1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,890 [MUSIC PLAYING] 2 00:00:12,040 --> 00:00:14,770 So now you've got some ideas right now. 3 00:00:14,770 --> 00:00:16,360 It's time to pick your favorite idea. 4 00:00:16,360 --> 00:00:19,400 So hopefully this is the idea that if you wake up, 5 00:00:19,400 --> 00:00:22,030 you're feeling really good about it, you're excited, 6 00:00:22,030 --> 00:00:23,650 you can't wait to write, you can't 7 00:00:23,650 --> 00:00:25,480 wait to get into final draft and start 8 00:00:25,480 --> 00:00:27,730 making-- turning it into a script, but like hold up, 9 00:00:27,730 --> 00:00:28,790 hold up, hold up. 10 00:00:28,790 --> 00:00:30,850 So what-- we're actually going to do something 11 00:00:30,850 --> 00:00:33,140 more fun than that, more fun than writing the script. 12 00:00:33,140 --> 00:00:38,000 So the first thing we do and this is in a lot of ways 13 00:00:38,003 --> 00:00:39,673 the most fun part of the process for us, 14 00:00:39,670 --> 00:00:41,230 because you've got the idea down, right? 15 00:00:41,230 --> 00:00:41,620 That's so hard. 16 00:00:41,620 --> 00:00:43,780 You got an idea, which is really, really hard 17 00:00:43,780 --> 00:00:45,190 and really taxing. 18 00:00:45,190 --> 00:00:47,200 But once you have the idea, the fun part 19 00:00:47,200 --> 00:00:48,800 is to explore that idea. 20 00:00:48,800 --> 00:00:51,280 So this is something we call blue-skying, 21 00:00:51,280 --> 00:00:53,570 we say we're going to blue-sky our idea. 22 00:00:53,570 --> 00:00:56,560 And basically that just means no pressure brainstorming. 23 00:00:56,560 --> 00:00:58,570 And remember, you could start blue-skying, 24 00:00:58,570 --> 00:01:00,520 you can start brainstorming an idea, 25 00:01:00,520 --> 00:01:02,920 and it's not getting you excited. 26 00:01:02,920 --> 00:01:04,180 So you can always go back. 27 00:01:04,180 --> 00:01:06,940 I mean, you're never forced to stick with an idea. 28 00:01:06,937 --> 00:01:08,267 I mean, we do that all the time. 29 00:01:08,270 --> 00:01:11,020 And one way you know it's a good idea 30 00:01:11,020 --> 00:01:12,970 is that it starts to unlock a lot of doors. 31 00:01:12,970 --> 00:01:15,640 So as you're thinking about the idea, 32 00:01:15,640 --> 00:01:17,860 as you're brainstorming it, suddenly you 33 00:01:17,860 --> 00:01:19,190 go, oh, what about this? 34 00:01:19,190 --> 00:01:19,870 What about that? 35 00:01:19,870 --> 00:01:20,740 It's exciting. 36 00:01:20,740 --> 00:01:24,910 It's just like, oh, wow, this is a really fun sandbox to play in 37 00:01:24,910 --> 00:01:26,950 and there's so much, almost too much, to do here. 38 00:01:26,952 --> 00:01:29,082 That was certainly the case with "Stranger Things." 39 00:01:29,077 --> 00:01:30,127 We had a psychic girl. 40 00:01:30,130 --> 00:01:31,300 We had monsters. 41 00:01:31,300 --> 00:01:32,440 We had a police chief. 42 00:01:32,440 --> 00:01:33,590 We had another dimension. 43 00:01:33,590 --> 00:01:34,090 We're like-- 44 00:01:34,090 --> 00:01:35,200 Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, 45 00:01:35,200 --> 00:01:36,790 we just had all this stuff, and we just wanted-- 46 00:01:36,790 --> 00:01:38,560 we started to spit all these ideas. 47 00:01:38,560 --> 00:01:40,870 But I think the most important thing 48 00:01:40,870 --> 00:01:43,600 is to trust yourself and trust what you're feeling, 49 00:01:43,600 --> 00:01:45,460 and just you want to feel that passion, 50 00:01:45,460 --> 00:01:46,790 you want to feel the excitement. 51 00:01:46,793 --> 00:01:48,343 If you've got that, great. 52 00:01:48,340 --> 00:01:49,620 We should start blue-skying. 