As big fans of the series, we're more than a little excited about the Stranger Things cartoon coming next year. It was already looking like a strong year for animation in 2026, and a new take on the magic of Hawkins could be the icing on the cake.
Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 is already causing some controversy, though. Some fan are wondering why it has a 3D animation style if creators Matt and Ross Duffer say the intention is to evoke the feeling of an '80s cartoon. But is that necessarily a contradiction?
Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 will be set between seasons 2 and 3, with the characters Eleven, Mike, Will, Max, Lucas and Dustin all appearing. There will be some new monsters, like an Upside Down pumpkin zombie and human Upside Down vine hybrids, and we're told in the announcement above that nothing is what it seemed. That suggests that it won't belong in the canon of the live-action series.
The Australian studio Flying Bark (Moon Girl, Devil Dinosaur and 100% Wolf) is handling animation. The showrunner is Eric Robles, who's known for the Nickelodeon/Netflix series Glitch Techs.
Robles has said that a big part of the inspiration came from the Saturday morning cartoons of the era, and particularly from that after-school classic of classics The Real Ghostbusters.
But that doesn't mean that Tales from ’85 will have 2D art. It looks more modern, also taking influence from Spider-Verse, Arcane and Jurassic World: Chaos Theory with its bold colour palette and almost stop-motion look. It also seems that efforts have been made to retain a clear visual connection to the live-action series, recreating its atmospheric lighting.
Speaking at the Annecy festival earlier in the year, Robles also said that character designer Meybis Ruiz Cruz's style played a big role in shaping the visual direction of the series, with a depiction of Eleven (see the Instagram post above) a key reference for early 2D explorations that were then developed into 3D.
“Her beautiful style captured the perfect blend of style and realism. And her shapes, painting technique, and her ability to capture the likeness of the actors was a huge breakthrough for us," he said.
It seems the series doesn't so much try to replicate the look of the 1980s as to capture the feel. That's something more difficult to define than an art style, and Robles has mentioned that it also involves drawing on other influences, such as movies, from ET to The Lost Boys, and books like RL Stine's Goosebumps series.
If the team gets it right, Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 could be the ultimate nostalgic animation for kids of that era like me.
Stranger Things: Tales from ’85 will be released on Netflix some time in 2026.
If you're inspired, check out our guides to the best animation software and the best laptops for animation.
