1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:10,440 [MUSIC PLAYING] 2 00:00:10,437 --> 00:00:11,957 Where'd it go? 3 00:00:11,960 --> 00:00:12,560 Where is it? 4 00:00:22,360 --> 00:00:25,790 Will! 5 00:00:25,790 --> 00:00:28,830 OK, so now that you have, you know, some of your characters 6 00:00:28,830 --> 00:00:31,020 roughed out or some ideas for the characters, 7 00:00:31,020 --> 00:00:33,490 I think it is worth thinking about the world 8 00:00:33,488 --> 00:00:35,278 that these characters are going to inhabit. 9 00:00:35,280 --> 00:00:39,000 So this setting-- we had talked about this a little bit 10 00:00:39,000 --> 00:00:41,460 in terms of we didn't do a lot of research 11 00:00:41,460 --> 00:00:44,970 when it came to Montauk and ultimately Hawkins. 12 00:00:44,970 --> 00:00:48,010 It was small town by the beach, whatever. 13 00:00:48,010 --> 00:00:49,740 But I think something that's worth doing 14 00:00:49,740 --> 00:00:53,280 is start talking about sort out the mini settings 15 00:00:53,280 --> 00:00:55,680 within your bigger setting, the locations 16 00:00:55,680 --> 00:00:57,270 that your characters can exist in. 17 00:00:57,270 --> 00:00:59,460 So for "Stranger Things," for instance, 18 00:00:59,460 --> 00:01:01,950 you got Mike's basement is a major one. 19 00:01:01,950 --> 00:01:02,720 You got the core-- 20 00:01:02,720 --> 00:01:03,930 ROSS DUFFER: The, gym the junkyard. 21 00:01:03,930 --> 00:01:05,370 MATT DUFFER: The gym, yeah, junkyard, 22 00:01:05,370 --> 00:01:07,290 and you don't have to do a "Lord of the Rings" 23 00:01:07,290 --> 00:01:09,540 style or George RR Martin map. 24 00:01:09,540 --> 00:01:12,000 Just write down some of these locations 25 00:01:12,000 --> 00:01:14,850 that really could offer a really good setting 26 00:01:14,850 --> 00:01:15,690 for certain scenes. 27 00:01:15,690 --> 00:01:17,580 It's just nice to start-- 28 00:01:17,580 --> 00:01:19,770 again, you're not going to have a super in focus 29 00:01:19,770 --> 00:01:22,230 picture of your world at this point, 30 00:01:22,230 --> 00:01:25,430 but it's gonna start coming a little bit more in focus. 31 00:01:25,427 --> 00:01:26,757 So you have some characters now. 32 00:01:26,760 --> 00:01:28,580 Start to think about that setting 33 00:01:28,575 --> 00:01:29,705 that they're gonna inhabit. 34 00:01:29,700 --> 00:01:34,360 And I remember, like, early on season three, we came in-- 35 00:01:34,355 --> 00:01:36,485 we had a writers room at this point, and we came in 36 00:01:36,480 --> 00:01:39,390 and the writers had done this exact exercise, 37 00:01:39,390 --> 00:01:42,060 enlisted a bunch of possible locations 38 00:01:42,060 --> 00:01:44,520 that would be fun to explore in season three. 39 00:01:44,520 --> 00:01:46,080 And one of them was a mall. 40 00:01:46,080 --> 00:01:47,950 And we went, well, that's interesting. 41 00:01:47,947 --> 00:01:50,277 That would be a fun place for our characters to inhabit. 42 00:01:50,280 --> 00:01:52,680 So it's possible that one of these locations 43 00:01:52,680 --> 00:01:55,510 ends up becoming more important to your plot. 44 00:01:55,513 --> 00:01:56,803 So it's always a good exercise. 45 00:01:56,805 --> 00:01:59,225 Season two-- season two was tunnels. 46 00:01:59,220 --> 00:02:01,350 I remember we're just like tunnels are cool. 47 00:02:01,345 --> 00:02:01,845 Like-- 48 00:02:01,845 --> 00:02:03,125 ROSS DUFFER: It's our very thing. 49 00:02:03,120 --> 00:02:04,340 MATT DUFFER: Yeah, we all like tunnels, 50 00:02:04,340 --> 00:02:05,970 and then that does sort of become 51 00:02:05,970 --> 00:02:07,380 a major part of the season. 