the ones who are not alone and refuse to be. Whatever is here did not come for you. It came for the household, and you are the one standing in the hallway. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ 4 The Upside Down Nod to 'Alien' Image via Netflix There are a few moments throughout Stranger Things that feel like direct callbacks to Alien and Aliens, in particular, but perhaps one of the most obvious nods came from Season 1's "Chapter Eight: The Upside Down." In the first season finale, Jim Hopper (David Harbour) joins Joyce as they enter the other dimension looking for Will. Along the way, they spot an open Demogorgon egg in a moment that powerfully resembles a similar scene in Ridley Scott's Alien when the Nostromo crew investigates LV-426. While this nod was one of the most visually potent, Stranger Things would reference the Alien franchise a few more times throughout its entertaining five-season run. Nancy herself would grow into an Ellen Ripley-like (Sigourney Weaver) action hero as the show progressed, and by Season 4, the Demogorgon experiments found by Hopper and Joyce in Russia felt eerily reminiscent of Alien: Resurrections — another fun nod to Winona Ryder's career. Still, that first major Alien reference gets us every time, especially since it clearly signaled more danger. 3 Robert Englund of 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' Fame Image via Netflix Circling back to Nancy and Robin's time at Pennhurst, Stranger Things Season 4 found a way to put the king of all nightmares into a season all about nightmares. Robert Englund appears at the mental institution as Vecna's estranged father, Victor Creel, who was mutilated and charged with killing his family after Vecna (then Henry) slaughtered them. Englund, of course, played none other than Freddy Krueger in A Nightmare on Elm Street and its sequels, which made this Easter egg so sweet. To further add to the Krueger reference, when we first meet Victor, he's actually scratching away at his cell, a clever callback to the deformed serial killer's own signature claws. Beyond that, Nancy herself is something of a Nightmare on Elm Street reference as the original film featured a protagonist named Nancy Thompson, played by Heather Langenkamp. For the most intense Freddy Kruger antics, you'll have to look elsewhere, but Vecna isn't far behind as a true "nightmare master." 2 'Halloween II' Hospital Logo Image via Netflix Not every major horror reference in Stranger Things is meant to be a big spectacle of a thing. In fact, one of the very best callbacks to the genre at large comes from Season 3's "Chapter Five: The Flayed" in the form of a glossed-over hospital logo. That's right, if you thought you'd seen that Hawkins Memorial Hospital logo before, you actually had back in the original Halloween II, although then it was used for Haddonfield Memorial Hospital. While the second season contained a few different Michael Meyers references, Season 3's small tribute to the Halloween franchise is a touching note that delivers. It's not this big, obvious thing; rather, it's a small detail that cleverly reminds us that Stranger Things owes a debt of gratitude to all the horror stories that came before. Unsurprisingly, the franchise would be referenced again in Season 4. 1 27 Years Between Mass Murders Just Like 'It' Image via Netflix Another fun connection between the larger horror genre and Stranger Things comes in the time between Vecna's first set of murders and his return to Hawkins. Stephen King Easter eggs in Stranger Things abound, but perhaps the least obvious (but most perfect) of them all is this delightful little callback to It. Just as the interdimensional Pennywise returns every 27 years for a new murder cycle in Derry, Maine, so, too, does Henry Creel, aka Vecna, after murdering his family in 1959 and breaking through the Upside Down in 1986. Of course, Vecna still killed some folks at Hawkins Lab in between his first killing spree and his last, but in Season 4, it's these 27 years that help Nancy and the rest of the Hawkins clan discover just who Henry is. Unlike Pennywise, Vecna wasn't dormant that entire time. Rather, he was plotting his revenge and hoping to enact his plan to use the Upside Down to bridge two worlds. Stranger Things Release Date 2016 - 2025-00-00 Network Netflix Showrunner Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer Directors Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer, Andrew Stanton, Frank Darabont, Nimród Antal, Uta Briesewitz Writers Kate Trefry, Jessie Nickson-Lopez, Jessica Mecklenburg, Alison Tatlock Main Genre Drama Seasons 5 Producers Rand Geiger, Justin Doble, Lampton Enochs Franchise Stranger Things Creator(s) Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer Story By The Duffer Brothers Streaming Service(s) Netflix Executive Producer(s) Shawn Levy, Dan Cohen, Curtis Gwinn, Cindy Holland, Karl Gajdusek, Iain Paterson, Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer