Yee-ow!! Stranger Things Season 5 revealed, to those who haven’t seen Stranger Things: The First Shadow, that the parents of all of the Netflix series’ main characters used to be in drama club together… and I have thoughts!
Spoilers for Stranger Things Season 5, Volume 1 ahead! The same goes for First Shadow, honestly. Do-si-do away if you haven’t finished watching the first part of the final season.
In episode 4, we learn that Sadie Sink’s character Max did a timey-wimey thing and ended up wandering the halls of Hawkins High in 1959, when the West End and Broadway play Stranger Things: The First Shadow takes place. Max picks up a flyer for a production of the musical Oklahoma! directed by Will and Jonathan’s mother Joyce. She even sees young Joyce aggressively promoting the musical by the lockers. The flyer reveals that the play stars many familiar names… including Henry Creel a.k.a. Vecna himself.
1. Did Joyce and the other parents actually do ‘Oklahoma!’?
Nope! This is a key subplot in Stranger Things: The First Shadow, actually. The rebellious teen Joyce’s plan is to pretend like they’re putting on “another goddamn high school production of Oklahoma!” and then reveal on opening night the real play: “Dark of the Moon,” a provacative 1945 play set in the Appalachian Mountains about a witch boy and a mortal girl who fall in love based on the folk song “The Ballad of Barbara Allen.” She wants her play to get noticed so that she can get a scholarship and get out of Hawkins for college and beyond. Oh, Joyce!!
2. Was “Oklahoma” a nod to Patrick Vaill?
That’s probably not most people’s first question. But it is mine, so let me explain. One of the actors who brought The First Shadow to life on the West End is Patrick Vaill. He originated the role of young Dr. Brenner, a.k.a. “Papa” on Stranger Things. The connection to Joyce’s school musical is that, in real life, Vaill played Jud Fry in an acclaimed recent-ish revival of Oklahoma on Broadway. I’d be content if the play’s writers decided to put this in the canon for that little tip of the hat alone.
That said, the Rodgers and Hamilton musical has been referenced in pop culture a lot recently. It played a significant role in the second season of Euphoria, the 2020 film I’m Thinking of Ending Things, and of course the 2025 movie Blue Moon to name a few. So we should look a little further than that.
3. Is it a nod to the musical’s darker themes?
Most people, including Joyce, remember Oklahoma as a feel-good, corny, safe musical about love in the American heartland. But if you start to shuck that corn, you’ll see that it’s a story about a community scapegoating, villain-izing, and ultimately murdering an outsider. That’s something that the 2019 revival, and Vaill’s performance in particular as the outsider in question, highlighted without changing a single word. (The witches are persecuted in Dark of the Moon, too. Joyce definitely could have done something revolutionary with the text if she’d looked a little closer. She was just 60 years too early.)
Societal pressure to conform is also a theme that persists in Stranger Things. Only, the freaks and geeks are the heroes as well as the victims. Certified popular guy Steve “the hair” Harrington had to go through a lot of character growth and learn to let his freak flag fly in order to become a fan favorite on the Netflix series. At first, our sympathies were with social outcasts like Will, his friends, Eleven, and even Barb.
4. Why would you cast future Vecna as Curly?
The flyer for the musical says that the producing is “introducing Henry Creel as Curly McClain.” That’s definitely one way to sell tickets. It seems odd that Joyce would even pretend to cast Henry against type as the handsome and popular cowboy who gets the girl.
But let’s think about the song “Pore Jud is Daid,” which Curly’s character sings to Jud when he learns that Jud has shown romantic interest in his crush, Laurey. In that song, Curly pretty blatantly encourages Jud to kill himself, implying that he’ll never be truly understood while he’s alive. Curly gets in Jud’s face and gets in his head, drawing out all of his insecurities. Even though he wasn’t actually cast in that role, does that remind you of anyone?
