Characters / Stranger Things: Supporting Cast

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General tropes about the Wheeler family.

• Badass Family: Bravery is definitely a trait that runs in the Wheeler family. It's most obvious with Nancy and Mike, but Karen proves her mettle when she takes on a Demogorgon with nothing but a broken glass bottle to protect Holly and even Ted gets in one good swing at the creature, showing that despite his aloof attitude, he is not a coward who will abandon his family. Also, Holly bravely fights off Henry/Vecna, even landing two hits across his face with a fire poker.
• A Boy, a Girl, and a Baby Family: From Seasons 1-4, the Wheeler kids consist of Mike, Nancy, and their pre-schooler sister, Holly.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Between Season 1-4, Karen, Ted and Holly have no idea about what Mike and Nancy have been up to or the supernatural stuff that has been happening around the town, with only Holly actually witnessing some of the events (which she doesn’t properly understand due to how young she is). They are shockingly introduced into the loop in Season 5 after a Demogorgon attacks their house, kidnaps Holly, and hospitalizes Ted and Karen, with Nancy lamenting to Mike that if they were told about it, they likely wouldn’t have been in such serious danger.
• Make-Out Kids: Anytime the teenage Karen and Ted are seen together in The First Shadow, it's pretty much guaranteed that they will either already be passionately making out or will be very soon.
• Nuclear Family: Played with. Nancy describes her family as such as a joke in Season 1, and they definitely fit the dynamic: there's two parents and three kids, with the only thing that's missing being a dog or a cat. As a family, they're pretty dysfunctional however, especially when compared to the Sinclairs, who are the show's other, more stable example of an '80s nuclear family.

Karen Wheeler (née Childress)

Played By: Cara Buono

Originated By: Florence Guy (West End), Dora Dolphin (Broadway)

Debut: "Chapter One: The Vanishing of Will Byers" (1x01)

Mike, Holly and Nancy's mother. A housewife who serves as the voice of concern for her children, though only within the confines of their home.

• '70s Hair: The blown out wings she sports in Season 1 are very much a holdover from the 1970s (likely around the time Mike started grade school, judging by the Farrah Fawcett-esque influence).
• '80s Hair: In Season 2 she sports a frosted, hair-sprayed edifice. Season 3 shows her with very teased, blown out, curled hair, even in a ponytail. Come Season 4, she sports a crispy, even more bleached-blonde 'ramen noodle' perm, complete with an Olivia Newton-John-esque sweatband.
• Action Survivor: After spending four seasons Locked Out of the Loop, Karen finally comes face to face with a Demogorgon in Season 5. When it threatens her daughter, she stares it down, smashes a wine bottle and manages to stab it enough times to leave it wounded. Sadly, she ends up hospitalised in a critical state after the fact, but it's more than almost anyone, including dozens of trained, armed soldiers in the mid-season finale, is able to do. She performs better when the Demo-dogs attack the hospital and she sets a trap for them by putting an oxygen tank into a dryer and turning them all into crispy critters. Not bad despite being heavily injured.
• Advertised Extra: Karen is officially considered part of the main cast in the opening credits of every season except the fourth, despite never playing a major role in an episode until the fifth and final season, specifically in the second, and later sixth, episodes.
• The Alcoholic: Downplayed throughout the first four seasons; in every scene involving Karen during the second season, she is seen with a glass of wine (regardless of time of day) but certainly never appears to be inebriated. Played Straight in the first episode of Season 5 as she goes through an entire bottle of wine while arguing with Ted about Holly's imaginary friend.
  Ted: Is this your first one, or are we on to number two?!
• The Alleged Car: Her Mercury Colony Park station wagon is... fully compliant with the Law Of Narrative Causality, in a way that's utterly realistic to people who've dealt with that final generation of carbureted cars.
• Almighty Mom: When she and Holly are cornered by the Demogorgon, Karen angrily yells at the monster to stay away from her daughter, before she charges to stab it repeatedly with her broken wine bottle.
• Awful Wedded Life: She is bored and frustrated in a marriage where her husband doesn't appreciate the things she does around the house to keep things organized, doesn't help her with disciplining the children or spending time with them, doesn't notice her enough to see she changed her hair, and leaves the bulk of duties to her.
• Betty and Veronica: The Veronica to Heather's Betty for Billy's Archie, because she knows she shouldn't given into her attraction to him on account of being married with a family. Which gets flipped the opposite way when Heather becomes the Veronica after being possessed by the Mind Flayer and Karen becomes the Betty as Billy still wants to protect her.
• Blemished Beauty: At the end of the series she sports visible permanent scars on her neck and upper chest as a result of the Demogorgon attack in Season 5.
• Blonde Republican Sex Kitten: Implied. In Season 2 she has lightened and curled her hair and is implied to be voting Republican what with the Reagan/Bush '84 sign on their front yard. She also talks favorably about British Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on the phone with a friend.
• Brainy Brunette: She starts off the series with meticulously styled brown '70s Hair that gets lighter and lighter as the series goes on and is proven to be a very intelligent woman who is frustrated with her role and that she was never taken seriously.
• Distracted by the Sexy: Becomes flustered and hilariously nervous when she first meets Billy. It doesn't help that his shirt is unbuttoned enough to expose his chiseled pecs and abs.
• Everyone Can See It: Oblivious, home-bound, Locked Out of the Loop Karen can easily see there is chemistry between Hopper and Joyce.
• Everyone Has Standards: Though she's tolerant of her useless husband to some extent, Karen is absolutely disgusted when Ted suggests right in front of Lucas and Dustin's parents that the members of The Party and Hellfire should be arrested to "teach them a lesson". Especially considering that their own children are involved with said club.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: She has a casual dress for the home, albeit one that is suitable for the cover of homemaker magazines, and with elaborate and voluminous hair. Hair that gets more teased, curled, frosted, and styled as time goes on to emphasize an inner fire coming out.
• Foil: To Joyce. A colder, still-married, and more stable mother that stays at home to watch her kids and who, despite her best efforts, has a hard time getting involved with the broader narrative.
• Girliness Upgrade: In the first Season, she typically wears plaid shirts and sensible slacks, but come Season 2, she sports a frosted, coiffed '80s hairdo, more makeup, and a more feminine wardrobe (pussycat bow blouses, pencil skirts etc.). She also has a fairly fanservicey bathtub scene, where she greets a delighted Billy on her doorstep in a flowy, sexy bathrobe. Whilst she is undoubtedly pretty in Season 1, she goes full on Stacy's Mom in Season 2. Season 3 upgrades it even further with her in bold makeup matching a figure-hugging swimsuit, looking utterly like a movie star or star of another Netflix show set in the 1980s.
• Good Parents: She tries to reach out to both of her children, especially after Will's disappearance.
• Happy Marriage Charade: Her and Ted, according to Nancy, married out of convenience rather than love. Season 2 further drives home the point that Ted and Karen are definitely not on the same page. Season 3 even has her nearly cheating on Ted with Billy.
• Hidden Depths:
  • It's implied that she used to be closer to Mike and Nancy, but they've grown distant from each other. She does care deeply for them regardless.
  • She picks a lock with a hairpin when snooping in Nancy's room, suggesting that she might have been something of a Former Teen Rebel.
  • Rebel Robin showcases Karen (through Robin's eyes as she worked at Melvald's) as a resentful, vain housewife who resents her children and pines for her glory days in high school as a popular beauty, telling Robin to enjoy her youth. The book perhaps has the most negative view of her.
  • In Season 3, she tenderly comforts Mike and Nancy when they're distraught, and provides the latter with genuinely good advice. Her talk to Nancy also implies that she once tried to make it in the world, but was eventually beaten down. She also is ultimately unable to go through with cheating on her husband with Billy.
  • Season 5 shows that she's where all three of her kids get their fighting spirit from, showing her stabbing a Demogorgon with a broken wine bottle in defense of Holly and saving Lucas, Max, Robin, and Vickie from a trio of Demodogs by tossing an oxygen canister into a dryer, distracting and frying them.
• High-School Sweethearts: She and Ted met and fell in love in high school, while she was a cheerleader and he played on the football team.
• Horrible Judge of Character: She once found Ted to be a desirable choice for marriage, and latterly finds Billy to be a desirable option, even after witnessing him publicly humiliate an overweight child.
• I Coulda Been a Contender!: When she talks to Nancy about her struggles at the Hawkins Post, it's implied that she likely struggled with trying to make her mark on the world while feeling beat down by the misogynistic attitudes of her day.
• If You Thought That Was Bad...: Sure, she's worried about Mike when the government agents kick her door in, looking for the boys and Eleven; what she doesn't know is that they have little to no hesitation killing people that are tangentially in contact with the girl. Had the scrubs and agents not been preoccupied with locating the kids, Karen and Ted might not have come out alive and kicking.
• Lady Drunk: Especially in Season 2, she is often seen with a glass of something in her hand, likely due to the monotony and her dissatisfaction with her marriage. In Season 5, Ted bitterly comments on her drinking by asking whether she's still on her first or already her second bottle of the night. This habit comes in handy when a Demogorgon attacks her, Ted, and Holly while she's drunk, and shockingly she manages to severely wound it with nothing but a smashed wine bottle.
• Lady in a Power Suit: Is seen wearing a boxy (fashionable for 1986) blue suit in Season 4 as she tries to look for Nancy and the other kids after a town hall meeting goes wrong.
• Lady in Red: Season 3 shows her wearing more red lipstick, likely emphasizing her bolder personality and the beginning of her coming out of her shell. The flowy dress and cleavage-enhancing lingerie she wears to meet Billy for an aborted rendezvous are red. Season 1 has her in a red sweater for Christmas that is figure-hugging without being revealing and Season 2 has her in a red pussycat bow blouse and later a revealing plush red robe when she comes out of the tub to meet Billy.
• Lipstick-and-Load Montage: As seen in Season 3's opener, where prior to meeting up with Billy for some fun at a local motel, we see her at her dressing table applying some very vampish makeup and teasing her hair out — all whilst "Died in Your Arms" by Cutting Crew sets the mood.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Despite her two older kids being involved in some wild adventures with life or death consequences, she remains oblivious to them (which is just as well, as both Mike and Nancy do not want her to know). The beginning of Season 5 has her and Ted thrust into a crash course with the Upside Down when a Demogorgon personally attacks the Wheeler house to kidnap Holly, heavily wounding both of the Wheeler parents in the process despite their best attempts to stop it.
• Mama Bear:
  • While not as prominent as Joyce, she is extremely frustrated and vocal when Brenner and Connie refuse to tell her the details when her son is in danger. While not particularly insightful, she is shown to be a very doting parent.
  • When Nancy tearfully confides in her about the misogynistic harassment she has received at the Hawkins Post, Karen gets really pissed off and tells Nancy to continue with the story she's trying to pursue and pretty much refers to those guys as "shitheads".
  • In Season 4, she extends it to her kids' friends, especially after it appears the Hellfire Club maybe the target of angry reactionaries and defending Mike that he is not a murderer or a cultist. When she sees him again, she states she doesn't want to be separated again from him.
  • When the Upside Down takes over Hawkins, causing a earthquake, she runs to the aid and protection of a hysterical Holly and shields her with her body.
  • In Season 5, when a Demogorgon comes to the Wheeler house to take Holly, she attempts to escape with her daughter only for the monster to corner them in the kitchen. Despite never having encountered a Demogorgon before, Karen smashes her empty wine bottle into a makeshift shiv and stabs the monster repeatedly like a madwoman.
  • Later in the season, when three Demodogs have Lucas, Robin, Vickie, and Max dead to rights in the hospital, the still injured Karen comes to their defense by tossing a flammable oxygen tank into a dryer, which explodes and incinerates the creatures.
  • In the penultimate episode, when the gang go to regroup with the others to save Holly and the other kids from Vecna, she attempts to go with them, even when Vickie tries to tell her she should stay in the hospital due to her injuries. Karen angrily says that she won't lie in bed while her daughter needs her. It is only when Mike assures her that he, Nancy, and the others have it handled that she agrees to stay behind.
• Morality Pet: To Billy. He shows a more human, charming side when he's flirting with her and seems genuinely nervous when he's on the brink of hooking up with her. Even more importantly, he even manages to stop himself, albeit briefly, from taking her to the Mind Flayer. Although that means his aggression is aimed at Heather.
• Mrs. Robinson: While she ultimately decides to not follow through with it, there's no mistake that she has major hots for Billy, who is roughly her daughter Nancy's age.
• Ms. Fanservice: Completely graduates into this role in Season 3, with her swimsuit scenes, glamour-girl makeup and figure-hugging wardrobe, as well as a (spoof) workout video used to promote the new season. In-Universe as a teenager, in Joyce's school production of Dark of the Moon, she modifies her villager costume to be far racier, including having only two themed pasties to hide her breasts. An already stressed Joyce shuts this down and orders for Sue to tape Karen up, causing her to run away and change.
• Obnoxious Entitled Housewife: Robin in Rebel Robin sees her as one when Karen bosses (with a smile) a bag boy over how he is packing things wrong, thinking that Karen is comfortable treating him like a servant. She is also shown to be blind to the struggles of less popular children like Robin and focuses a lot on weight and beauty.
• Out of Focus: Despite still receiving main character billing, Karen has very little screen time or plot significance in Season 2 and despite getting her own poster for Season 4, she has little screen time.
• Parental Hypocrisy: She gets angry with Nancy after finding out she slept with Steve in Season 1, disapproving of either premarital sex or her underage daughter having sex in general. But in Season 3, she ogles Billy at the pool with other bored housewives and comes very close to cheating on her husband with him.
• Parental Obliviousness: Doesn't realize that Mike is hiding Eleven in their basement, and ascribes any of his odd behavior solely to missing Will. By the time of episode seven of Season 3, she's lost complete track of two of her kids, guessing they're probably off with friends and justifying her lack of knowledge as "it's summer!"
• Parents as People: She's loving, but her hesitation and obvious lack of relating to her older kids have helped build up walls between them all; they all know, but don't discuss it. Karen presents a story of a frustrated woman going through an attempt to both improve herself (in a very '80s way) and add a little spice to what she considers her tediously dull life now that her kids don't apparently need her to pump her energy into them as much. She doesn't go through with full-on adultery, but an oblivious Ted still has a rocky marriage on his hands. The irony is... she'd jump at the chance to get closer to her older kids by being let into the loop and probably has skills she could use to help them, but they don't see that anymore than Ted lets himself spot her makeover rebellion for what it is.
• Parents Know Their Children: She immediately picks up that Nancy is visibly altered by something that happened during her get-together (as Nancy just had her first sexual experience with Steve). She knows that something is obviously wrong, only that she cannot pinpoint what. Later, Nancy does confess because of Barb's disappearance.
• Pink Is Feminine: She is frequently seen in different shades of pink throughout the series, shades that grow from pastels to bold saturated "shocking" looks highlighting both her femininity, the changing fashions, and her Hidden Depths.
• Pom-Pom Girl: As established in Stranger Things: The First Shadow, she used to be a cheerleader in high school, which is how she met and started dating Ted, who was on the football team.
• Power Hair: Sports a new shorter 'do in the Season 5 epilogue which, when combined with the visible scars on her chest, shows how much she has grown in confidence during the show.
• Silk Hiding Steel: She spends four seasons as a traditionally feminine housewife who is Locked Out of the Loop and does very little to impact the plot, unlike Joyce, but there are several moments that hint at Karen having a tougher nature than is originally apparent. Then in Season 5 it becomes very clear where Nancy got her badassery from as Karen rises to the occasion to protect her children and their friends from otherworldly monsters, showing remarkable bravery, resourcefulness, and determination despite only having a limited understanding of the Upside Down and its dangers.
• Skewed Priorities: When she learns Steve and Nancy slept together, Nancy calls her out on focussing entirely on that when Barb has completely vanished. Karen clearly realizes her mistake immediately and visibly kicks herself.
• Spanner in the Works: She had no way of knowing the help she gave the heroes by stabbing the ever loving shit out of the Demogorgon that was after Holly, as the wounds created a blood trail they could follow.
• Took a Level in Badass: In Season 5, when confronted with a Demogorgon trying to take Holly, Karen's immediate response is to get between them and stab at it with a broken bottle. She extends this further, when upon hearing the Demodogs coming to attack Lucas, Robin, Vickie, and Max at the hospital, Karen (despite being heavily injured), pulls out her IV tubes without hesitation and comes to their defense by tossing a flammable oxygen tank into a dryer to fry the creatures and save them.
• Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Look at Karen, then look at her husband. There's a discrepancy there. Nancy somewhat bitterly analyzes her parents' relationship as a Marriage of Convenience, with Karen as the younger Trophy Wife and Ted as the older partner providing the money; the discrepancy grows over the next seasons where her look gets more glammed up and her clothes reveal more of her figure while he looks as schlumpy as before. Somewhat explained by them getting together when they were still teenagers and Ted was a young, handsome football player.
• Unfulfilled Purpose Misery: In Season 3, she partially admits to Nancy that she had her own ambitions (not detailed) but she was shut down by the misogyny and self-doubt of her youth that she just gave up and gave in to her traditional role as a wife and mother. This is another reason for why she feels so bored and frustrated.
• Weight Woe: In Rebel Robin she openly envies Robin's ability to eat candy and stay slim, with emphasis on Karen's "Jazzercise-toned stomach", showcasing that Karen has to maintain a strict diet and exercise regimen to stay trim as she was before having children.