53 00:01:49,620 --> 00:01:52,460 [MUSIC PLAYING] 54 00:01:55,765 --> 00:01:57,645 So usually when Ross and I are blue-skying, 55 00:01:57,640 --> 00:02:02,450 what we do is we get together, we hit on music, 56 00:02:02,450 --> 00:02:05,920 we open up our computers, and then we just start to bat 57 00:02:05,920 --> 00:02:06,610 around ideas. 58 00:02:06,610 --> 00:02:11,050 So we throw out, it's almost stream of consciousness. 59 00:02:11,050 --> 00:02:13,570 So it's just, we just throw out any and every idea 60 00:02:13,570 --> 00:02:14,430 that we have. 61 00:02:14,430 --> 00:02:15,950 We jot it all down. 62 00:02:15,950 --> 00:02:18,550 It's super sketchy, very, very messy. 63 00:02:18,550 --> 00:02:20,080 A lot of the ideas we throw out. 64 00:02:20,080 --> 00:02:21,790 Will never see the light of day. 65 00:02:21,790 --> 00:02:22,940 No one will ever read them. 66 00:02:22,940 --> 00:02:25,230 This is like a very personal part of the process that's 67 00:02:25,232 --> 00:02:26,922 just for yourself, but it's always 68 00:02:26,920 --> 00:02:28,240 good to have too many ideas. 69 00:02:28,240 --> 00:02:30,430 You can always pull from them later. 70 00:02:30,430 --> 00:02:31,390 You'll be surprised. 71 00:02:31,390 --> 00:02:34,270 I think as we stepped through our brainstorming for "Stranger 72 00:02:34,270 --> 00:02:36,550 Things" how some ideas we had very early on 73 00:02:36,550 --> 00:02:41,470 became something we used in season two or season three. 74 00:02:41,470 --> 00:02:44,410 So it's always good to have a huge grab bag of ideas 75 00:02:44,410 --> 00:02:47,470 and just start to throw any and everything out. 76 00:02:47,468 --> 00:02:49,138 And the reason we like, even though it 77 00:02:49,135 --> 00:02:51,855 is stream of consciousness, why we like writing it down 78 00:02:51,850 --> 00:02:54,220 is because then you can go back, then you sleep on it, 79 00:02:54,220 --> 00:02:55,450 you come back the next day. 80 00:02:55,450 --> 00:02:58,090 You read through sort of your thought process and these ideas 81 00:02:58,090 --> 00:03:01,630 and go, well, this here, this little line here, 82 00:03:01,630 --> 00:03:04,960 that's really sticking out as a really-- something really cool. 83 00:03:04,960 --> 00:03:07,240 Maybe we should build on that and go from there. 84 00:03:07,240 --> 00:03:10,240 It's nice to just write it down and keep 85 00:03:10,240 --> 00:03:13,060 a document of your process. 86 00:03:13,060 --> 00:03:16,150 We typically spend, I don't know, anywhere from a week 87 00:03:16,150 --> 00:03:17,410 to two weeks on this. 88 00:03:17,410 --> 00:03:19,410 I think that was the case for "Stranger Things." 89 00:03:19,410 --> 00:03:21,880 I mean, we spent about two weeks throwing out ideas. 90 00:03:21,880 --> 00:03:24,160 I like giving yourself a lot of time on this, 91 00:03:24,160 --> 00:03:27,450 because then again, it lowers the pressure. 92 00:03:27,447 --> 00:03:29,527 And that if you have a day that's not particularly 93 00:03:29,530 --> 00:03:31,570 productive and you don't come up with a big idea, 94 00:03:31,572 --> 00:03:33,162 you don't start getting frustrated. 95 00:03:33,158 --> 00:03:35,198 You're like, okay, well, there's always tomorrow. 96 00:03:35,200 --> 00:03:37,200 You're going to have days, good days, 97 00:03:37,195 --> 00:03:39,325 and you're going to have bad days, and that's okay. 98 00:03:39,320 --> 00:03:40,150 Don't stress out. 99 00:03:40,150 --> 00:03:42,570 It's important to be patient and generous with yourself. 100 00:03:42,567 --> 00:03:44,527 So give yourself a little bit of time for this. 101 00:03:44,530 --> 00:03:45,730 Just get it all out there. 