Stranger Things' 2026 Return Has Given Itself A Timeline Problem

While the news that the Stranger Things franchise isn’t over yet is exciting, the direction that Netflix’s spinoff Tales from ’85 is taking leaves a lot to be desired. It’s official. Now that the first Stranger Things spinoff, Tales from ’85, has been renewed for a second season, fans of the Netflix sci-fi mystery franchise can breathe a collective sigh of relief. Clearly, although the original show’s series finale aired in late 2025, Stranger Things isn’t going anywhere quite yet.

That said, this good news comes with some major drawbacks. Notably, it’s not a new, original Stranger Things spinoff show that has been green-lit, but rather a second outing of the divisive animated spinoff from April 2026. Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 aimed to fill in the blanks from the time jump between seasons 2 and 3, introducing a new character in the form of Odessa A’Zion’s Nikki Baxter and cramming her into the shared storyline of the original show’s gang.

This was a divisive decision to say the least, although the problems the new character created had little to do with A’Zion’s performance or anything unique about Nikki. Instead, it was Nikki’s very presence that opened up a lot of plot holes that went unanswered by the ending of Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 season 1. Why the gang never mentioned her in the original show, when she played a pivotal part in one of their biggest adventures, was just one of the many strange canon inconsistencies created by the spinoff’s first outing.

Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 Has Even Less Plot To Cover

According to Netflix, season 2 of Tales from ’85 will continue the story of season 1 directly, with Eleven, Mike, Will, Dustin, Lucas, Max, and Nikki now facing another strange conspiracy and taking on new monsters that invade Hawkins immediately after the ending of season 1. Where season 1 covered the gap between Stranger Things season 2 and 3, season 2 will now reportedly cover the significantly shorter gap between Stranger Things: Tales from ’85’s season 1 finale and the start of season 3’s story.

If that is starting to sound like a vanishingly small amount of time, that’s because it is. If there is one that HBOMax’s Stranger Things replacement IT: Welcome to Derry got right, it was the show’s decision to tell its story on a sprawling, multi-generational canvas that spans decades. This means that the horror series can add new characters and new subplots while still focusing most of its action on the same eerie small-town setting.

Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 is set to take the exact opposite approach, and the show’s dwindling time frame makes its storytelling feel bizarrely cluttered. Viewers already know that Dustin attended summer camp immediately before the events of season 3, arriving home the day that season 3’s story began. According to the tie-in comic Stranger Things: Science Camp, Dustin left Hawkins in May 1985, while Stranger Things: Tales from ’85’s season 1 finale ends a few months into 1985.

Tales From '85 Season 2 Risks Diluting Stranger Things' Main Story

For anyone struggling with the math of this timeline, future seasons of Tales from ’85 have only a few weeks, at most, to cover. The show could theoretically jump forward to focus on the gap between seasons 3 and 4, but Eleven and Will left Hawkins in the season 3 finale, meaning the series would be left without two of its main characters. At a time when sci-fi streaming shows are getting bigger and more ambitious than ever in their storytelling, the Stranger Things franchise has painted itself into a corner with this plot.

The more time Tales from ’85 spends filling in this one minor gap, the weirder Nikki’s completely unmentioned absence from later seasons of the original series will feel. The less time the spinoff has to cover, the more weirdly granular and hyper-specific its timeline will need to get for the show to still make sense. All of these issues could be solved by one major change, but it’s one that the franchise seemingly struggles to make.

Author Caitlyn Schneiderhan’s spinoff novel Stranger Things: One Way or Another, which was subtitled "A Nancy Wheeler Mystery,” was set in the period between seasons 4 and 5, and offered viewers a few answers to the canon plot holes caused by the show’s time jump. However, much like Tales from ’85, this spinoff also failed to break new ground for the show, refusing to center on any new characters or a new setting, or even a new time period within the same cast and the familiar terrain of Hawkins.

The Stranger Things Franchise Needs To Break New Ground

This is a real, substantial issue for the franchise, as evidenced by the disappointing 63% critical rating and 52% audience rating of Stranger Things: Tales from ’85’s season 1. The success of Apple TV’s For All Mankind spinoff Star City, which literally takes place on the other side of the planet from its predecessor, proves that viewers and reviewers alike reward spinoffs that radically change the franchise’s focus.

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Tellingly, the other two recent Netflix shows produced by Stranger Things creators Duffer Brothers, The Boroughs and Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen, both fared far better with critics than Tales from ’85. Neither The Boroughs nor Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen has any canon links to the Stranger Things franchise, but this proved to be an unexpectedly good thing for both shows upon their early 2206 release.

The shared popularity of these two very different Duffer Brothers projects proves that Netflix’s best Stranger Things future means moving beyond the original show’s timeline and Tales from ’85. Making another show would be a good start, but more pertinent is making sure that this next spinoff centers on characters other than the original stars in the original setting during the same time period as the original show.

It is hardly surprising that Netflix wants to be as conservative as possible in its approach to the Stranger Things franchise, since it is one of its most lucrative properties. However, the streaming service took a risk when it green-lit the original series Stranger Things, and the humdrum reaction to Tales from ’85 season 1 is compelling proof that viewers want a riskier, more daring approach from the franchise going forward.

Source: Netflix