Theodore "Ted" Wheeler

Played By: Joe Chrest

Originated By: Gilles Geary (West End), Jamie Martin Mann (Broadway)

Debut: "Chapter One: The Vanishing of Will Byers" (1x01)

The extremely laid-back and removed patriarch of the Wheeler family. Completely out of touch with the goings-on in his household, much less Hawkins.

• '50s Hair: Perhaps to emphasize his Reagan support, his age, and how distant his family feels around him, he wears this style to reflect how stagnant this view of the world and his priorities are in a modern world that has, more or less, moved on from a strict view of families and what it means to be an American. This is in contrast to the family he emotionally neglects who wear '70s and '80s-style hairstyles.
• Adults Are Useless: The most prominent example in the show. He's useless whenever the family gets into an argument, speaks in lame baseball metaphors to a son who couldn't be less interested in sports, and instantly believes everything the government cover-up team tells him. Lampshaded in this exchange from "Dig Dug", when Dustin attempts to ask him where both of his children (who have been gone for days) are;
  Dustin: Son of a bitch. You're really no help at all, you know that?
  Ted: Hey, LANGUAGE!
• Big Eater: He is often more absorbed in his food than anything serious going on, whether it's his children arguing or them being in danger.
• Bigger Is Better in Bed: According to Karen in Stranger Things: The First Shadow, his, ah... "dingleberry" is very impressive, which she hints is one of the only reasons she's with him in the first place.
• Bumbling Dad: He's lazy, clueless, and nearly always has his priorities in the wrong order, but he does care about and provide for his kids.
• Catchphrase: "Language!"
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Despite his bumbling, lackadaisical approach towards his family, Season 5 proves that he is a fierce protector when the chips are down, trying to take down a Demogorgon with a golf club. It doesn't work, but you gotta give the guy major props for seeing a monster and choosing to fight it anyways to defend his family.
• Deadpan Snarker: A deconstructed version, as Season 4 emphasizes his ability to quip dry one-liners at the expense of his kids or his kids' friends (to the embarrassment of Karen). This also annoys the other parents of the Party when he carelessly implies that they should be threatened with jail time.
• Demoted to Extra: Appears only twice in Season 3, and only has dialogue in one scene. His car (the silver-gray Pontiac Bonneville Model G) has never been seen anywhere in the entire series except parked in the driveway.
• Dissonant Serenity: No matter how crazy things get, Ted doesn't let that get to him. The guy just doesn't care; it's as simple as that.
• The Drag-Along: He doesn't act out of his own initiative, though it goes beyond the apparent. It's implied that Karen's apparent inaction towards their children is due to Ted talking her out of her concerns.
• Dumbass Has a Point: It's clear that he is not the most curious or intellectual man, but his hunch in Season 1 that the weird events surrounding Hawkins lab may have something to do with the Soviets more or less comes true, when the Soviets attempt to reopen the gate in Hawkins.
• Everyone Can See It: Even oblivious, incurious, dense, mediocre Ted can see there is chemistry between Joyce and Hopper, despite him not realizing there is no chemistry between him and his own wife. When Karen notes Joyce and Hopper make an odd couple, Ted remarks "there's always one for everyone", putting his hand on his wife's shoulder, which causes her to roll her eyes in annoyance.
• Everyone Has Standards: Even Ted, for all his faults, finds it absurd that the news media even suggested that Eddie and the Hellfire Club could somehow be responsible for the "earthquake", meaning he's not paranoid enough to be a part of the infamous "Satanic Panic" of the '80s demonstrated throughout Season 4.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: A family example. His wife is angry and dismissive of him (and is tempted to cheat on him), his daughter rolls her eyes at him, and his son can tell his attempts at talking with him are hollow. The only one who seems to hold any regard for him is the youngest child (and that's likely because she's too young to even consider her parents are flawed). Even the other neighbourhood parents don't seem to like him much and find him obnoxious.
• Good Counterpart: To Lonnie Byers. Ted is a lot less charming and personable, but he's also a completely genuine individual who actively provides for his family. While he's undeniably distant, in his own way he does make an effort to be there for his loved ones. In short, he's more obliviously doing a half-hearted '50s dad thing than being outright neglectful.
• Hands-Off Parenting: If Ted was remotely more invested in the plights of his kids, Eleven would have been found out sooner. He seems to leave most of the parenting duties to Karen, only really contributing with the occasional admonishing comment, and always only at her overt insistence.
• Happy Marriage Charade: Him and Karen, according to Nancy, married out of convenience rather than love. Season 2 further drives home the point that Ted and Karen are definitely not on the same page.
• Hidden Depths: The First Shadow reveals he used to be quite a skilled guitar player when he was a teenager.
• High-School Sweethearts: The First Shadow and Season 5 reveal that he and Karen have been together since high school.
• Innocently Insensitive:
  • Or at least close to that. He asks his son if he'd jump off a cliff if his friends did so in Season 2. Considering that he did jump off a cliff to save his friend in Season 1 and is only alive because of Eleven...
  • In Season 4, this is more serious as he makes remarks about Mike being in a cult despite the severity of the situation and then makes a comment about how the kids need to spend time in jail to be taught a lesson. The fact that he's not taking the situation seriously rightfully gets on everyone's nerves.
• I Was Quite the Looker: Despite being boring and somewhat plain, he's portrayed as much more attractive and stylish (for the time) in The First Shadow.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He's snarky and quick to make dismissive remarks towards his kids and their friends (especially Dustin, who's not afraid to dish it right back), but he does show at various points that he at least genuinely loves his family at the end of the day (with how he uses a golf club to attack a Demogorgon), which is more than can be said for some other dads on the show like Max and Billy's or Will and Jonathan's. Furthermore, despite his snarking, he still lets the Byerses stay in his house in Season 5, showing he takes being a good neighbor seriously.
  • He's also been shown napping with Holly in his lap, indicating that he has a much warmer relationship with his young daughter than his son.
• Jock Dad, Nerd Son: As a teenager, Ted was a dim-witted jock on the school football team, in stark contrast to his D&D playing, unathletic son. Even when partaking in "nerdy" activities such as joining the drama club for their productions of Oklahoma!, it's primarily because his girlfriend is in the show too, and so he can lead the audience in an off-the-cuff singalong — something that would horrify Mike.
• Lazy Husband: When he isn't making clueless remarks and asides, he is often asleep on his chair — the chair is a Lay-Z-Boy — in the living room, which pisses Karen off, especially when she's taking a bubble bath by candlelight whilst reading a romance novel and listening to Streisand — and the doorbell rings.
• Mr. Fanservice: As a teenager during The First Shadow, when the power goes out during the school play and Joyce orders him to entertain the crowd in the meantime. Ted, who was in the middle of a costume change, rushes out in just his underwear with a guitar, which the In-Universe (and real life theatre) audience are very appreciative of.
• Mellow Fellow: It is in general very hard to get a genuine rise out of him, but this unfortunately also is a problem for his relationship to his family.
• Misery Builds Character: Tells Mike that ties are supposed to be tight when they dress for Will's "funeral."
• Out-of-Character Moment:
  • In the episode "The Body," he asks Karen if he should comfort Mike about Will's apparent death.
  • In "The Vanishing of Holly Wheeler", where he attempts to take down a Demogorgon with a golf club.
• Papa Wolf: He might be a clueless goober, but he doesn't hesitate to take a swing at the Demogorgon despite being armed only with a golf club to protect his wife and daughter.
• Parental Neglect: A downplayed example; he's far from the worst parental figure on this show, but he is pretty checked-out when it comes to the lives and concerns of his kids, and usually puts in the barest effort possible into engaging with them (usually limited to chiding them for their language). He's basically living at work, not at home.
• Patriotic Fervor: When the government is at his door asking questions, his immediate response is to insist they trust them. And when told Eleven is a danger to Mike, his first response is to worry she's a spy. In Season 2, his house has a great big Reagan/Bush '84 sign in front of it, and it's revealed that the government spookshow easily secured his unqualified cooperation by taking his "Russian child agent" story and running with it. He even salutes them and calls his family patriotic Americans.
  Ted: My God, is she Russian?
• Perpetual Frowner: It's quite rare to see him smiling, and that's mainly because of his not-so-appealing facial features and how hard it is to genuinely get his attention.
• Skewed Priorities: The poster boy. Disappeared kids? He's got chicken to nibble! Government agents kick the door open asking for his son? Let's trust them!
• The Snack Is More Interesting: Ted doesn't stop eating dinner while the rest of the family engages in an emotionally charged conversation about Will's disappearance. Karen calls him on it by heatedly asking if he's enjoying the chicken. He doesn't even understand what she's mad about. In Season 4 he is seen holding a stack of doughnuts at the Town Hall meeting while his wife and the other parents are worried about vigilantes hunting down their kids.
• Tough Love: Seems to be a firm proponent of this, as he's insistent on making his kids and their friends take the harsh route to teach them lessons. Season 4 even has him openly suggest that the teenage Lucas, Max, and Dustin spend the night in jail for fleeing the police, with which the Sinclairs, Mrs. Henderson, and his own wife all take much issue.
• Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Look at Ted, then look at his wife. There's a discrepancy there. Nancy somewhat bitterly analyzes her parents' relationship as a Marriage of Convenience, with Karen as the younger Trophy Wife and Ted as the older partner providing the money.
• Vague Age: Nancy outright says that her father was older than her mother, and Karen was attracted to the wealth and stability he offered. However, he appears in The First Shadow as an attractive and sporty high school student. It's unclear if he was held back in school, that Nancy was misrecounting the situation, or that the situation was retconned. In Season 5, Karen is explicitly said to be 46 years old and Ted estimated to be in his "late forties"; a Freeze-Frame Bonus of their names on a flyer for Joyce's high school play and a comment by Max in the Grand Finale seem to confirm Ted's age being retconned.
• What You Are in the Dark: In Season 5, he comes face to face against a Demogorgon threatening his family, with himself alone and armed with only a golf club. He has no clue what it is, but he still makes a stand and even though it No Sells his club, he still goes for another swing before he gets thrown across the room and through a wall. He may have been a Bumbling Dad, but it can't be denied that Ted does love his family.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Ted acts like he is living in a '50s sitcom. He is a shameless Lazy Bum who only cares about his job, thinks there's nothing wrong with Hawkins, and constantly makes cheesy quips that show he has little to no awareness of how serious things are.

