Is Stranger Things Based On a True Story?

By Ella Zak and Aleia Fernandez

You might think that Stranger Things is just a fictional story, that it can’t possibly be true! But what if we told you that some parts of the hit show might actually be real?

While the characters aren’t real and neither are demogorgons (thank goodness), there are rumors about projects that sound eerily similar to the storyline in Stranger Things. Grab some eggos, ‘cause things are about to get strange!

In season one of the show, Eleven is being tested on by Mr. Brenner, who used LSDs and sensory machines to experiment on her. What's interesting is that this might be real. We’ve tracked down some of those conspiracies for you below.

According to Digital Spy, a project called the MK-ultra, which was conducted in 1953 by the government and the CIA, was used to give people mind-control capability, to give the US an advantage against Russia during the Cold War. Later the project was shut down in 1956, because of the many dangers it could lead to.

Some strange things undeniably. 

It turns out that the Duffer Brothers (writers of Stranger Things) actually drew inspiration from this incident, and intertwined the project into the show.

But, there is something that is even deeper and darker than the MK-ultra project. There is a conspiracy theory that there was a string of experiments in Camp Hero, Montauk, Long Island.

Apparently, according to Business Insider, the experiments were operated on kidnapped children, like the show’s star, Eleven. The experiments had things to do with what seems impossible: time travel, mind control and teleportation. A man named Preston Nichols, who was supposedly one of the kids that were kidnapped, wrote a book about it: The Montauk Project/ Experiments in Time.

Based on an interview by Business Insider, in the book, Nichols describes one of the experiments. “The first experiment was called ‘The Seeing Eye.’ With a lock of person's hair or other appropriate object in his hand, Duncan [Cameron, supposed psychic] could concentrate on the person and be able to see as if he were seeing through their eyes, hearing through their ears, and feeling through their body. He could actually see through other people anywhere on the planet.”

We pulled a student from Hunters Point, Camila Valdez-Ritter, and asked her if she knew the true story behind Stranger Things. And like most people would say, she responded, “No.”

Many people don’t know the truth behind the hit show, but they deserve to know! These are all conspiracy theories, but do you think they are real?