Netflix has ordered a live-action “Stranger Things” prequel to series, sending the franchise back to the 1950s with a show called “Other Worlds: A Stranger Things Adventure” that is scheduled to debut in 2028.
The streamer made the announcement Friday, Nov. 6, which fans mark as “Stranger Things” Day. The date matches the night in 1983 when Will Byers went missing in the original series. Word of a spinoff first surfaced in 2022.
The new show is set in Marion, Nevada, in 1955, decades before the kids of Hawkins, Indiana, stumbled onto a supernatural conspiracy. It also predates the stage play “The First Shadow,” which follows Henry Creel in Hawkins in 1959.
Around the original show's finale, Matt and Ross Duffer hinted that the spinoff would explore what happened before Creel encountered the otherworldly substance that gave him his powers.
A brief teaser opens on an old bicycle with a boom box playing the doo-wop hit “Sh Boom (Life Could Be A Dream)” by The Chords. A title card reads April 19, 1955, before a roar tears the clouds apart and reveals what could be another version of the Upside Down.
The Duffers created the series with Kate Trefry, who has written for “Stranger Things” since its second season and wrote “The First Shadow.” Trefry will run the show and serve as an executive producer.
Joe Wright, the BAFTA and Golden Globe winner behind “Atonement,” “Darkest Hour” and “Pride & Prejudice,” will direct the first three episodes and also executive produce. Shawn Levy’s 21 Laps is producing, and filming will take place in New Mexico.
The project is a carve-out from the Duffers’ overall deal at Paramount. The brothers, producing through their Upside Down Pictures banner, left their Netflix overall arrangement when it expired in April 2026.
Beyond the time and place, the creators are keeping the story under wraps, saying casting comes next. Levy said the show will introduce all-new characters, themes and mythology.
It’s Stranger Things, but also thrillingly fresh, with a new setting, new heroes and villains, and new… actually, we’re not allowed to say any more.
Matt and Ross Duffer, co-creators
“Other Worlds” becomes the fourth title in the franchise. The flagship drama, which premiered in 2016 and wrapped at the end of 2025, drew more than 1.2 billion views across its first four seasons, and its final season delivered Netflix’s biggest English-language premiere week.
Netflix also streams two seasons of the animated “Stranger Things: Tales From ’85,” while “The First Shadow” won a Tony Award. The brand has further stretched into books and fan attractions at Netflix House.