Holly Wheeler

^{Click here to see her as a toddler}

Played By: Anniston & Tinsley Price (Seasons 1-4), Nell Fisher (Season 5)

Debut: "Chapter One: The Vanishing of Will Byers" (1x01)

Youngest child of the Wheelers and Mike and Nancy's younger sister. In Season 5, she is now an elementary schooler who's been unsettling her parents due to her habit of talking with an imaginary friend.

• Ascended Extra: Originally not much more than a Living Prop, Season 5 elevates her to a major character who's targeted by Vecna, with her even acting as the main perspective character who's trapped in his mental realm. She even gets an episode named after her, "The Vanishing of Holly Wheeler", a successor to the series premiere.
• The Baby of the Bunch: Holly is consistently depicted as the youngest member of the Wheeler household, often shown in high chairs, playing with toys, or being looked after by her parents.
• Break the Cutie: Her arc in Season 5 consists of her having to deal with the trauma of being captured by Vecna and trying to escape his mental realm.
• Cassandra Truth:
  • Is one of the few people besides Joyce who sees the thing living in her walls, but because of her young age, when she tells her mother, she isn't believed.
  • In Season 3, she notices the trees rustling at the Fourth of July festival due to the Monster Spider, but her parents encourage her to look at the fireworks.
  • By Vol 2 of Season 5 she is the only other child besides Derek who hasn't been brainwashed by Vecna's manipulations and is willing to fight and try to escape, while none of the other children believe her warnings, and even attack her when she becomes defiant.
• Character Development: Over the course of Season 5 she goes from a vulnerable victim of bullying who's easily manipulated by Vecna, to a brave girl who's willing to stand up for herself and try to fight back against his manipulation with Max's help.
• Children Are Innocent: She's aged between 3 to 6 years old from Seasons 1 through 4, and usually with her mom, so she doesn't get into much trouble.
• The Cutie: Holly is absolutely adorable and innocent.
• Daddy's Girl: She is often found alongside her father. This becomes a plot point in Season 3, wherein Karen discovers Holly sleeping gently on Ted's lap in front of the TV. Such familial closeness ultimately reminds Karen that her responsibilities as a mother and a wife come first, and she stands up Billy's offer of a late-night tryst.
• Damsel in Distress: At the end of the first episode of Season 5, she is captured by a Demogorgon and has her consciousness trapped in Vecna's mental world.
• Girlish Pigtails: Both as a toddler and as an elementary schooler, she sports a set of pigtails that add to her cuteness.
• Guile Hero: During her pep talk to Holly in season 5, Max tells Holly that intelligence matters more than physical strength. Her resourcefulness and ability to solve the puzzle and find the escape from Camazotz proves she has what it takes to prevail against Vecna.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: Has blonde hair and embodies innocence and sweetness.
• Intergenerational Friendship: In Season 5, she forms a friendship with Henry Creel, who manipulates her into believing that he wants to protect her from the monsters infesting Hawkins. After learning the truth from Max when they're both trapped in Vecna's mindscape, she strikes up a quick friendship with the older girl.
• In the Hood: She spends most of the Camazotz storyline wearing a yellow cape with a hood.
• Kiddy Coveralls: Starts her Vecna ordeal in Season 5 in the same overalls she rocks at school, visually underscoring her innocence as she's dragged into the nightmare.
• Little Miss Snarker: In Season 5 it turns out she has quite the sharp tongue, much like her older siblings and parents.
• Living Prop: Prior to Season 5, she is often in the background and rarely involved with or even aware of the situations and drama within the show.
• Loved by All: Her older siblings snark at each other but are always gentle with her; their friends clearly feel protective of her like she was their own sister; and even normally caustic characters seem to have a soft spot for her. Erica Sinclair only starts to hear her brother's rescue mission out when she hears Holly is in danger. When we get a glimpse into her school life, her teacher seems more concerned than annoyed by her conversations with her imaginary friend, Mr. Whatsit, and all of her peers are nice to her (except Derek, but he's a dick to everyone).
• Nice Girl: Much like her siblings and their mom, Holly is incredibly sweet and friendly to the point that pretty much everyone adores her. Unfortunately, this also means that she's easily manipulated by Vecna, who exploits her kindhearted nature to lure her into his mind as "Mr. Whatsit".
• Out of Focus: In Season 2, she only makes very brief appearances before seasons 3 and onward bring attention to her again.
• Practically Different Generations: Holly is much younger then both of her siblings, but there is an especially large age gap between her and Nancy, who starts Season 1 as a sophomore in high school when Holly is about three years old.
• Red Riding Hood Replica: When in Vecna's Mindscape, she wears brown cape as she ventures into the forbidden forest to face potential monsters, evoking this fairy tale archetype.
• Shared Family Quirks: During their ordeal in Vecna's realm, Max realizes that Holly shares several of Mike's traits, particularly stubbornness and a refusal to listen.
  Max: I take it back.You don't remind me of your brother. You are your brother!
• Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome: Holly is consistently aged three to six during the first four seasons, but is aged up a little to around nine or ten in Season 5.
• Sympathy for the Devil: When she’s in Henry’s memories, she sadly asks Max why a man was trying to hurt young Henry since Henry was trying to help him, wondering if this incident made Henry into the villain he became.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: The Girly Girl to Max's Tomboy in season 5. During their escape from the Upside Down, there is a big contrast between them: Max is a tough and sarcastic girl who wears practical clothes, while Holly is an innocent girl who wears a 1950s blue dress and has long pigtails.
• Trademark Favorite Food: As revealed in season 5, Holly's favorite food is blueberry pancakes.
• Trapped in Another World: After being taken by the Demogorgon to the Abyss as one of Vecna's vessels, she spends most of Season 5 trapped in Vecna's recreated childhood home.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight:
  • Sees Will trying to signal her with the Christmas lights in Season 1 and his attempts to push through the wall, but she's more confused than freaked out.
  • In season 3, she spots the nearby trees rustling due to the Mind Flayer moving through them, but her parents ignore what she's saying and tell her to look at the fireworks.
  • This becomes a plot point in season 5, as she begins having conversations with Vecna himself on a regular basis. However, due to being Locked Out of the Loop, she has no idea who Henry really is and simply treats him like an imaginary friend.

Patty Newby

Originated By: Ella Karuna Williams (West End), Gabrielle Nevaeh (Broadway)

Debut: "Stranger Things: The First Shadow"

The adopted sister of Bob Newby. An outcast at Hawkins High who ends up befriending new student Henry Creel.