52 00:02:07,380 --> 00:02:08,760 And one of my favorite things in the season 53 00:02:08,759 --> 00:02:10,559 are all those sort of underground tunnels 54 00:02:10,560 --> 00:02:12,120 that the kids have to navigate in the finale. 55 00:02:12,120 --> 00:02:12,990 ROSS DUFFER: So, again, you don't 56 00:02:12,990 --> 00:02:15,410 need to know how it's going to play a role in your script. 57 00:02:15,407 --> 00:02:18,567 It can just be a good exercise to start filling out this world 58 00:02:18,570 --> 00:02:21,110 and going, OK, well, in their journey maybe 59 00:02:21,108 --> 00:02:21,898 they could go here. 60 00:02:21,900 --> 00:02:23,230 Maybe they could go to the mall. 61 00:02:23,233 --> 00:02:24,293 Maybe they could go here. 62 00:02:24,295 --> 00:02:26,065 You're just filling it out, more detail. 63 00:02:26,063 --> 00:02:27,483 You don't have to use any of this, 64 00:02:27,480 --> 00:02:29,310 but it's going to be it's going to be good to have. 65 00:02:29,310 --> 00:02:30,040 Yeah. 66 00:02:30,041 --> 00:02:32,991 [MUSIC PLAYING] 67 00:02:36,430 --> 00:02:38,510 There's another version in terms of your setting 68 00:02:38,510 --> 00:02:41,290 or your world where it's not based in reality at all, which 69 00:02:41,290 --> 00:02:46,600 is what we had with this other dimension in "Stranger Things." 70 00:02:46,600 --> 00:02:51,310 Now it wasn't super developed initially 71 00:02:51,310 --> 00:02:53,800 when we were first coming up with the idea in the pilot. 72 00:02:53,800 --> 00:02:56,620 You saw some of this rough idea we had of, like, a mouth 73 00:02:56,620 --> 00:02:58,600 leading to the other world and all of this, 74 00:02:58,600 --> 00:03:02,320 but one thing that we had talked about early on is-- 75 00:03:02,320 --> 00:03:05,110 and some of this was for budgetary reasons and also 76 00:03:05,110 --> 00:03:07,090 we were very much inspired by "Poltergeist." 77 00:03:07,090 --> 00:03:11,120 We didn't see that world where the little girl was taken. 78 00:03:11,120 --> 00:03:13,270 So it was in-- for us, it was like, well, 79 00:03:13,270 --> 00:03:15,640 that might be scary if we never actually see it. 80 00:03:15,640 --> 00:03:16,490 We never see it. 81 00:03:16,490 --> 00:03:17,410 We never go into the upside down. 82 00:03:17,410 --> 00:03:18,760 We're only hearing it over-- 83 00:03:18,760 --> 00:03:19,470 that was-- right? 84 00:03:19,470 --> 00:03:20,470 It was the initial idea. 85 00:03:20,470 --> 00:03:21,930 We're only hearing it over walkies. 86 00:03:21,928 --> 00:03:24,078 We're only hearing it over radios or whatnot. 87 00:03:24,080 --> 00:03:26,200 So it was like it would all be left up 88 00:03:26,200 --> 00:03:28,800 to the imagination of the viewer. 89 00:03:28,795 --> 00:03:29,565 Yes. 90 00:03:29,560 --> 00:03:33,850 And ultimately that went away pretty quickly 91 00:03:33,850 --> 00:03:36,190 as we started to write the show because we 92 00:03:36,190 --> 00:03:37,450 realized this is a show. 93 00:03:37,450 --> 00:03:38,530 This is not a movie. 94 00:03:38,530 --> 00:03:39,660 I'm starting to get antsy. 95 00:03:39,663 --> 00:03:40,583 I want to go in there. 96 00:03:40,580 --> 00:03:41,650 I want to see what's-- 97 00:03:41,650 --> 00:03:42,490 I want to see what. 98 00:03:42,490 --> 00:03:44,350 We still limited how often we went in there, 99 00:03:44,350 --> 00:03:45,310 but we did go in there. 