Hey everybody! It’s been a few months since I did one of these rewrites and I thought I’d share a new one with you guys. This concept is a little more out there you could say and likely a controversial idea if it were introduced in the season, but I think it would’ve been a lot more compelling. Personally, I loved the Wormhole revelation for The Upside Down and I think there was a lot more potential to explore.

As always, these rewrites are kinda like little fics of mine with reinterpretations and little headcanons. Overall, just ideas to pitch for fun.

Properties

Before we get on to major revelation changes, I wanted to flesh out the properties of The Upside Down being a Wormhole since I feel like it was underbaked. Especially when it comes to things being mirrored in this interdimensional world. Basically, despite being a physical copy of Hawkins on November 6th, 1983, the physics within this Wormhole is unstable and malleable which means powerful beings like Vecna or The Mind Flayer are capable of manipulating the environment by tapping into the Exotic Matter (which this world is made of) and reflecting things into the dark reflection of Hawkins.

They do this so the Democreatures can have a better navigation of the foreign human environment before entering our world. But, this mirroring effect isn’t just limited to them.

External forces can inadvertently cause things to be mirrored in The Upside Down Hawkins. Example, it’s possible Starcourt Mall was copied over when the Soviets attempted to create a new Mothergate using The Key machine since it was exerting a massive amount of energy to create a tear.

Overall, The Upside Down being a creation that can be manipulated gives it the feeling of being like a sandbox where Vecna and The Mind Flayer are essentially gods of this pocket universe.

In this version, The Upside Down version of Dimension X/Abyss has gravity due to the Exotic Matter releasing gravitational waves as it keeps this Wormhole stable from collapsing. So, this means Holly is able to walk freely on the other plate of The Upside Down for a moment, until Vecna telekinetically launches her through the sky and down to the Hawkins Upside Down before dragging her back up as a way to snuff out any hope of escape.

But, why are there mirrored versions of Hawkins and DX at all? Can’t they just be blank spaces? Well, with a little help from u/kauan1983 on some of the lore, the mirroring act as anchors to the specific locations the Wormhole is connected to. So if there was nothing on either plate, then nothing can cross over since there isn’t a mirrored anchor connecting worlds.

Predestination Time Loop

Now, this is def going to be the more controversial ideas, but with each release of the previous seasons everyone has speculated the possibility of there being time travel being incorporated at some point in the show, and I don’t blame them because it makes sense. We got Vecna’s grandfather clock and the fact that The Upside Down Hawkins is physically unchanged in 1983. So, my rewrite takes inspiration from old theories of The Upside Down and Dimension X being a future Earth, and Vecna resetting Earth in time.

Put simply, The Abyss or Dimension X is a prehistoric Earth several billions of years ago. In the Stranger Things universe, this time period is specifically located within what we thought was the end of the Hadean Eon (4.2-4.0 BYA) but was actually an undiscovered period in time where there was predatory life. The Abyss would’ve been renamed to “The Nether Eon” which calls back The Upside Down’s original name.

In The Nether Eon, Earth was starting to cool down as the surface was filled with moist liquid while the deeper layers of the soil was still hot. The Demos emerged as early life forms on our planet that eventually went extinct due to the changing landscape and climate. Along with the tendrils and organic flora originating from this period.

Then, there is The Mind Flayer, a prehistoric god of ancient Earth. While I’m deliberately keeping its origins mysterious and vague to leave room for interpretation, my hypoethesis is that this entity originated from the soil itself due to the unstable gravity and constant electrical storms giving it a collective consciousness. Where this being went after billions of years? Can’t answer that for you.

So, what is a predestination time loop? It’s a loop where the future becomes the cause of the events that occur in the present after contacting the past.

Basically, our characters in Hawkins accidentally caused their future events we see in the present. The Wormhole opened up specifically in the location where Hawkins would be located in The Nether Eon, the past, but was eventually destroyed. However, there is a supernatural imprint on that area and billions of years after the past became the future, our characters contact the past and the loop repeats again.