• Adoption Angst: Throughout the play, she has a lot of angst over being adopted, getting mocked as "The Girl From Nowhere" by the likes of Walter and worrying that her biological mother must not have cared about her to give her up. When Henry reveals that Principal Newby is her biological father and stole her as a baby, she's actually relieved, as it meant her mother loved her after all.
• Black and Nerdy: All of her actors have been either black or mixed-heritage, and one of the things that initially draws her and Henry together is their shared love of the superhero character Captain Midnight.
• Blue Is Calm: Many of her outfits incorporate shades of blue into them, and she ends up being the only calming human presence in Henry's life and the only thing still connecting him to his humanity, serving as a direct contrast to the Red Is Violent motif of The Mind Flayer, who encourages Henry to give in to his murderous urges.
• The Conscience: She's this for Henry throughout the events of The First Shadow, essentially serving as the only thing still connecting him to humanity, in contrast to Brenner and the Mind Flayer's shared role as The Corruptor. When he thinks he's killed her, that last connection is gone and paves the way for him to becoming the Omnicidal Maniac that is Vecna.
• Deuteragonist: She is the second most important character in The First Shadow, just under Henry himself.
• Determinator: Pretty much nothing is enough to stop or dissuade her when she puts her mind to something. This is best shown when she breaks into a locked down wing of the town hospital to speak to her father, and later willingly enters into a hypnotised state so she can talk with Henry while he's trapped in Hawkins Lab.
• Deadpan Snarker: She has her moments of dry wit, particularly when it's against Walter Henderson.
• Disney Death: When Henry forces her off the rafters at the end, she hits the floor and presumably dies on impact. Then as the curtain falls for the next scene, she regains consciousness and is taken to the hospital. The last time we see her, she's using a cane but no worse for wear.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Her father gets blinded by Henry, and she herself nearly falls to her death when Henry throws her off the rafters. Thankfully, not only does she survive the fall (albeit with a permanent handicap), she is able to go to Vegas to reunite with her mother, thanks to Henry's psychic abilities (his final act of kindness before the Mind Flayer takes control of him).
• Facial Horror: When the Mind Flayer masquerades as Patty to scare Henry, her face bursts open to reveal the muscle and bone underneath, giving her the appearance of a Demogorgon.
• Hero of Another Story: She gets a very quick, easy-to-miss name drop in Season 5, when Max encounters Henry's high school memories. Little does Max know that this random person on a flyer was the only person that Henry ever loved.
• I Have Brothers: Just the one brother, but thanks to it being the AV club founder and amateur Buccaneer Broadcaster Bob, Patty knows how to operate a radio very skilfully, which comes in handy when she needs to contact an imprisoned Henry.
• Insult of Endearment: She frequently reassures Henry that he's not a freak, he's just a weirdo, which she always says with fondness.
• Indy Ploy: Manages to pull off one of these when she needs to get in to the locked down wing of Hawkins hospital to see her father. She takes the burger Bob was eating, smears the sauce on his face and has Joyce scream that he's "infected" which draws the attention of the nurses and guards, allowing her to slip by unnoticed.
• I'm Not Afraid of You: When Henry, who is possessed by the Mind Flayer, tries to torment and toy with her by revealing her true parentage, Patty resists him by expressing her relief about finally knowing the truth, before firmly stating that she's not afraid of him. This actually seems to depower and ward off the Mind Flayer's influence, allowing Henry to return to his senses, at least for a little while.
• Living Emotional Crutch: Patty is the only person that Henry genuinely trusts and cares for. Through their shared struggle as outcasts and love of superheroes, the two get along swimmingly, to the point where Henry starts developing feelings for her. Henry's Start of Darkness is sealed when he gives into the Mind Flayer and nearly murders Patty.
• Missing Mom: She has one of these, who she thinks works as a singer in Las Vegas, with her ultimate goal being to leave Hawkins and find her. At the end of the play, she does.
• Nice Girl: A kind, empathetic girl who proves to be one of the very few people that Henry genuinely loves, even above his own parents.
• Only Friend: She's pretty much the only real friend that Henry has, in both Hawkins High and his life in general, as the rest of the students are either friendly but distant (like Joyce and Bob), ambivalent towards him (like Hopper) or bully him for being "weird" (like Walter).
• Remember the New Guy?: Bob never mentioned having a sister in the series, though this is justified as Patty wasn't even in Hawkins by the time of the show. Season 5 would retroactively reference Patty in one of Henry's flashbacks.
• Showgirl Skirt: During the vision of the Las Vegas club her mother performs in that Henry conjures for her, she finds herself wearing one of these as he tries to get her to dance with him.

Principal Newby

Originated By: Matthew Pidgeon (West End), Andrew Hovelson (Broadway)

Debut: "Stranger Things: The First Shadow"

The father of Bob and Patty Newby, and the principal of Hawkins High School in 1959.

• Dad the Veteran: Like Victor Creel, he served in WWII and the two of them bond over this shared history together.
• Eye Scream: His eyes are caved in by Henry when he tries to separate him and Patty, leaving him blind and insane.
• Fantasy-Forbidding Father: He's very strict with Patty, apparently more so than he is with Bob, forbidding her from not just seeing boys but also taking part in the school musical.
• Shell-Shocked Veteran: He tries to reassure Victor while he's having a PTSD induced breakdown by relating that he saw some horrific things during his service in the War too, not that it helps much.
• Teacher/Student Romance: It's revealed by Henry to Patty that her parents relationship was this, with Patty's mother falling in love with him when she was a student and he was her principal. Principal Newby then took the infant Patty and abandoned her mother, never telling her the truth about what really happened.

Barbara "Barb" Holland

Played By: Shannon Purser

Debut: "Chapter One: The Vanishing of Will Byers" (1x01)

Nancy's best friend and reluctant voice of reason.

• '70s Hair: An old photo at her parent's house shows her with a face-framing Dorothy Hamill-esque pageboy.
• '80s Hair: Barb styles her shiny red locks into a short, wavy style of the decade.
• Academic Athlete: According to Stranger Things Worlds Turned Upside Down: The Official Behind-The-Scenes Companion, she was noted to be playing Varsity Softball while being a Class Treasurer and public library volunteer, and a member of the Key Club, National Honor Society, Rotary Youth Exchange, and a Mathlete. Also a childhood photo has one of her wearing a ballet costume, implying she took ballet.
• Alone Among the Couples: At Steve's party, she's forced to fifth-wheel alongside Carol/Tommy and Steve/Nancy.
• Ambiguously Bi: Even for a best friend, she's quite protective and devoted to Nancy, and her hurt and dejection after being told by Nancy to go home while she stays with Steve at the party can be read as romantic rejection, but it's never really developed one way or another. Not least because she is abducted into the Upside Down and brutally killed mere moments after.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: She is abducted into the Upside Down and dragged offscreen screaming before she can escape her attacker. We see her badly mutilated and half eaten corpse in the penultimate episode, confirming her demise was quite gruesome.
• Dead All Along: Nancy is worried that Barb might have been killed just like Will, only that Will wasn't killed, but Barb was. She doesn't get confirmation until El finds out while searching for both in the Upside-Down.
• The Drag-Along: Sensible, dependable Barb really has no interest in partying at Steve's house with jerks like Tommy H. and Carol, but Nancy convinces her to come along, and she reluctantly agrees. She really only stays out of well-founded concern for Nancy, and gets abducted to the Upside Down by the Demogorgon whilst patiently waiting for her on the patio.
• Face Full of Alien Wing-Wong: Her mutilated, decaying corpse is found by Eleven with a larger version of the worm-thing Will coughed up emerging from her mouth.
• Foregone Conclusion: We as the audience know for a fact that Barb was murdered by the Demogorgon less than five minutes after it abducted her, but Nancy and subsequently nobody else knows what has happened to her. When her ultimate fate is revealed in Episode 7 "The Bathtub", foregone conclusion it may be, but seeing her mutilated corpse is gut wrenching and heartbreaking at the same time, especially at the thought that an innocent girl had died so horrifically. This assumption ends up not being so foregone to a degree, as Season 4 implies Vecna may have had a hand in Barb's death as well.
• Gas Leak Cover-Up: Invoked and played with. Investigator Murray argues that in order to hit Hawkins Lab where they will hurt, he, Nancy and Jonathan have to set up a considerably less outlandish version of the truth of Barb's death. In their version, instead of Barb being pulled to a parallel dimension and killed via a rift that the Hawkins Lab personnel forcibly opened, Barb would have died from a poisonous experimental gas leak that the lab coats tried to cover up. Contrary to the trope itself, it's not the suits who are trying to push the story, but rather Barb's friends trying to exact punishment from the offending party, who otherwise would have been given the benefit of the doubt.
• Gory Discretion Shot: We don't quite see her body in full (with the exception of her gouged-out face), but she was clearly dispatched quite gruesomely after being dragged back into the pool. This lack of seeing the deed would end up becoming important in Season 4, as Vecna implies it was him and not the Demogorgon who actually dragged Barb back in and killed her.
• Gut Feeling: Barb has 20:20 vision when it comes to the internal dynamic of the terrible trio Nancy is trying to make friends with to get with one of them. And she wasn't all that wrong about how awfully the pool party would go for her in their company, either. Unfortunately for her, "party-crashing monsters from beyond the dimensional veil" would have needed a full-blown crystal ball and tarot deck, not just a good gut.
• Hidden Depths: According to "Rebel Robin", Barb uses her good girl persona to get what she wants and is a lot sneakier than she appears.
• Huge Schoolgirl: She's a lot larger, curvier, and taller (Shannon Purser is 5'9") than most of the girl characters.
• Kill the Cutie: With her large glasses, mom jeans, coy demeanor, porcelain features, red hair, and her loyalty towards Nancy, it's hard to not find Barb endearing. This is likely why so many audience members were upset when she was confirmed to be dead.
• Mauve Shirt: While she does appear for a while prior to her death, it's more or less inevitable once she gets left alone at Steve's party that it's only a matter of time.
• Missing White Woman Syndrome: Deconstructed. In an age where teens were allowed to be more free-range, going missing even when you are a young white woman doesn't get the authorities all that bothered, especially after only a couple of days of it.
• Nerd Glasses: She sports very large Sally Jessy Raphael-style glasses which, along with her penchant for voluminous high-waisted pants and high-necked blouses, lend her a rather momsy, mature look.
• Nice Girl: Barb is perhaps the nicest teenager in the show (along with Nancy), being excited for Nancy's budding relationship with Steve, but also concerned for her when she begins to hang around jerkasses Tommy H. and Carol. She also waits for Nancy when she goes upstairs with Steve, despite her telling Barb that she can go home.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: She goes to the party with Steve and his friends to make sure Nancy doesn't get too drunk. Even after Nancy tells Barb that she can go home, Barb remains nearby out of concern for her friend. This ultimately leads to her getting abducted by the Demogorgon and killed by Vecna.
• Pink Is Feminine: She wears a coral pink, ruffled sweater-blouse with a pussycat bow the last time she was alive and in one of the old school photos of herself when she was younger, she wore a similar style blouse with a darker pink color. This is likely to tie her into her "classic good girl" role.
• Redhead in Green: An old photo of herself that was displayed with her childhood photos has her in a green formal dress that complements her flaming hair color.
• The Reliable One: From being a pre-test quiz mistress to having a car, compassion and common sense, Barb is great to have in your corner.
• Revealing Cover-Up: When her car is oh-so conveniently found by ever-so convenient state troopers right by the bus station, it all but confirms to Hopper that the "Energy Department" is definitely behind everything going on in Hawkins.
• The Runaway: Invoked, as this is the initial presumption of her disappearance. As most of the search efforts are concentrated on finding Will, Barb's own disappearance largely goes under the radar. El finds out that she was taken to the Upside Down and killed seemingly by the Demogorgon; when Hopper and Joyce venture into the beast's lair, they find Barb's dead body next to Will. Season 2 reveals the government is still lying that it's a disappearance.
• Sacrificial Lamb: She's the first in our world to be killed by a monster while her friend gets laid.
• Sarcastic Devotee: A loyal friend to Nancy, but frequently snarks about her relationship with Steve and his party.
• Sex Signals Death: Inverted. She is the only one at the party not to have sex and is taken while everyone else at Steve's party is hooking up.
• Shrinking Violet: She's extremely uncomfortable at Steve's party, hesitant to stick up for herself, and she's in general a very cautious character.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Despite being killed off less than halfway through Season 1. Not only does her death lead to Nancy realizing the existence of the Demogorgon, and in turn down the path of the other main characters, but it also serves as the final nail in the shutdown of Hawkins Laboratory.
• Tomboy with a Girly Streak: Barb is considered less feminine (compared to Nancy) but she has interests in athletics while sporting eyeshadow, pink, and took ballet.
• True Blue Femininity: She is a classic "good girl" whose childhood portraits on her parents' sideboard feature her wearing a blue sundress and bolero sweater. She's last seen alive sporting a dark turquoise jacket.
• We Used to Be Friends: "Rebel Robin" reveals she used to be good friends with Robin from kindergarten to sixth grade, until Barb chose to hang out with more "priss" and conventional girls like Nancy.
• Youthful Freckles: She has porcelain skin with prominent freckles.