100 00:03:45,308 --> 00:03:47,498 And then that forced us to evolve it more 101 00:03:47,500 --> 00:03:51,100 and actually explain what this world would look like, 102 00:03:51,100 --> 00:03:53,860 but when we wrote the pilot-- 103 00:03:53,860 --> 00:03:56,410 and you'll see in our outline and when we actually go 104 00:03:56,410 --> 00:03:57,970 into more detail in the pilot-- 105 00:03:57,970 --> 00:04:00,010 we didn't know a whole lot. 106 00:04:00,010 --> 00:04:03,220 It didn't even have a name in terms of the upside 107 00:04:03,220 --> 00:04:05,370 down wasn't even what we were calling it. 108 00:04:05,370 --> 00:04:07,120 In the beginning it was called the nether, 109 00:04:07,120 --> 00:04:08,890 which is more of a placeholder. 110 00:04:08,890 --> 00:04:10,720 The upside down name came about later 111 00:04:10,720 --> 00:04:12,610 in the writing of episode five when 112 00:04:12,610 --> 00:04:14,380 Mike is trying to explain where Will is, 113 00:04:14,380 --> 00:04:17,680 and he flips a D&D board over and says upside down. 114 00:04:17,680 --> 00:04:24,640 What if this is Hawkins, and this is where Will is, 115 00:04:24,640 --> 00:04:25,540 the upside down? 116 00:04:25,540 --> 00:04:27,610 And that just sort of stuck, and that just 117 00:04:27,610 --> 00:04:29,920 became the terminology to which we've 118 00:04:29,920 --> 00:04:31,630 referred to this other world. 119 00:04:31,630 --> 00:04:34,930 And then practically, we had to do something very simple 120 00:04:34,930 --> 00:04:37,330 because we kind of do a huge visual effects extravaganza. 121 00:04:37,330 --> 00:04:40,630 And so that started to effect what this world would actually 122 00:04:40,630 --> 00:04:41,410 look like. 123 00:04:41,410 --> 00:04:44,170 But, again, you know, so you can start-- 124 00:04:44,170 --> 00:04:46,920 you can start to-- you can be pretty vague at the beginning 125 00:04:46,923 --> 00:04:49,093 here, and you don't have to have it all figured out. 126 00:04:49,090 --> 00:04:51,640 If you're telling a show this is an eight-hour process, 127 00:04:51,640 --> 00:04:54,010 you're not gonna have all eight hours 128 00:04:54,010 --> 00:04:55,340 fully mapped out at this point. 129 00:04:55,340 --> 00:04:56,630 Well, I think it's important. 130 00:04:56,632 --> 00:04:59,002 So it just-- to reemphasize something 131 00:04:59,000 --> 00:05:00,940 my brother's saying there, when we're going in 132 00:05:00,940 --> 00:05:03,630 and we're pitching to Netflix, we're pitching the show, 133 00:05:03,628 --> 00:05:05,918 and we have the pilot, it's not called the upside down. 134 00:05:05,920 --> 00:05:07,330 There's no-- there's-- 135 00:05:07,330 --> 00:05:10,450 the spores and the vines, I mean, none of that none of that 136 00:05:10,450 --> 00:05:12,160 is figured out, and we didn't get 137 00:05:12,158 --> 00:05:13,448 hammered by Netflix about that. 138 00:05:13,450 --> 00:05:15,730 It was like could you describe the mythology 139 00:05:15,730 --> 00:05:16,600 of this other world. 140 00:05:16,600 --> 00:05:17,770 Like, they don't-- whatever. 141 00:05:17,767 --> 00:05:19,407 They get it is a scary other dimension. 142 00:05:19,410 --> 00:05:20,410 You're going to figure-- 143 00:05:20,410 --> 00:05:22,180 you're going to give it-- figure it out. 144 00:05:22,180 --> 00:05:25,120 I think something that is intimidating to a lot of people 145 00:05:25,120 --> 00:05:26,620 and it was certainly intimidating us 146 00:05:26,620 --> 00:05:28,440 when we started is you see these products 147 00:05:28,438 --> 00:05:29,978 and they're fully done, fully formed, 148 00:05:29,980 --> 00:05:31,300 and you just get overwhelmed. 