Stranger Things Fans Have Started A Petition To Bring Back A Beloved Character

Stranger Things kills off characters from time-to-time. The characters it kills are rarely, if ever, members of its core cast.

Spoilers ahead.

Rather, the Duffer Brothers have come up with a formula: Introduce a lovable new character each season and then, once audiences have become marginally invested in that character, kill them off.

Kill them off instead of killing off Mike or Steve or Nancy or Max.

This has been pretty effective in the past. In Season 1, Barb died when she was taken and killed by the Demogorgon. Barb was . . . fine, I guess. Honestly, we barely got to know her before she bit the proverbial bullet and I’ve always found the “justice for Barb” fan movement kind of silly.

Season 2’s death was, up until now, probably the most heartbreaking. Bob—played by Sean Astin of Lord of the Rings and Goonies fame—was a really likable guy and, due to his relationship with the Byers family, his death hit pretty hard.

In Season 3, the Duffer Brothers killed off Alexei, a jovial Russian who was trying to help Hopper, Joyce and Murray stop the bad guys. Honestly, the entire Russian plot in Season 3 was so preposterous that almost everything about it was silly to me, but I was sad that Alexei died. Then again, I was coming to expect it. The formula was starting to become apparent.

So when they introduced Joseph Quinn’s Eddie Munson in Season 4, almost everybody predicted that he was toast. And if Eddie had been just another Barb or just another Alexei, everyone would have been okay with it.

Instead, Eddie quickly became one of the most likable characters in the entire cast, far more interesting and engaging than Mike or Jonathan or many of the others. He had a sweet relationship with Dustin and could have had a cool amicable rivalry with Steve but the formula proved too strong even for him.

Instead of exploring what might have happened if he’d returned to Hawkins as the chief suspect in the string of bizarre murders Vecna carried out, the show killed him off in one of the most pointless self-sacrifices ever. It was sad, sure, but more than that it was infuriating. I agree that there are too many characters on this show, but I’d trade Eddie for half of them in the blink of an eye.

What has Mike actually done in the last three seasons that matters at all? Jonathan is almost entirely useless now. Steve, as likeable as he’s become, has had a very full and complete character arc. His sacrifice would have had a profound impact on everyone. Eddie was swept under the rug.

Naturally, fans who agree with this general sentiment and who loved the character Eddie Munson have started a Change.org petition to bring him back. At the time of this writing, over 21,000 people have signed it.

I’m not sure how this would work. While fans have theorized that this could have been another fake-out death a la Hopper, the Duffer Brothers have said definitively that he is dead and gone.

Joseph Quinn isn’t happy about his character dying but he understands.

“I don’t think it’s very fair. But I think it kind of fits into the rest of the theme of the season — it’s more adult, it’s brutal, it’s more frightening, and it’s this kind of sense that life isn’t always easy,” Quinn says. “You feel like it’s more mature. And whilst we’d all like Eddie to become celebrated and get the hero’s death he deserves, I think it’s kind of classier storytelling.”

Maybe. Or maybe it’s just a damn shame to lose such a genuinely great character whose story was never fully told.

Sign the petition here.