Mr. Holland & Marsha Holland

Played By: Cynthia Barrett (Mrs. Holland) & Aaron Muñoz (Mr. Holland)

Debut: "Chapter Three: Holly, Jolly" (1x03)

Barb's parents.

• '50s Hair: Mrs. Holland wears her hair in an outmoded '50s style, which complements her role as a traditional housewife.
• Gaslighting: The Lab does this to them — badly. The "Department of Energy's" piss-poor attempt at selling the "Barb ran off to the bus station and got on a Greyhound to wherever" story (rather than coming up with a more character-appropriate reason for her disappearance, a fake body or a Jane Doe report meeting their daughter's description, the idiots just left Barb's ultimate fate hanging), they (quite naturally) still tried digging into their daughters disappearance with Murray's help, understandably. This leads to Nancy, Steve (well, somewhat) and Jonathan to feel guilty about being unable to tell them what really happened and inadvertently joining in on contributing to this wrong narrative, especially as the Hollands were sinking their house and savings into their search. This compels the kids to move against the Lab more actively. Nice job, Brenner & Co.
• Good Parents: Post-disappearance, they are both willing to blow all their money to either get their child back or at least find out what happened to her.
• Housewife: Marsha is a classic example, as she is seen at home during the day wearing an apron, preparing the family meal. The fact that she later offers only KFC to Steve and Nancy speaks volumes about her state of mind at that point.
• Mama Bear: Marsha is determined to get her daughter home or find out about her, even if it means putting the house on the market.
• Oblivious Guilt Slinging: They are upbeat about the possibility of finally tracking down Barb, unaware that their dinner guests know exactly what happened to her but can't bring themselves to tell them.
• Outliving One's Offspring: Sadly is the case for them, as Barb was taken to the Upside Down and killed there and it's even implied that she is likely their only child.
• Papa Wolf: As determined as his wife to get his daughter home, aside from putting the house on the market, he is visibly angry with Hopper for the perceived inaction in searching for her.
• Parents Know Their Children: Which is why they knew what they were told about Barb's disappearance was a pile of BS.
• Unnamed Parent: Zig-Zagged. Mrs. Holland's given name is spoken while her while her husband's is not.

Claudia Henderson (née Yount)

Played By: Catherine Curtin

Originated By: Maisie Norma Seaton (West End), Shea Grant (Broadway)

Debut: "Chapter Five: The Flea and the Acrobat" (1x05)

Dustin's mother.

• Back for the Finale: She returns to attend her son's graduation in the final episode.
• Bourgeois Bohemian: Implied. While she's not vocal about her political beliefs like typical examples, she does display a Mondale/Ferraro '84 sign in her front yard and lives in the same hilly, upper-middle class area of Hawkins as the Sinclairs and Wheelers who are notably more Republican. She's also audibly cheering Dustin on when he uses his valedictorian speech as a chance to say "screw conformity" and flip off the principal.
• '80s Hair: Sports a teased and curled style in Season 3 and it gets more volumized in Season 4.
• Crazy Cat Lady: Though she's since mellowed into merely being the kind of feline lover described below, she was one of these as a teenager, taking her cat Prancer to school with her and being seen as the local "freak" because of it. She's so grief-stricken by his death that she offers a $100 reward for the person who finds his murderer.
• Good Parents: Very sweet, close and loving with her son, dotes on her cat.
• Kind Hearted Cat Lover: A loving and supportive mother who is very attached to their cat Mews. After Mews dies (as far as she knows the cat "disappeared"), she is seen snuggling a new kitten at the 2nd season finale.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Like the Sinclair parents, her son Dustin is very close to her, yet he manages to convince her that their cat Mews went missing when, in fact, the cat got disemboweled by a creature from another world.
• Mama Bear: In Season 4, her first instinct after her son and his friends are made targets by reactionaries is to defend his reputation, search for him, and keep him safe from the growing Witch Hunt.
• Satanic Panic: In her youth she was quick to start blaming the death of her cat Prancer and the other murdered pets of Hawkins on the Devil. And just like Jason, she is technically correct in believing there's a supernatural element behind it, but it's primarily the Mind Flayer's influence, not anything Satan related.

Walter Henderson

Originated By: Calum Ross (West End), Ian Dolley (Broadway)

Debut: "Stranger Things: The First Shadow"

Dustin's father, who is out of his and his mother's lives by the time the show takes place.

• Jerkass: A thoroughly unpleasant young man who, at best, annoys everyone around him and, at worst, verbally bullies them, as he did with Patty and Henry.
• Kissing Cousins: It's brought up several times throughout the play that he apparently made out with his cousin, which he always desperately denies.
• Like Father, Unlike Son: He and Dustin couldn't be more different, as while his son is a brave, kind and heroic kid, Walter is a slimy bully who constantly belittles those around him and picks on those he considers different.

Charles and Sue Sinclair (née Anderson)

Played By: Arnell Powell (Mr. Sinclair) and Karen Ceesay (Mrs. Sinclair)

Charles Originated By: Ammar Duffus (West End), Robert T. Cunningham (Broadway)

Sue Originated By: Kemi Awoderu (West End), Ayame Cymone (Broadway)

Debut: "Chapter Five: The Flea and the Acrobat" (1x05)

Lucas and Erica's parents.

• '80s Hair: Both wear styles associated with middle-aged professionals and suburbanites in the African American community during the decade. Mrs. Sinclair in relaxed Compressed Hair and Mr. Sinclair cropping his textured hair into a conservative style. Mrs. Sinclair's hair starts to take on an appearance equal to Princess Diana◊ in Season 4.
• Back for the Finale: They appear to cheer on their son at his graduation in the final episode.
• Dad the Veteran: Mr. Sinclair had fought in the Vietnam War.
• Deadpan Snarker: When showing the newly enrolled Henry Creel around Hawkins High during The First Shadow, Sue had a witty description loaded for pretty much the entire student body. Though for Walter Henderson, she simply gives a curt:
  Sue: Eat shit, Walter.
• Foil: The Sinclairs, especially Charles, contrast with most of the parents on the show. From the family's scenes together, Charles and Sue are portrayed as a close and loving couple who are involved in their children's lives. Charles has a strong connection with Lucas, ensuring that he can come to his dad for girl advice—something that one would never see Mike do with his father—and unlike Ted, Charles also seems to have a very close relationship with his wife. Charles is also less plagued by his notions of masculinity and strict behavior, in contrast to Hopper, Lonnie, and Neil. Sue seems to be a stern but fair disciplinarian, if Erica's rant about how mad she would be if Erica was late for an uncle's birthday party was anything to go by.
• Good Parents: Involved, loving, and expecting their children to behave well. Compared to the Byers and the Wheelers, they're presented as a more stable, functional family.
• Happily Married: In contrast to most of the parents on the show, they're presented as a loving couple who are affectionate with one another.
• High-School Sweethearts: The two of them knew each other in high school and presumably started dating then, though ironically for the couple who are undoubtedly the most loving of the kids parents, Sue didn't seem to care for Charles' interest in her at first.
• Locked Out of the Loop: To a lesser extent than Karen and Ted; both their children are very close to them and do come to them for more mundane concerns like crushes on girls or sibling bickering and using too much maple syrup, but their children keep them out of the events surrounding the Upside Down, likely out of concern for their parents' safety than being outright distant.
• Mama Bear: Mrs. Sinclair gives off this vibe, and according to Erica her mom would personally hunt down anyone who might have had something to do with the disappearance of any of her children. In Season 4, she is worried for Lucas after he's made a target of the local reactionaries and gets angry with Ted for making a carelessly insensitive comment about Lucas and his friends.
• Number Two: As teenagers, Sue was basically Joyce's second in command when she was organising and directing the school play.
• Nuclear Family: A classic example made up of mom, dad, son and younger daughter. They appear to be the only couple that hasn't had to contend with losing their child, a sagging love life, a divorce, history of abuse, or any of the other problems that have plagued the other families featured in the show.
• Papa Wolf: In season 4, Charles is shown to be protective of his kids and gets angry at Ted after he makes the dumb suggestion that the kids could benefit from a stay in jail.
• Standard '50s Father: Charles fulfills this role better than most of the fathers on the show, being kind and dependable with an authoritative air that allows his son to ask him for advice regarding girls while reading his newspaper.
• Women Are Wiser: Apparently, one of the reasons that Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair have such a good relationship is that Mr. Sinclair has learned to subscribe to this. When Lucas is asking him for advice on talking to girls and brings up how he mends fences with his wife even when she is in the wrong, Mr. Sinclair's response is to half-jokingly quip "She's ''never'' wrong."

Sara Hopper

Played By: Elle Graham (Season 1), Tilly Morris (Season 5)

Debut: "Chapter Eight: The Upside Down" (1x08)^note Flashback

Chief Hopper's late daughter with his former wife Diane.

• Baldness Means Sickness: Her bald appearance in flashbacks visually reinforces that she is undergoing chemotherapy.
• The Cutie: One of the reasons her dad has been long unable to cope with her loss. She was a cute little button.
• Daddy's Girl: She was Hop's pride and joy.
• Death of a Child: Died very young from a sudden illness, due to her father's unprotected exposure to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War.
• Girlish Pigtails: Her hairstyle drives home her innocence.
• Littlest Cancer Patient: In flashbacks, she has a fainting spell, and her mom and Hopper take her to the hospital to find out that she presumably has cancer.
• Morality Pet: Sara is one of the reasons Hopper is fiercely protective of Eleven, as she was the catalyst for much of his kindness.
• Posthumous Character: Her demise is the source of Hopper's grief, aggressiveness, and bouts of alcoholism. It's also presumed to have caused his divorce.

Teresa "Terry" Ives

Played By: Aimee Mullins

Debut: "Chapter Three: Holly, Jolly" (1x03)^note Newspaper article, "Chapter Six: The Monster" (1x06)

Eleven's biological mother. A middle-aged catatonic woman and former subject of Dr. Brenner's experiments.