5. Who would the other parents play in ‘Oklahoma!’?
Sorry, but I cain’t say no to fan casting these characters. This doesn’t really match the alleged “billing order” on the (fake) flyer that Max reads. But my best educated guess as to the Hawkins Tiger Troupe cast of Oklahoma! is as follows:
Curly: Henry Creel
Jud Fry: Alan Munson
Laurey Williams: Patty Newby
Ado Annie: Karen Childress
Will Parker: Ted Wheeler
Ali Hakim: Jim Hopper
Aunt Eller: Joyce Maldonado
If I were Joyce, I would have cast my friend/crush as Ali Hakim, a supporting character has a lot of jokes and one great song that’s mostly talking. Listen to “It’s A Scandal! It’s An Outrage!” and tell me that a grumpy young Hopper wouldn’t have crushed that… if they’d actually had the guts to do the musical.
Isn’t it sweet to think that the Wheeler’s marriage, as stagnant as it may be in 1987, was part showmance? They could have been such a cute Annie and Will! That leaves the role of Jud to Eddie’s father, who we know had a troubled life and is likely in jail as of the most recent Stranger Things. And I think that Joyce may have stepped in as one of them, and Aunt Eller is perfect for a director. As for the leading lady…
6. Back up, who is is Patty Newby?
Surely you remember Bob Newby, Sean Astin’s character from Season 2. His sister Patty is one of the main characters in The First Shadow, and was Henry Creel’s love interest when they were both in high school. Patty is passionate about singing and nearly dies after the events of the prequel. Henry might be misunderstood, but he is still dangerous.
7. Is there a significance to the date?
You bet your bottom dollar! (Sorry, Joyce, is Annie too mainstream for you, too? Take a listen to “We’d Like To Thank You Herbert Hoover” and get back to me.) According to Stranger Things Season 5, the “one night only” event happened on November 6, 1959. That’s the same month and day Will Byers vanished in 1983/Season 1! Sound the theory alarms!
Henry Creel didn’t go Carrie-at-the-prom on everyone during intermission, or anything, but something bad did happened to him that night. We’ll get to that in a second. My question is, does he blame Joyce in some twisted way? Is that why he took her son and set the plot of Stranger Things in motion?
8. Does this have anything to do with Max’s cave?
Or, how much childhood trauma can one show give its Big Bad? We’ve got the deaths of the kids in the Rainbow Room, the deaths of the Creel family, whatever happened at the cave, and now this play…
9. What actually happens in The First Shadow?
A lot, so let’s focus on the school play subplot. Joyce, Hopper, and a few of the other students become convinced that Victor Kreel (Henry’s father) is behind some mysterious animal deaths in Hawkins. They send a message to Henry, using the play to lure him back and get a witness statement from him. Patty even promises to run away with him, if he meets her at the play. Only then, he gets kidnapped by Dr. Brenner for good. Henry never got to star in Dark of the Moon with his girlfriend, or leave town together, free from Hawkins Lab. If he had, maybe none of this would have happened. To make matters worse, Joyce doesn’t get a scholarship. A few months later, Jim gets sent to Vietnam. The play-within-the-play ends up being kind of a bad memory for all of the characters. Except for Ted Wheeler, who does get to sing a little bit of “Oklahoma” after all.
Back to the November 6 of it all, the timeline of Stranger Things: The First Shadow and Stranger Things the Netflix series don’t 100 percent add up. The First Shadow has Henry killing his family on the same day as the school play. But, on the show, the Creel murders happened in March of 1959, not November. So take all of this with a grain of salt. Sometimes an Easter Egg is just an Easter Egg.
10. Will ‘Stranger Things’ Season 5 have a dream ballet?
Please, please, please!
11. Why don’t the adults remember Henry/Vecna?
Theatre kids are famously pretty tight. Sure, Henry Creel is unrecognizable in Vecna form. But why doesn’t Joyce recognize Henry Creel’s name? She cast him as the lead in her show! Why doesn’t Hopper remember? The other adults, sure, aren’t as privy to those big lore-heavy conversations on Stranger Things. Bob Newby, who has a minor role in The First Shadow, died on Stranger Things before the kids learned anything about the Creel family. But Joyce and Hopper at least should have put two and two together when it comes to Vecna by now. That’s just another mystery the final season of Stranger Things now has to answer.
(featured image: Netflix)
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