The Upside Down Hawkins symbolically represents a future Earth where The Mind Flayer and its monsters fully enters our world and infects it, so it’s like a preview of what‘s to come.

Hourglass

I know that explanation was quite heavy to understand so I’ll try to simplify it as best I can using an hourglass analogy, which would be visually used in my version of Season 5.

An hourglass has no fixed origin point as both glass cups are the same shape, despite whichever one is holding the sand. Top cup is the past. The funnel is the Wormhole. The sand is time, and simultaneously represents both The Nether Eon and Earth’s history. Bottom chamber is the future.

When it’s flipped, the top cup housing he past begins to bleed into the bottom cup, the future. Flip again, and the past became the future and the future is now the past as the loop repeats itself. Flip again.

Flip. Flip. Flip.

Flip Upside Down.

Upside Down. It’s meaning fully realized.

And even deeper symbolism is that the hourglass is shaped like the image of infinity, as there is no true start or end point to this time loop.

And the whole thing is meant to be completely interpretive because while we saw the Womrhole get destroyed, thus cutting off connection to The Nether Eon there is still an imprint in prehistoric Earth’s past and the loop will likely continue again.

The Hellscape

This is just a smaller detail but important. The Wormhole will be located in The Hellscape instead of an empty void. The Hellscape is an interdimensional space where it acts as a barrier between dimensions, and in this case, timelines as well, so it would make perfect sense to have this interdimensional bridge be located in the space between realms.

The giant fleshy tube would make even more sense as it acts as a protective layer or shield against the chaotic strikes of lightning and prevent it from destroying the bridge. It also provides a striking visual as the exterior of the fleshy Wormhole is charred black from the crimson lightning, and overall a giant megastructure seen protruding between the sky planes.

Speaking of sky planes, there would be multiple layers of The Hellscape in my rewrite. Each sky plane represents a different dimension or period in time the interdimensional space is separating from colliding. So, when Vecna attempts to merge the plates of the Wormhole we see the parallel sky planes about to collide into each other, thus merging the interdimensional barriers into one.

Conclusion

I had a lot of fun with this revision because, again, I really liked the idea of The Upside Down being a Wormhole and I firmly believe there was a lot of potential to make it more unique. Because it is a really cool subversion from what we thought was simply an alternate dimension of our world. And, I really wanted to fulfill the grandfather clock Vecna used in a meaningful way because they ended up dropping it in Season 5, and I wanted to introduce the concept of time travel into the show WITHOUT MCU-ifying it with a bunch of convoluted messy timelines.

Jamie acted the fuck out of this scene!

Like, post Season 3 we don’t know exactly what happened to the building aside from it having a burning Flesh Flayer and the military investigating it. But, we don’t know what they did with the mall after the fire and its eventual shutdown. Was it bulldozed?

So, bringing back Starcourt but completely abandoned and vandalized would’ve been so interesting to see. How would this work? I imagine we could switch things up in Sorcerer where the characters choose to sneak the kids through the tunnels and out of the abandoned mall because there’s been some choppers hovering over the WSQK for a few weeks lately, so they need a new location they wouldn’t suspect.

Plus, we could’ve gotten some brief Season 3 nostalgia with parallel shots and angles of Starcourt in its prime replicated pin the abandoned mall, and paying homage to its final battle with the Demogorgons attacking our characters inside before stealing the kids.

This is just for fun, so don’t take it too seriously, lol.

Obviously, he won’t use his Mr. Whatsit persona on Erica since she‘s twelve by 1987 and wouldn’t fall for some mysterious man telling her he’ll save Erica and her family. So, her kidnapping would’ve been sudden and definitely would’ve seen a much scarier version of Vecna’s mind. She’s eventually find her way to the cave and meet with Max.

Ensues is an even more iconic and hilarious duo to watch.

It definitely would’ve shown us a lot more of the relationship between Henry and Brenner and how he truly felt about him.

I love how so simple yet so effective of Henry glitching between avatars looks, and it does make sense since he can suddenly change his appearance in the blink of an eye. And it does emphasize more of the surreal atmosphere of the Mindscape. No dramatic, excessive spectacle effects to over do it.