• Ambiguous Situation: In the first season, it's not known whether Terry went insane from the pressure of her efforts to fight the government, or the scrubs at Hawkins did something to her to shut her up once and for all. Season 2 confirms that Terry was subjected to brutal electroshock therapy. This, combined with the trauma of losing — and briefly finding, only to lose again — her daughter, is what fried her brain and made her the Empty Shell we see today.
• And I Must Scream: This is precisely what Terry's Madness Mantra summates: Terry has been seeing certain things and hearing certain words related to Jane's kidnapping on loop for years now — Becky telling her to breathe as she goes into labor. The sunflowers in her hospital room where she's lied to and told Jane was stillborn. The combination on the safe she gets the gun out of to go get Jane back at any cost. The rainbow on the doorframe outside Jane's room, where she finally confirms she was always right and Jane was kidnapped. And finally, horrifically, the voltage Brenner ordered the shock therapy machine turned to when it fried her mind. Breathe. Sunflower. Three to the right, four to the left. Rainbow. Four-fifty. Breathe... Her worst memories on repeat for eternity — Becky says Terry's stuck in a dream she hopes is good, but really Terry's been subjected to a hellish Fate Worse than Death. And by the time Eleven leaves, Becky knows the truth. Imagine her caring for her sister now, hearing those words and knowing what they mean.
• Cassandra Truth: No one believed her when she told the world that she carried a baby to term and was taken away from her. The problem lay in the fact that she tried to fight a battle against the very people that held all records of the events, with nothing but her word to show for it. Taking matters into her own hands, she broke into Hawkins Lab to find her daughter, finding her in the "Rainbow Room", where she was captured and subjected to a lobotomy.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: We never see her again after Season 2.
• Conspiracy Theorist: What her sister Becky describes Terry devolved into. It reached the point where it became Big Brother Is Watching until she lost her sanity. It's later revealed that she was subject to brutal electric shock therapy by Hawkins Lab personnel.
• Daddy Had a Good Reason for Abandoning You: Gender Flipped. She never intended to abandon Jane, and only abandoned her after being driven to insanity, and being physically unable to move, by electroshock therapy.
• Dad the Veteran: Her and Becky's father and Eleven's biological grandfather was a World War Two veteran who was involved in liberating a Nazi concentration camp. He suffered PTSD and nightmares from it.
• A Day in the Limelight: She is one of the main characters of Suspicious Minds. It focuses on her backstory and her time with Dr. Brenner and her relationship with Eleven's biological father.
• Diagnosis: Knowing Too Much: She was subjected to electro-shock therapy in order to silence her from claiming her daughter back.
• Empty Shell: Her traumatic past has taken its toll on poor Terry, though Season 2 shows that Brenner running a powerful electrical current through her head has more than a little to do with that. We see her sitting in her wheelchair with an apathetic Thousand-Yard Stare.
• Faking the Dead: She claimed that her baby was taken away from her and that all records were faked in order to show that she aborted the baby. She's correct: Eleven is her daughter, Jane.
• Gaslighting: The government spent such an effort trying to convince the world that she miscarried her daughter that Terry went insane. She knows the truth deep down, but the government made sure to destroy everything else in her mind, rendering her unable to fend for herself. Season 2 reveals that her present state is a result of her attempt to bust into Hawkins Lab and find Jane. She succeeded in that much, before Brenner caught her and essentially had her brain deep fried.
• Good Girls Avoid Abortion: In the novel Suspicious Minds, she refuses to abort her child against her friend Gloria's advice.
• Guinea Pig Family: She was experimented upon as a young woman, and her daughter was too.
• Hidden Depths:
  • The tie-in novel revealed that she was a very ambitious and idealistic young woman who wanted to change the world and be part of something bigger.
  • She is revealed to have been riveted by The Two Towers around that time, likely implying she was as nerdy as her daughter's friends.
• Hippie Parents: Flashbacks have shown her looking like a young hippie of the early '70s with long hair and long dresses. The tie-in novel pushes this further by showing her as a serious and hard-working college student and waitress who is very much interested in the world around her and wants to go to places like New York and Berkeley. She's also shown to be very idealistic.
• I Was Quite a Looker: With a side of She Cleans Up Nicely. In her catatonic state, she isn't able to pay attention to her appearance. When she was a young woman in the '70s, as seen in flashbacks, she was very pretty, with golden locks and stylish clothing.
• Laser-Guided Amnesia: The scientists at Hawkins Lab literally fried her brain with 450 volts of electricity after she broke into the lab to look for her daughter, leaving every single one of her memories removed forever except for her worst ones, which she endlessly repeats to this day.
• Madness Mantra: She is in a permanent, semi-catatonic state, endlessly repeating the refrain "Breathe. Sunflower. Rainbow. Three to the right, four to the left. 450." It turns out that this apparent nonsense is linked to her memories of losing Jane to the researchers at Hawkins Lab, and her desperate attempts to get her back. It is all that she has left of her daughter.
• Mama Bear: She fought so much to try to prove her child was alive that her mind broke under the pressure, or at least that's what her sister Becky thinks. Turns out, she was lobotomized to keep her quiet once and for all.
• Military Brat: Her late father was a veteran of World War II and after being traumatized by the experiences, he emphasized to her the importance of being knowledgeable about current events.
• Mind Rape: She was experimented on, gaining telekinetic powers in the process. She was pregnant at the time and those responsible took her full-term baby from her when she was born. These events shattered her mind and left her catatonic.
• Mirror Character: To Joyce. Both are loving mothers who had their child taken from them because of Hawkins Lab and refused to give up hope that they were still alive, leading to everyone close to them thinking they were simply mad from grief.
• Nice Girl: According to the novel Suspicious Minds, Terry was a warm and friendly young woman.
• Parents Know Their Children: She refuses to believe anything but the fact that her child is still alive and will come back to her.
• Promotion to Parent: According to the tie-in novel Suspicious Minds, she was promoted to guardian for Becky after their parents died in a car accident.
• Psychic Link: She's fully aware that her daughter is alive, as they share a link, which is confirmed in Season 2 when Eleven visits her.
• Psychic Powers: While she can't do anything on the scale of her daughter, she can manipulate small electronics and share memories with Eleven through their Psychic Link.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Terry appears only fleetingly in every single season, but her role is extremely important to the story and to Eleven/Jane's development. Not only is she Jane's mother, but the memory of her, Brenner's crime against her, and her love for Jane actually motivates Eleven continuously throughout every season, giving her the strength to draw upon her psychic powers even in the worst circumstances.
• So What Do We Do Now?: Even if she were to get her child back, she is in no position to raise anyone, as she's already catatonic and completely unable to even take care of herself. As Eleven sadly finds out.
• Tested on Humans: All sorts of things were done to her to test her potential Psychic Powers.
• Thousand-Yard Stare: Constantly, as a side effect of being lobotomized by Brenner's team.
• Trauma Conga Line: Revealed in Suspicious Minds: her parents died when she was young, leaving her to become guardian to her younger sister, Becky. As an idealistic college student, she tried to protest against the Vietnam War due to her father's experiences in World War II. She volunteered for experiments for money, which left her with telekinetic powers, and got pregnant by her then-boyfriend. Her boyfriend was sent to Vietnam where he was killed, and she nearly died giving birth to her daughter. She was then told that her daughter had died, but remained convinced that she was still alive. After all her efforts to be reunited with her daughter, she was for a moment before being brutally dragged away from her. She was then tortured via electroshock therapy, which seems to have left her effectively braindead.
• Unwitting Test Subject: She volunteered for the experiments and paid no mind to what was being done to her until she found out that she was pregnant... and the scrubs had shown some vested interest in the prospective daughter. All hell broke loose from that point forward.
• You Are Too Late: Hopper and Joyce come to talk to her about the experimentation done on her in the past, but she had been rendered catatonic years ago by Brenner pumping her brain full of electricity. They leave empty-handed.

Rebecca "Becky" Ives

Played By: Amy Seimetz

Debut: "Chapter Six: The Monster" (1x06)

Terry's younger sister and main caretaker.

• Agent Scully: She received the brunt force of Terry's breakdown, so is not so inclined to believe her claims of a "lost child".
• Arbitrary Skepticism: Played with. She's aware that Terry was experimented on, but she doesn't believe in a missing child, or the whole superpowers claims. It's hard to blame her, considering how outlandish it sounds. El showing up in Season 2 and opening the door with her powers puts a pin in that.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: When Hop and Joyce visit her and Terry, it's markedly clear that Becky has had to deal with people asking names and nosing around for a long time.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: We never see Becky after Season 2, even though she's Eleven's aunt.
• Cool Aunt: After she learns that Jane is actually her niece, she immediately wants to take care of her and does her best to help her.
• Dad the Veteran: Her and Terry's father was a World War II veteran who liberated a Nazi concentration camp. He had nightmares and PTSD from it.
• Little Sister Instinct: Suspicious Minds reveals that she is Terry's younger sister, but now that Terry is catatonic, Becky has taken on the role of her carer.
• Nice Girl: She loves her sister dearly and takes care of her the best she can. What's more, when Eleven tracks her and Terry down and proves that she's Jane Ives, Becky shows herself to be a loving and attentive aunt. She even asks Eleven to stay and live with her, and apologizes to her for not believing that she existed.
• Promotion to Parent: She's her sister Terry's only carer and becomes a parental figure for El, since Terry can't take of her.

Neil Hargrove

Played By: Will Chase

Debut: "Chapter Eight: The Mind Flayer" (2x08)

Billy's father and Max's stepfather.

• Abusive Dad:
  • Neil is both physically and verbally abusive to Billy, which goes a long way toward explaining Billy's Jerkass behavior. This is shown more in Runaway Max where he infamously beats Billy with a belt.
  • He's not the greatest stepdad to Max in Runaway Max either, calling her a stupid little girl for trying to help Billy, as well as trying to take her dad's place as a father, regardless of how Max feels about him, or her real father. It's made more clear when he abandons Max to leave Hawkins without a second thought.
• Crazy Jealous Guy: Max implies that he didn't like the amount of time that she was spending with her biological father, which is what was the catalyst of the Hargroves moving from California. He was also abusive to his first wife because he suspected (with no discernible proof that the audience sees) that she was cheating on him.
• Domestic Abuse: He physically attacked his first wife, Billy's mother, purely for encouraging Billy's love of surfing. Runaway Max also that indicates that he doesn't treat Susan much better, and ultimately abandons her by Season 4.
• Don't Make Me Take My Belt Off!: In Runaway Max, he beats Billy with a belt for getting a speeding ticket; it's all but stated that this is a regular occurrence, much to Max's horror and disgust.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: In season 4 Max mention Neil couldn't handle Billy not being around showing that despite abusing him, he was devastated over Billy's death.
• Evil Counterpart:
  • To Jim Hopper. Like Jim he demands obedience and is prone to angry outbursts when his stepchildren go missing, and generally has a tough time disciplining rashly. However, unlike Jim, Neil is not shown to have a soft, fatherly side or any of Hopper's other likable traits, or even remorse as Hopper eventually grows to regret some of his more Kick the Dog moments.
  • To a lesser extent, he is also one to Lonnie Byers, who was only shown as emotionally abusive, but not physically, and seems to have a better temper by comparison.
• Grief-Induced Split: It's implied that one of the reasons he and Susan split up between Season 3 and Season 4 is because of the death of Billy; Max states Neil didn't cope with it well and the couple's relationship deteriorated until Neil left. The marriage already had issues, with Susan being uncomfortable with Neil's authoritarian behaviour towards Billy; Neil was also abusive towards his first wife and is shown to have been controlling of Susan, at the very least. Max doesn't care about her stepfather leaving because she thinks he's an asshole, although without his financial support she and her mother had to move to a crummy house in a trailer park and Susan is forced to work two jobs; Susan hasn't been coping well, frequently drinking heavily.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Neil has a very short temper. In Runaway Max, when Max and Billy meet for the first time, he is barely able to restrain his anger over Billy being late.
• Hate Sink: One of the most despicable adults in the show. He is one of the reasons for Billy's repugnant behavior, and is also incredibly hot-headed and aggressive. Even in-universe, when El sees the past Neil's abuse in Billy's memories, she views him with disgust as she looks for "the source". Season 4 makes him worse as it's revealed he abandoned Susan and Max to fend for themselves after Billy's death.
• Hypocrite: His first major scene is beating his own son for losing track of Max. Yet once Billy died, he had no problem abandoning her and Susan to their fates even though they relied on his financial support.
• Jerkass: He's a stern, vicious man who exhibits a variety of intolerant, bigoted behaviors and is shown to be violently abusive to his son.
• Karma Houdini: He wrecked Billy's life and since he doesn't appear in any present scenes in Season 3, it's likely he never gets his comeuppance. Extra sad is that Billy was ultimately the one to pay the price in the end. Even worse, the only other people who could punish Neil are in no position to do so at the end of Season 3, as El (who saw Neil's abuse in Billy's memories) loses her powers and moves away, while Hopper (whom El could have tipped off) is missing or potentially also dead. Even after his son dies, he abandons Susan and Max, never to be seen again.
• Kick the Dog: Whatever satisfaction that could be had from watching him verbally and physically beat Billy down is lost when it's realized that it's precisely why Billy is a son of a bitch in the first place.
• Love Is a Weakness: Not only does he refuse to show Billy any affection, he abused his wife whenever she did, accusing her of "weakening" Billy by encouraging him and supporting his interests. The fact that he divorced Susan and left Hawkins entirely after Billy's death implies that he did love Billy to some extent, but is so twisted up that he'd rather abandon his second family than admit that.
• Mirror Character: To Lonnie Byers. Both of them are abusive, self-absorbed parents who treat their spouses like garbage, and try to force their children to be more masculine than they truly are. They also both make very few appearances before disappearing from the story altogether, due to a Lack of Empathy for their respective wives. The only real differences are that Lonnie isn't the slightest bit invested in his kids, with even Will's disappearance and presumed death barely affecting him (outside of him trying to cash in on it through a lawsuit). By contrast, Neil does care about his son and adopted daughter to some extent, to the point where he shows concern and anger over Billy letting Max wander around unsupervised.
• Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: He's absolutely correct when he says that nothing about Billy's behavior is okay, but we later learn that he's the reason for Billy's behavior.
• Office Romance: How he and Susan got together, detailed in Runaway Max: they were coworkers at a bank, with Neil as the security guard and Susan as a bank teller. They bonded over coffee breaks and single parenthood.
• Outliving One's Offspring: At the end of Season 3, he has lost Billy to the machinations and destruction of the Mind Flayer.
• Politically Incorrect Villain:
  • Chews Billy out for "staring at himself in the mirror like a faggot" and offhandedly refers to the girl he's planning a date with as a "whore". Makes you wonder how his wife feels.
  • As seen from Billy's childhood, he's incredibly insecure when it comes to masculinity, considering his first wife's loving nature to be weakening Billy.
  • Season 3 and Runaway Max reveal him to have beaten his first wife and to be a hard-core Republican who longs for the 1950s and looks down on Walter Mondale and that lady (Geraldine Ferraro).
• Put on a Bus: By the time Season 4 starts, Neil has left Max's mom after Billy's death. Max makes it very clear to her counselor that she does NOT miss him.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: He leaves Hawkins following Billy's death, abandoning his wife and stepdaughter in the process.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: How he talks down to Billy is a mix of this and Hair-Trigger Temper. Billy then talks to Max the same way.
• Wanted a Gender-Conforming Child: Makes Lonnie Byers look positively supportive in this department. It doesn't matter how many girls Billy sleeps with, how many fights he wins, how athletically gifted and muscular he is, or how much he drinks, Neil will always find a way to say that Billy isn't manly enough.

