‘Stranger Things’ heads to the cinema?

Amid films scrambling to secure suitable theatrical distribution, Netflix has swooped in with a new strategy altogether — cinema screening for television.

The final episode of its hit series, Stranger Things, will be screened across more than 350 theatres on December 31, through to January 1, 2026.

Variety reported that the scheduled two-day event “appears to mark the first time an episode of a Netflix series will also be exhibited theatrically”. While details about the “the precise theaters will be announced at a later date, according to an announcement from Netflix.”

The latest development comes shortly after the show’s creators, Matt and Ross Duffer, had expressed interest in screening the finale of Stranger Things season five for a theatre audience.

“That would be amazing,” Ross said. “Because the fans could be there with other fans, and experience it as a communal thing — it would be incredible,” Ross Duffer had revealed in a cover story for the outlet. While his brother, Matt Duffer echoed the sentiment that theatrical screening could be “about experiencing it at the same time with fans.”

Though in the same story, Netflix’s chief content officer Bela Bajaria had countered that the series has always been viewed on the streaming platform by “a lot, a lot, a lot of people” and never “suffered from lack of conversation or community or sharing or fandom.”

“I think releasing it on Netflix is giving the fans what they want,” she had claimed.

However, Variety noted that following the discussion which kicked off on social media from this back-and-forth, “it appears that the people of the Upside Down have gotten their wish.”

Meanwhile, the fifth and final season of Stranger Things is on track to release on Netflix nonetheless. The show will return in two volumes for the final season, with the first set to premiere on November 26, and the latter on December 25.