‘Saying Goodbye To Childhood’: Duffer Brothers Explain the Dungeons & Dragons Ending Of Stranger Things

The Duffer Brothers always knew Stranger Things wouldn’t end with a climactic explosion or a final monster showdown. Long before the final season reached audiences, Matt and Ross Duffer had already envisioned the series’ closing image — a door shutting in the basement of the Wheeler house.

In the finale, now streaming on Netflix, Max, Lucas, Dustin, Will and Mike climb the steps out of the Wheelers’ basement after completing their final Dungeons & Dragons campaign. As the group disperses, Mike lingers for a moment before shutting the basement door, quietly bringing the story to an end.

The idea, Matt Duffer revealed, had been locked in for years. “We’d been sitting with that idea for a very long time,” he told Tudum, explaining why the series

chose intimacy over spectacle for its final beat. Leaving Childhood Behind, One Step At A Time

As each member of the group exits the basement, the moment carries symbolic weight beyond nostalgia. “That’s them leaving their childhood behind,” Matt Duffer explained.

For him, Finn Wolfhard’s performance as Mike anchors the emotional heart of the scene. “I think Finn gave a really beautiful performance there because you see him go through this real grief and sadness about leaving it behind,” he said. That sadness doesn’t linger indefinitely — it transforms into something gentler. Matt described the moment as eventually settling into “a bittersweet happiness.”

Passing The Torch To The Next Generation

The emotional clarity of the scene sharpens when Mike’s younger sister Holly and her friends rush past the group to begin their own D&D game. In that instant, Mike understands exactly what’s happening.

“It is their time to leave it behind and pass the torch to the next group of kids,” Matt Duffer said.

The background chatter of new voices and dice rolling becomes a reminder that childhood doesn’t end — it simply moves on to someone else.

Remembering Joy, Not Just Loss

Ross Duffer viewed the moment less as an ending and more as a reckoning with memory. For him, the scene is about Mike “remembering all the joys that he had as a kid.”

Those memories don’t vanish with age. “Those memories will always be there for him,” Ross said, “but it’s time to move on.”

The next generation, audible in the background, reinforces the finality of the moment. “They’re going to have their own amazing childhood,” Ross reflected, “but our story is over once [Mike] shuts that door.”

Why The Series Had To End With Dungeons & Dragons

Stranger Things began with a Dungeons & Dragons game in the Wheeler basement, introducing audiences to its characters as kids before they were heroes. Ending the series the same way felt inevitable to the creators.

“That’s been planned for a very long time,” Ross Duffer said. “It felt right to go full circle. This is about this group of characters saying goodbye to their childhood.”

The basement, he explained, is more than just a location. “That basement, specifically the Dungeons & Dragons game, represents their childhoods and how we first met them as an audience.”

To say goodbye properly, the group needed to sit at the table one last time.

Filming The Ending That Mirrored The Beginning

Shooting the final scene stirred memories far beyond the script. “It was such a blast shooting,” Ross recalled. “It really reminded us of the first day on set when we filmed the kids playing D&D in Season 1.”

That moment wasn’t just symbolic — it was literal. “That was the first thing we ever shot,” he said, “and it felt appropriate that this would be the last thing we ever shot.”

The Duffers even recreated camera movements and framing from Season 1 to visually echo the series’ opening moments.

When Fiction And Reality Collided On Set

For Matt Duffer, filming the final scene blurred the line between storytelling and lived experience. “It was very emotional and nostalgic to shoot that scene,” he said.

The emotions weren’t manufactured. “What was happening on the day and what the actors were feeling and what we were feeling very much mirrored the scene.”

There was no need for heightened drama or grand speeches. Just a quiet ending that respected the journey.

“We’re really happy with how it turned out,” Matt added.