Susan Hargrove (formerly Mayfield)

Played By: Jennifer Marshall

Debut: "Chapter 8: The Mind Flayer'' (2x08)

Max's mother and Billy's stepmother.

• Adults Are Useless: She's hardly around enough to see how much of an asshole her stepson is to her daughter.
• Alcoholic Parent: After Neil abandons her and Max, she turns to alcohol to cope with her newfound poverty.
• Broken Bird: Season 4 shows she has become a stressed, emotional wreck while working two jobs to afford the trailer she and Max now live in after Neil abandons them.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: She doesn't appear in Season 5. We never see her reaction to Max waking up, or to her being in a coma in the first place.
• A Day in the Limelight: We learn more about her in Runaway Max, particularly her relationships with Max and Billy and how she and Neil got together.
• '80s Hair: Her strawberry blonde hair is permed and coiffed to high heaven.
• Female Misogynist: Not an overt example but in Runaway Max it's revealed that while she supported Walter Mondale during the 1984 election (which was going on during Season 2), she thought he was crazy for picking Geraldine Ferraro as his running mate for Vice-President because she felt no one would vote for a woman, even if she had a law degree. Max even notes her as wishing for a daintier daughter, pretty much wanting Max to be like Nancy before the events of Season 1.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Even before Neil, she dated a number of men who were unreliable, goofy, unfaithful or lazy, though they were more amiable to Max. Season 4 has her make a comment about Eddie doing something to warrant police attention, showing that she exhibits prejudiced attitudes.
• Office Romance: How she and Neil got together in Runaway Max. They were coworkers at a bank, Susan as a teller and Neil as the security guard. They bonded over being single parents and it escalated from there.
• Outliving One's Offspring: She loses her stepson at the end of Season 3.
• Parental Neglect: She and Neil are on vacation for most of Season 2, only appearing come episode 8, which means she left her daughter in Billy's care for a whole week. Also, whilst she's clearly bothered by Neil's abuse of Billy, she voices only weak concern.
• Put on a Bus: She is absent for all of Season 3, only returning (briefly) in 4.
• Riches to Rags: A downplayed example. In Season 2, she and Max seemed to be living in a modest but comfortable house with the Hargroves. But in Season 4, after Neil abandons them following Billy's death and without his financial support, they're now reduced to living in a trailer with Susan working two jobs to make ends meet.
• Trauma Conga Line: Having to endure a second divorce due to losing her stepson and becoming destitute as a result hasn't done any favors for her mental health, in which we can see her getting drunk in broad daylight to take her edge off. Then her daughter is left braindead and in a coma. She's absent in Season 5, but we can imagine she's not in a good spot at all.
• Useless Bystander Parent: Not only is she not around to keep Max safe, but she sees her husband physically manhandle his son and just stands there horrified. Granted, she was likely afraid of how he might react if she tried to intervene.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Her reaction to Max being put in a coma at the end of Season 4 is never shown, nor does she appear in Season 5.

Suzie Bingham

Played By: Gabriella Pizzolo

Debut: "Chapter Eight: The Battle of Starcourt" (3x08)

Dustin's Mormon-raised genius girlfriend from Utah whom he met at Science Camp.

• Affectionate Nickname: "Suzie-poo", courtesy of Dustin.
• Chekhov's Gunman: Introduced in name only at beginning of Season 3. Confirmed not only as real by the end of Season 3, but also the only character who knows the numerical code — Planck's constant — needed to save the world.
• Child Prodigy: Dustin's claims about her being a genius turn out to be 100% correct; in fact she is probably the smartest pre-adult character in the entire cast.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Despite Dustin seeing Suzie as the love of his life in Seasons 3 and 4, she's nowhere to be seen, nor is she even mentioned at any point in Season 5.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: Gets protective when she hears Erica on the walkie with Dustin, unaware that Erica is more of an Annoying Younger Sibling than a threat to her relationship.
• Dating What Daddy Hates: She is in a long-distance relationship with Dustin, however since he is not Mormon (he is indeed an agnostic) her parents will probably never approve.
• Girlfriend in Canada: Played With, as for most of Season 3 just about everyone thought that Dustin made her up, but then she turns out to be real.
• Gosh Darn It to Heck!: When she's frustrated she sounds like this. She even reprimands her older sister for actually swearing, with the use of a stern, "Language!" Even Mike has to watch himself from slipping up around her.
• Her Boyfriend's Jacket: A variant; Dustin lets Suzie keep his iconic red, white, and blue baseball cap after they leave science camp.
• Informed Attractiveness: According to Dustin, she's as attractive as Phoebe Cates. She's definitely cute when we get to see her in person, but in a more grounded, mundane way — her intelligence, on the other hand, is every bit as real as advertised.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Despite providing absolutely crucial help on two occasions, she's completely unaware of the existence of the Upside-Down and the threat it poses.
• Long-Distance Relationship: Her boyfriend, Dustin, lives in Hawkins, Indiana, whereas she lives in Utah.
• Lovable Nerd: As big of a nerd as Dustin. The two end up singing the theme to The NeverEnding Story during the Final Battle with the Mind Flayer. When not dancing along while singing she is triumphantly acting out singer Limahl's poses.
• Massive Numbered Siblings: The brief stop at her home in Season 4 reveals that she has at least 8 siblings.
• Pink Is Feminine: She is seen wearing a pink floral nightgown and cute hair decs.
• Skewed Priorities: Since she feels that Dustin blanked out on her for the past few days and is only now contacting her to ask her for a math equation, she threatens to hang up on him if he doesn't make up for it by singing The NeverEnding Story theme with her, dismissing his claims about "saving the world" as one of his games. This happens all while the kids are being pursued by the Mind Flayer and the adults could be caught by the Soviets at any minute. Understandable, as "saving the world from Russians and monsters" is a rather unlikely activity for a 14-year-old from a small Midwestern town like Dustin to be engaged in, and despite everyone in the Party being on the radio with him, no one thinks to tell Suzie that Dustin is being deadly serious.
• Small Role, Big Impact: Suzie only appears twice on the show but, both times, she provides invaluable help to the heroes without even realizing it:
  • In Season 3, she provides the value of Planck's constant, allowing Hopper, Joyce and Bauman to successfully destroy the Soviet machine before it can tear open a new Gate to the Upside-Down.
  • In Season 4, she uses her informatic skills to find the location of NINA. This, in turn, allows the boys to reach Eleven just in time to prevent her from getting killed by one of Sullivan's soldiers.
• Smart People Wear Glasses: She sports a large, round pair of spectacles, and is a Child Prodigy.
• Spanner in the Works: Unknowingly to both the Mind Flayer and the Soviet Union when Dustin contacts her for a crucial bit of information necessary to take down both, albeit temporarily.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Dustin describes their relationship as such, due to the distance and (her) disapproving parents. Indeed they get angry that she has a long-distance boyfriend, and an agnostic one at that.
• Teen Genius: She knows Planck's Constant despite being 14 at most.
• Token Religious Teammate: The only one among the protagonists and their close associates to mention religious belief as a factor in her thinking.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: Whether she and Dustin reconnected after the government shutdown of Hawkins was lifted is never revealed, as she is not mentioned a single time throughout Season 5, even during the epilogue where we see Dustin in college.

Eden Bingham

Played By: Audrey Holcomb

Debut: "Chapter Six: The Dive" (4x06)

Suzie's older sister, who would really like her to help with their vast, unruly bunch of younger siblings.

• Badly Battered Babysitter: Mostly because her younger siblings are borderline crazy, their father (parents?) is virtually absent, and Suzie can barely be bothered with such mundanities.
• Goth: She has the look, although much closer to the "listens to The Cure" than to the "wears period Victorian lace" end of the scale. Not so much gloomy as very much put upon.
• Ironic Name: The not-very-religious Eden is named after the biblical Garden of Eden, which is lampshaded by Argyle when she introduces herself.
• Promotion to Parent: To her great dismay, she has to watch the children and divide chores between her siblings while their father wiles away in his office.
• Ship Tease: With Argyle, with whom she smokes weed.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: About as far from Suzie as you can get. Where Suzie is a Gosh Dang It to Heck! type who can even use a glance to force Mike to clean up his language, Eden doesn't care. (Hard to say about the rest of the kids, who mostly just seem deranged or feral).
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: For someone raised in a Mormon household, Eden is quite profane.
• Whole-Costume Reference: Her baggy black outfit, messy hair, and goth makeup is a sweet nod to Allison Reynolds, the kooky "weird girl" from '80s teen classic The Breakfast Club.

Alexei

Played By: Alec Utgoff

Debut: "Chapter One: Suzie, Do You Copy?" (3x01)

A Soviet scientist working on the Gate.