149 00:05:31,300 --> 00:05:33,300 It's like how am I going to figure all this out. 150 00:05:33,300 --> 00:05:34,920 And the answer is one step at a time. 151 00:05:34,923 --> 00:05:37,093 Like, so a lot of this stuff wasn't even figured out 152 00:05:37,090 --> 00:05:39,400 when we sold it to Netflix. 153 00:05:39,400 --> 00:05:43,000 So that should relieve a lot of pressure 154 00:05:43,000 --> 00:05:46,270 from you to not get overwhelmed and it's just a little bit 155 00:05:46,270 --> 00:05:46,850 at a time. 156 00:05:46,850 --> 00:05:48,100 And even as you're writing your script 157 00:05:48,100 --> 00:05:49,640 it's not going to all be figured out. 158 00:05:49,642 --> 00:05:50,922 So allow-- 159 00:05:50,920 --> 00:05:52,450 It's going to be a process. 160 00:05:52,450 --> 00:05:54,730 Even after we had written the pilot script 161 00:05:54,730 --> 00:05:56,230 and we were meeting with people, we 162 00:05:56,228 --> 00:05:58,268 did start to get asked questions about the world, 163 00:05:58,270 --> 00:06:00,260 and that forced us to sit down-- 164 00:06:00,255 --> 00:06:01,135 And think about it. 165 00:06:01,130 --> 00:06:04,090 And think about it and talk about it more and whatnot. 166 00:06:04,090 --> 00:06:05,540 And it'll evolve. 167 00:06:05,540 --> 00:06:08,050 It'll start to evolve, and then eventually when 168 00:06:08,050 --> 00:06:10,780 we decided we have to go in there once we started 169 00:06:10,780 --> 00:06:14,380 moving into writing later scripts for Netflix, 170 00:06:14,380 --> 00:06:16,720 we went, OK, what could this world look like. 171 00:06:16,720 --> 00:06:18,190 We talked about "Silent Hill." 172 00:06:18,190 --> 00:06:19,720 We talked about "Alien." 173 00:06:19,720 --> 00:06:21,670 We talked about the aesthetics of it. 174 00:06:21,670 --> 00:06:24,110 Again, that wasn't figured out on the pilot stage, 175 00:06:24,110 --> 00:06:27,190 and that was-- in our instance, that was OK. 176 00:06:27,190 --> 00:06:28,960 Again, it's going to be baby steps. 177 00:06:28,960 --> 00:06:31,180 All of this is to say it's good 178 00:06:31,180 --> 00:06:34,690 actually to say simple and vague and you're fine. 179 00:06:34,690 --> 00:06:37,300 It's not-- don't expect it to be fully formed at this stage. 180 00:06:37,300 --> 00:06:39,580 Don't try to make it fully formed. 181 00:06:39,580 --> 00:06:42,410 Just stay-- continue to stay zoomed out. 182 00:06:42,410 --> 00:06:45,350 [MUSIC PLAYING] 183 00:06:48,290 --> 00:06:49,900 Similar to the aesthetic or whatever 184 00:06:49,900 --> 00:06:52,840 of the upside down of this alternate dimension, we have 185 00:06:52,840 --> 00:06:56,270 this sort of psychic space that 11 exists in, which was we 186 00:06:56,265 --> 00:06:57,645 called the black void where she's 187 00:06:57,640 --> 00:06:59,980 in just completely black space. 188 00:06:59,980 --> 00:07:04,660 And, again, you know, that came about, we realized as we were 189 00:07:04,660 --> 00:07:05,970 writing it, I mean, we had-- 190 00:07:05,970 --> 00:07:08,980 we needed a way to visualize how 11 was 191 00:07:08,980 --> 00:07:10,390 using these psionic abilities. 192 00:07:10,390 --> 00:07:11,880 We wanted to be kind of in her head 193 00:07:11,878 --> 00:07:13,418 as she was doing these things and she 194 00:07:13,420 --> 00:07:14,620 was making psychic contact. 