Robin and Nancy’s visit to Victor Creel — with its extensive protocols, underground cells, and stone walls — owes a lot to Clarice’s first meeting with Hannibal Lecter in Jonathan Demme’s classic Thomas Harris adaptation. And yes, that is original Nightmare on Elm Street star Robert Englund as Creel. However, after El tampered with Mike's radio to project the sound of Will quietly singing, Mike decided to show this to Lucas and Dustin. Lucas angrily insisted that Will was dead, though Dustin half-entertained Mike's suggestion, and wondered if Will had become a ghost. After further discussion, the boys decided to bring El to the Heathkit to communicate with Will, which was much more powerful than the boy's Supercoms. Eddie’s introduction is sandwiched by a pair of menacing songs from the Cramps’ 1980 album Songs the Lord Taught Us. Is “I Was a Teenage Werewolf,” its name taken from a 1957 movie starring Michael Landon, some kind of clue? (Probably not, but it’s a cool song.) In 1984, Lucas's personality took much of a big change. He has come to accept the abnormal and what is different from others. Last year's events also seemed to have haunted Lucas such as when he explains it all to Max Mayfield, he feels those events happened yesterday and wished he wasn't serious about it. Lucas also became more open to others as he invited Max to join his circle of friends, told her of last year's events, and sympathized with her troubled family life. As part of an "agreement" with Dr. Brenner to gain passage through the Gate, Hopper revealed El and the boys' location to laboratory officials. Agents broke into the school, capturing El and the boys. Eleven killed most of the agents, crushing their brains and making them bleed to death, however, this "drained" her of energy and strength, causing her to collapse. Without her protection they were recaptured; but the Monster, attracted by pools of blood spilling from dead bodies, burst through the school wall via a temporary portal.

The next day, Lucas and Dustin noticed Mike wasn't at school, since he was at home to accommodate El. After school, Dustin and Lucas came to Mike's house, discussing Eleven and what could have happened to Will. Lucas said that they should tell Karen about Eleven, but El used her telekinesis to prevent him from opening the door to leave. Later that evening, El attempted to explain Will's situation; she flipped their Dungeons & Dragons board upside down, on top of which she placed Will's player piece and then the Demogorgon piece. This gave Lucas, Mike and Dustin a vital clue as they continued to theorize about what happened to Will.After secretly getting some advice from his father on how to apologize to a girl, Lucas decided to meet Max at the arcade and tell her all of last year's events, including the Demogorgon and Eleven. However, after Lucas told her, Max did not believe him and even when he stopped her from speaking about it out loud, she still didn't believe him, asking for proof which Lucas sadly says that he can't. Before leaving the arcade with her stepbrother, Max takes Lucas's hand and tells him not to follow as he asks if she does believe him and watches her go. Mike, Will, and Eleven visit a roller rink called Rink-O-Mania in Lenora Hills. Though still decently popular today, the musical skating locations were a much bigger deal in the ‘80s. Carrie

Owens takes El to Nevada, where she’s forced to confront her past, while the Hawkins kids comb a crumbling house for clues. Vecna claims another victim.” Madonna After D'Artagnan escaped and Max confronted Mike about his behavior towards her, Lucas offered Max to help them for the creature, but she refused as she angrily told him how she was tired of being excluded from the party. Lucas tried to explain they didn't mean it and that there were secrets they couldn't tell her, but Max stormed off to meet her stepbrother. The Hellfire Club is a name with plenty of historical significance, but in the context of Stranger Things, it probably means more as an X-Men comics reference. Both the comics and historical Hellfire Club involved the elites of society, so Eddie has a fun sense of humor naming his club of outcasts that, even as it plays on the “satanic panic” around D&D. But the X-Men’s Hellfire Club were a key factor in Jean Grey’s Dark Phoenix story, and considering how often Stranger Things has flirted with those elements in Eleven’s story, they’re probably having some fun with us, too. In the newspaper we see Dr. Brenner reading in 1979, we can see four horoscopes, two of which contradict the other two. The first two are advising keeping one’s ideas to oneself, while the other two are advising seeking input from others. All seem to be about “clever thoughts,” “fantastic” ideas, and “ingenious plans.” Interestingly, “idea” is also one of the crossword puzzle answers. What does it all mean? Uhhh…you tell us? Magic 8-BallRealizing her impatience was not helpful at all, Max decided to sit down and express her feelings and state of life since Billy's loss. She explained that Billy took advantage of any chance to humiliate her throughout their life together and confessed that there were certain times when she wished for him to die in a car accident. When he decided to make a change by protecting Eleven from the Mind Flayer's proxy form, Max admitted that she had felt uncertainty over whether he deserved to be saved and that was the reason why she did not try to save him. No matter how many times she tried, she could not forgive herself and admitted that there was a part of her that wanted to join Billy in death.

Lucas' karate-themed outfit that he wears from "E Pluribus Unum" to "The Battle of Starcourt" was inspired by 1984's The Karate Kid, a film Max loves due to having a crush on Ralph Macchio.Haunted by Billy’s death, Max is going through a hard time as Stranger Things 4 opens. She has trouble communicating with her friends, especially Lucas, but she has found a way to console herself via Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God),” the first single from her great 1985 album Hounds of Love. Though a much bigger hit in the U.K. than the U.S., the song helped solidify her fandom in the States among cool alternative kids like, well, Max, and its recent surge to the top of the iTunes chart suggests it could win her a whole new generation of fans. For the curious, Hounds of Love is a great starting point, but you really can’t go wrong with any of Bush’s albums. Since scoring her first No. 1 hit in the U.K. at the age of 19 with “Wuthering Heights,” Bush has determinedly done her own thing and expected listeners to follow. Sometimes that means waiting out long hiatuses. She remains active — and even performed her first concerts since the ’70s in 2014 — but hasn’t released an album of new material since 2011. You’re bigger than Madonna to them,” Dr. Owens tells Eleven. That’s a big statement in 1986, given that the artist had already released “Like a Virgin” and was on the verge of releasing her third album, True Blue. Ghostbusters (again) Lucas is the fifth character in the series to be a main character in their own spin-off book; Brenner was featured in Suspicious Minds, Hopper was featured in Darkness on the Edge of Town, Max was featured in Runaway Max, Robin was featured in Rebel Robin, and now Lucas is featured in Lucas on the Line. A cardboard cutout of Freddy Krueger, villain of the Nightmare on Elm Street series, greets customers at Family Video. This is both an era-appropriate bit of set dressing — home video helped turn Freddy into a horror superstar — and a tip of the hat. Vecna, Stranger Things 4’s big bad, resembles a cross between the Cenobites of the Hellraiser series and Krueger (with a touch of the aforementioned Iron Maiden mascot Eddie thrown in the mix as well). Vecna’s hallucinatory approach to claiming his prey is especially indebted to Krueger, but instead of invading his victims’ dreams, Vecna would appear to bring the dreams directly to them. Dustin will even make the connection himself in a future episode. (Look for Nightmare star Robert Englund to show up later in the season, too.) But all of the little niggles are easily overlooked as the nostalgia and Stranger Things theme totally wins the day. This is the kind of retro gift that adults are going to love just as much as the teens!!!