• Chummy Commies: Provided you don't treat him as harshly as Hopper did, he's pretty friendly even with people from an enemy nation.
• Dying Alone: He succumbs to his bullet wound after Murray leaves him to get help.
• Everyone Can See It: He seems to have been under the assumption that Hopper and Joyce were already romantically and sexually involved and thinks it's hilarious that they aren't.
• Foil: To Steve. Steve is an American pretty-boy with little in the way of book smarts, while Alexei is a Russian scientist and isn't cool in a conventional sense. Both are captured by authority figures from enemy nations and interrogated, with contrasting results; Steve genuinely knows nothing, is understandably panicked during the whole ordeal and gets beaten and drugged despite his innocence, meanwhile Alexei does know what the Soviets are up to, stands his ground upon being questioned and ultimately manages to collaborate with his captors. Both also have an affiliation with ice; Steve sells ice-cream and Alexei enjoys slurpies.
• Heel–Face Door-Slam: He considers defecting to the U.S., but is killed by Grigori before it can get off the ground.
• He Knows Too Much: Hopper suspects that his superiors will want Alexei dead for being held captive for information, in addition to being seen as a traitor for giving up that information. He's right.
• Hope Spot: When Hopper's interrogation of him goes nowhere, he kicks Alexei out of Murray's place and gives him the keys to the car and cuffs. Hopper is betting on Alexei's predicted escape attempt to stop when he realises he'll be killed for giving up information and he'll come crawling back to him, and he's right — Alexei tries to drive away, but stops partway through the gate.
• Manchild: Alexei loves Looney Tunes, insists on Food as Bribe to cooperate with Hopper, and wins a giant Woody Woodpecker plushie at the Hawkins town festival.
• Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal: He ends up having a relatively fun time experiencing the joys of American life outside of his station and even considers defecting. Sadly, he's killed before he can really leave.
• Mundane Object Amazement: He finds 7-Eleven, slurpies (particularly cherry-flavored ones), and fairs amusing.
• Not So Above It All: Enjoys watching Looney Tunes and is really happy when he wins a Woody Woodpecker plushie at the Hawkins town fair.
• Odd Friendship: With Murray.
• Oh, Crap!: His reaction upon seeing Grigori at the fair.
• Punch-Clock Villain: He may be a scientist for the Soviets, but he doesn't agree with their cruelty. He also doesn't seem to be aware of the side-effects of his work.
• Redemption Equals Death: As soon as he starts to realize that he should stay with the Americans and begins cooperating, he gets killed.
• Russian Guy Suffers Most: He's on the receiving end of Hopper's temper (which is not totally undeserved) and is threatened by his Soviet superiors to complete his work on the Gate or else. Then, as he's coming to like his time on American soil, he's silenced by Grigori and ends up Dying Alone.
• Shoo Out the Clowns: He gets fatally shot by Grigori right before the grim and action-packed Season 3 finale.
• Smug Snake: Tells Hopper that he'll spill if he gets a cherry-flavored slurpie. When he gets a "shit" strawberry-flavored slurpie instead, he arrogantly refuses. Hopper isn't having any of it, but Alexei starts cooperating once Hopper crushes his Hope Spot.
• The Snack Is More Interesting: Has to be bribed with burgers and slurpies before he'll talk. When Hopper obliges, Alexei just complains about the taste of the slurpie, which leads to an explosive argument that looks like it could end in a bloodbath any second. Over slurpies.
• Turncoat: Sad though it is, as a Soviet all the actions listed above are incompatible with loyalty to Mother Russia. As he gives up all of the highly classified information he has to betray his home nation, he therefore qualifies. Even Grigori can see it, which is why he executes him without hesitation. Whilst saying nothing more than "Traitor".

Dmitri "Enzo" Antonov

Played By: Tom Wlaschiha

Debut: "Chapter Two: Vecna's Curse" (4x02)

A prison guard at the Gulag holding Hopper in Season 4, which also doubles as the training ground for the Soviet Demogorgon.

• All There in the Manual: He's not been referred to as "Dmitri" in the show yet, but is billed as such in casting information.
• Chummy Commies: Corrupt as he may be, he's quite personable. It's likewise implied that he was one of the more decent guards at the prison, even before he befriended Hopper.
• Dirty Cop: Prison Guard, but engages in corrupt and criminal behavior, such as working with a smuggler and taking bribes from prisoners. In this case it's a heroic example, as the regime he works for is a cruel and evil one, and his "corruption" is in aiding a hero, albeit primarily for his own benefit.
• Dramatic Guncock: To make Yuri cooperate with their escape plan, Dmitri cocks his gun to emphasize his threat to deliver a Boom, Headshot! if he refuses to fly them out of the USSR.
• Fire-Forged Friends: With Hopper. Originally just an alliance of mutual convenience, to which he doesn't care if Hopper succeeds or not, they become much more genuine allies when forced to fight the Soviet Demogorgon together. Hopper trusts him enough to keep an eye on Yuri when the latter is trying to kickstart a helicopter, making sure he won't sabotage them any further.
• Nerves of Steel: Dmitri is a truly brave man, even when he realises that Yuri has betrayed him, whilst clearly horrified, his reaction is still quite subdued, and he reacts to being made a prisoner with a miserable but calm manner. Notably, even after seeing how dangerous a Demogorgon is, Dmitri still tries to charge it with an axe and coordinate the others in an attempt to fight it.
• Oh, Crap!: He has three. The first is when he realizes that Yuri has betrayed him and his superiors are coming to apprehend him. The second is when Hopper starts to describe the Soviet Demogorgon and he realizes exactly how bad their odds against it are. The other is when Hopper tells him about being hit by Agent Orange during the Vietnam War; it's pretty clear he knows what the Agent Orange can do.
• Only Known By His Nickname: Yuri calls him Enzo, the name he apparently took to coordinate Hopper's escape, which was in reference to a place important to both Hopper and Joyce.
• Sole Survivor: By the end of the season, he is the only staff member of Kamchatka to be alive, the rest killed off by the various Demodogs and Demogorgon.
• 'Stache of Duty: His is a classic case, representing both authority and a past in the military service.
• Token Good Teammate: After Alexei, he's the only other Soviet that isn't a villain.
• "Well Done, Dad" Guy: He's got a teenage son who doesn't think too highly of him.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: He disappears and we get no indication of what he's up to after he and Yuri pick up the Americans and ferry them back to Hawkins.
• "You Used to Be Better" Speech: He gives a speech to Yuri about his past as a great man before his days as the "Peanut Butter Smuggler" and how he once would have looked up to him before he lost his way to gambling and greed. It clearly cuts Yuri deep and ends up compelling him to genuinely help out the Americans.

Yuri Ismaylov

Played By: Nikola Đuričko

Debut: "Chapter Four: Dear Billy" (4x04)

A Russian smuggler who profits off of the Cold War, and is hired to help get Hopper home.

• Actually, I Am Him: When he first meets with Joyce and Murray, he gives a spiel about the Yuri they are looking for was killed by polar bears shortly before they arrived. It isn't particularly convincing, and he is quick to assure them he is Yuri, alive and well.
• Affably Evil: He's a genuinely upbeat and cheery criminal smuggler who happily sells out Hopper, Enzo, and Joyce while pocketing the money they paid him. Enzo mentions that Yuri was once a far more impressive figure before his reputation sank to "peanut butter smuggler".
• Annoying Laugh: Yuri frequently lets out an incredibly fake-sounding laugh while he's trolling Joyce and Murray, much to their frustration.
• The Atoner: After all the crap he put Hopper, Joyce, Murray and Enzo through, he manages to redeem himself by tracking down a helicopter and getting them out of the gulag.
• Beware the Silly Ones: He's first introduced as a comedic character who acts very chummy and playful. This makes it all the more jarring when he becomes a traitor who singlehandedly ruins the heroes' plans.
• Bound and Gagged: When he is taken prisoner by Murray and Joyce, his legs and arms are bound and a rag is stuffed into his mouth, preventing him from warning the Soviets while still keeping with playing the role of a prisoner.
• Changed My Mind, Kid: Is about to leave Hopper, Joyce, and Murray to their fates, but Enzo manages to awaken his conscience by appealing to his sense of patriotism and his apparently once-heroic past.
• Deconstruction: Of the Loveable Rogue and Only in It for the Money. Yuri has no issue breaking laws to smuggle in goods to Russia for the right price, and seems affable when he first meets Joyce and Murray, but at the end of the day, he is only looking out for himself. While this kind of character might be considered a Jerk with a Heart of Gold in another story, it's made pretty clear here that he's a complete Jerkass whose only priority is how much money he can make. This is why he ultimately reneges on the agreement he made with Enzo: Why simply take the $40,000 he's going to receive anyways when he can also betray Hopper, Enzo, Joyce, and Murray to the KGB and make even more money off of that? Unfortunately for Yuri, this ends up proving to be his undoing: When Joyce and Murray eventually break free and overpower Yuri on the flight over, they crash his plane in Russia, take Yuri hostage, force him to help them break into the prison to rescue Hopper, and make it very clear to Yuri that the only "reward" he's getting at this point is not being tied up and left to freeze to death in the wilderness.
• Didn't Think This Through: If Yuri had just done what he was hired to do in the first place, he still would have received his money's worth while avoiding a lot of unnecessary grief. Instead, Greed got the better of him, and he betrayed Hopper and Enzo while also kidnapping Murray and Joyce so he could hand them over to the KGB for the right price. Right away, his plans went sideways: His plane gets destroyed, he is held hostage by the very people he was trying to kidnap (who are extremely pissed with him), he's forced to break into a Russian prison while being Bound and Gagged, and the only reason he survives the finale is because the others need a pilot. And all this without a rouble to show for it.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He claims to sincerely love his mother and his daughter, with his betrayal of Joyce and Murray motivated by getting enough money to set them up for life.
• Exact Words: He claims to be able to fly the Americans out of the USSR when they ask about him having a backup plane. He leads them to a beaten-down helicopter he had never flown before. Joyce is incredulous, but Yuri correctly reminds her that he never said a plane, he simply said he could fly them out of there.
• Fallen Hero: Downplayed; he's closest to the "withdrawn" subtrope. Although he used to be hailed a hero, by the time Joyce and Murray reach him he's an opportunistic smuggler.
• Famed in Story: He's a pretty well-known smuggler in his corner of the Soviet Union, and a former hero. (The latter part may explain why the authorities seem to tolerate him, despite the former part. That, or he's just a useful informant.)
• Hidden Depths: As Enzo pointed out, Yuri was originally a more noble rogue that would be ashamed of the opportunist he's turned into. This is enough to make Yuri reflect and eventually atone.
• Large Ham: Oh my. He barely utters a word that isn't a part of a loony, bombastic tirade filled with the oddest digressions.
• Laser-Guided Karma: He completely upsets the heroes' plan to get Hopper out of jail. As a result, he's forced to participate in an even riskier plan that what was already set into motion; Murray takes his place, tapes his mouth shut and makes him act as a prisoner, and he spends the rest of his runtime gagged, bound and forced to hop around.
• Noodle Incident: The event that earned him a reputation for heroism isn't described in detail, but the mention of "Damansky" suggests that it was the undeclared border war over Damansky/Zhenbao Island in 1969.
• Not Even Bothering with the Accent: Nikola Đuričko plays the Russian Yuri with his native, Serbian accent, joyously serving it up.
• Oh, Crap!: When his prisoners turn the tables on him and tie him to a tree in the Arctic environment, they point out that whilst they may not be hard enough to kill him, they won't need to, since he'd be as good as dead left in a hostile wilderness. His face falls immediately.
• Opportunistic Bastard: Paying this guy upfront turned out to be a very big mistake for everyone involved.
• Third-Person Person Frequently talks about himself in the third person.
• Venturous Smuggler: Deconstructed, as the kind of person willing to do such work is probably not a heroic or trustworthy individual.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: His final scene in Season 4 has him arrive at the prison to bring the Americans to Hawkins. No mention is made by the other characters of what he is up to or where he is, as he doesn't show up with Hopper and Joyce at the end.