195 00:07:14,615 --> 00:07:16,995 It was like, well, how in the world do we visualize this. 196 00:07:16,990 --> 00:07:19,750 We don't have a bajillion dollars to do this all CG, 197 00:07:19,748 --> 00:07:21,288 and we didn't want to do it that way. 198 00:07:21,290 --> 00:07:22,210 We wanted to keep it simple. 199 00:07:22,210 --> 00:07:22,880 And practical. 200 00:07:22,877 --> 00:07:24,967 And we wanted to do it practical. 201 00:07:24,970 --> 00:07:27,130 There was a movie that came out "Under the Skin." 202 00:07:27,130 --> 00:07:31,480 Now-- that Jonathan Glazer made with Scarlett Johansson 203 00:07:31,480 --> 00:07:33,680 where he had this really cool effect. 204 00:07:33,680 --> 00:07:37,000 It's like a really simple effect where Scarlett Johansson was 205 00:07:37,000 --> 00:07:39,850 in this strange-- 206 00:07:39,850 --> 00:07:41,800 just surrounded completely by black. 207 00:07:41,800 --> 00:07:44,060 And I think did maybe he did have-- 208 00:07:44,060 --> 00:07:45,040 Some reflection. 209 00:07:45,040 --> 00:07:47,680 Some reflective [INAUDIBLE] it's been a while. 210 00:07:47,680 --> 00:07:49,290 But what's interesting-- you know, 211 00:07:49,288 --> 00:07:51,078 it's worth pointing out a couple of things. 212 00:07:51,080 --> 00:07:55,310 A, that's an idea that came much later that evolved as you're 213 00:07:55,313 --> 00:07:56,233 working on the script. 214 00:07:56,230 --> 00:07:58,730 It wasn't there when we sold the script just like the upside 215 00:07:58,730 --> 00:08:00,430 down wasn't really figured out. 216 00:08:00,430 --> 00:08:05,440 It was something that came to us and also that it was very much 217 00:08:05,440 --> 00:08:07,600 inspired by another film that we had seen 218 00:08:07,600 --> 00:08:10,660 and a film that is completely unlike "Stranger Things." 219 00:08:10,660 --> 00:08:13,580 I mean, it's kind of almost an experimental film. 220 00:08:13,577 --> 00:08:14,407 "Under the Skin" is. 221 00:08:14,410 --> 00:08:15,640 It's a weird film. 222 00:08:15,640 --> 00:08:23,070 So it's good to watch all sorts of types of movies, not just-- 223 00:08:23,065 --> 00:08:25,335 don't just watch-- if you love Marvel movies, 224 00:08:25,330 --> 00:08:27,190 don't just watch Marvel movies. 225 00:08:27,190 --> 00:08:30,800 Try watch everything because even if it doesn't-- 226 00:08:30,803 --> 00:08:33,223 the tone of "Under the Skin" is so different than the tone 227 00:08:33,220 --> 00:08:37,020 of "Stranger Things," but it still had an element in there 228 00:08:37,015 --> 00:08:38,335 that was really helpful for us. 229 00:08:38,330 --> 00:08:40,990 And inspiring and I think and again it could be a painting. 230 00:08:40,990 --> 00:08:44,110 It could be a photograph that you love. 231 00:08:44,110 --> 00:08:47,870 It could be in the case of the spore-like aspect of the upside 232 00:08:47,870 --> 00:08:48,370 down. 233 00:08:48,370 --> 00:08:49,870 It could be a video game. 234 00:08:49,870 --> 00:08:50,800 MATT DUFFER: Yeah, that came from-- 235 00:08:50,800 --> 00:08:52,120 that was inspired by "Silent Hill." 236 00:08:52,120 --> 00:08:54,040 ROSS DUFFER: Again, you're going to be looking 237 00:08:54,037 --> 00:08:56,087 at things love and things that inspire you, 238 00:08:56,090 --> 00:08:59,800 and that's a perfectly valid thing to do. 239 00:08:59,800 --> 00:09:02,760 [MUSIC PLAYING] 240 00:09:06,710 --> 00:09:08,720 For this assignment, just start making 241 00:09:08,720 --> 00:09:11,440 a simple list of locations where your characters can exist. 242 00:09:11,435 --> 00:09:15,625 MATT DUFFER: It can be as basic as a bedroom a gym or tunnels. 243 00:09:15,620 --> 00:09:18,500 Start simple and have fun.