stranger-things

Being huge fans of ‘Stranger Things‘ and looking forward to the second season it’s fun to learn more behind the creative process of the show and especially that it was based on government experiments called The Montauk Project. Apparently, the show was initially so strongly linked to the experiments that in April of 2016 Netflix picked up a show called ‘Montauk’ which would eventually evolve into ‘Stranger Things’.

What did The Duffer Brothers have planned for their original take on the series?

“Described as a love letter to the ’80s classics that captivated a generation, the series is set in 1980 Montauk, Long Island, where a young boy vanishes into thin air. As friends, family and local police search for answers, they are drawn into an extraordinary mystery involving top-secret government experiments, terrifying supernatural forces and one very strange little girl.”

Well, the name is a pure nod to The Montauk Project while that description is ‘Stranger Things’ in a nutshell.

Unfamiliar with The Montauk Project itself? It was a set of government experiments in extreme science that would make Walter on ‘Fringe’ proud. The project was being run from Camp Hero or Montauk Air Force Station on Montauk, Long Island. While most of the information has been classified, details came forth from Preston Nichols who claims he has repressed memories from when he was involved in the project.

Nichols has gone into details on the experiments which appeared to try and crack such subjects as “time travel, teleportation, mind control, alien species, and even faking the Apollo moon landings.” Supposedly this was tied to The Philadelphia Experiment from 1943 which flung two sailors forward into 1983.

One of the tests was The Montauk Chair which was trying to allow one to have their mind transported into another to see and hear what they saw and heard:

“The first experiment was called “The Seeing Eye.” With a lock of person’s hair or other appropriate object in his hand, Duncan could concentrate on the person and be able to see as if he was seeing through their eyes, hearing through their ears, and feeling through their body. He could actually see through other people anywhere on the planet.”

That sure sounds a little familiar to anyone who had witnessed Eleven’s exploits in the first season.

More rumors circling the projects were that kids were being abducted to be used in experiments which also sounds like a familiar plot point.

An exert from ‘The Montauk Project: Experiments in Time’ also gave us the monster which came from Eleven and in fact might be part of Eleven:

“We finally decided we’d had enough of the whole experiment. The contingency program was activated by someone approaching Duncan while he was in the chair and simply whispering “The time is now.” At this moment, he let loose a monster from his subconscious. And the transmitter actually portrayed a hairy monster. It was big, hairy, hungry and nasty. But it didn’t appear underground in the null point. It showed up somewhere on the base. It would eat anything it could find. And it smashed everything in sight. Several different people saw it, but almost everyone described a different beast.”

It is quite clear that the inspiration of the Demogorgon is right there and came from Eleven as this monster came from the test subject above.

While not following exactly what supposedly happened at The Montauk Project it is clear where the inspiration for the series outside of being a love letter to classic 80s horror and science fiction had come from.

Are you interested what is to come in the second season of ‘Stranger Things’? Do you feel that more ideas from The Montauk Project will show up down the line? Share your thoughts below!

Source: Slash Film

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Stuart Conover is an author, blogger, and all around geek. When not busy being a father and husband he tries to spend as much time as possible immersed in comic books, science fiction, and horror! Would you like to know more? Follow him on Twitter!