102 00:03:45,730 --> 00:03:47,060 Vomit it all out. 103 00:03:47,060 --> 00:03:50,800 And I think it's all helpful, good and bad. 104 00:03:50,800 --> 00:03:53,660 [MUSIC PLAYING] 105 00:03:57,010 --> 00:03:59,090 So we're going to show you our blue-sky document 106 00:03:59,093 --> 00:04:01,473 for "Montauk," which eventually became "Stranger Things," 107 00:04:01,468 --> 00:04:01,988 right? 108 00:04:01,990 --> 00:04:04,690 Ross and I write it down as we're thinking it. 109 00:04:04,690 --> 00:04:06,750 So you're seeing really what was in our heads 110 00:04:06,745 --> 00:04:07,875 as we were writing it down. 111 00:04:07,870 --> 00:04:10,210 No one one's ever seen this before. 112 00:04:10,210 --> 00:04:13,180 But you'll really get a sense of how we generated the idea 113 00:04:13,180 --> 00:04:14,640 and how it evolved. 114 00:04:14,643 --> 00:04:17,063 In terms of the kind of things you're growing to blue-sky, 115 00:04:17,060 --> 00:04:18,130 you're going to be thinking about everything. 116 00:04:18,130 --> 00:04:20,470 You're going to be thinking about character, setting, 117 00:04:20,470 --> 00:04:24,610 world, mythology, drive, story, literally everything. 118 00:04:24,610 --> 00:04:26,320 Which sounds overwhelming, but it's not 119 00:04:26,320 --> 00:04:27,950 because it's fun because you can bounce 120 00:04:27,945 --> 00:04:30,585 from thinking about characters to thinking about setting 121 00:04:30,580 --> 00:04:31,660 to thinking about story. 122 00:04:31,660 --> 00:04:32,160 I mean-- 123 00:04:32,160 --> 00:04:34,360 You get stuck on one thing, you move to the next. 124 00:04:34,357 --> 00:04:36,437 And it's just-- you're going to see this document, 125 00:04:36,440 --> 00:04:38,170 it's a little chaotic, but we're going 126 00:04:38,170 --> 00:04:40,270 to go through and show you each of those things 127 00:04:40,270 --> 00:04:41,690 that we were talking about and how 128 00:04:41,687 --> 00:04:43,837 it led to this bigger piece. 129 00:04:43,840 --> 00:04:46,220 Something that's not going to be in this document, 130 00:04:46,220 --> 00:04:48,130 but it is something you can think about, 131 00:04:48,130 --> 00:04:49,900 you saw sort of doing it on the fly, 132 00:04:49,900 --> 00:04:53,410 and I don't think we nailed it, which is title, 133 00:04:53,410 --> 00:04:56,680 and that's something else you can blue-sky. 134 00:04:56,680 --> 00:05:00,130 I mean, for "Stranger Things," Montauk came to us 135 00:05:00,130 --> 00:05:02,290 instantly just because we-- 136 00:05:02,290 --> 00:05:04,060 it's a cool word. 137 00:05:04,060 --> 00:05:06,070 There's something a little spooky about it. 138 00:05:06,070 --> 00:05:09,130 Now when it came to changing the title due to, 139 00:05:09,130 --> 00:05:13,850 we weren't able to shoot in Montauk due to cost, 140 00:05:13,850 --> 00:05:15,580 so we had to move it to Atlanta. 141 00:05:15,580 --> 00:05:16,700 So it had to change. 142 00:05:16,700 --> 00:05:19,330 And we didn't want to just do call it, Hawkins. 143 00:05:19,330 --> 00:05:21,670 We didn't want to just do it as a make-believe town 144 00:05:21,670 --> 00:05:22,520 as the title. 145 00:05:22,520 --> 00:05:24,340 It's not-- wasn't very exciting to us. 146 00:05:24,340 --> 00:05:26,690 So we just came up with a bunch of ideas. 147 00:05:26,690 --> 00:05:27,820 You know we had The Keep. 148 00:05:27,820 --> 00:05:30,400 We had Indigo, which was going to be the name 149 00:05:30,400 --> 00:05:32,260 of the government program. 150 00:05:32,260 --> 00:05:34,900 And of course, amidst that we had "Stranger Things." 151 00:05:34,900 --> 00:05:36,670 And I think ultimately it sort of boiled 152 00:05:36,670 --> 00:05:39,790 down to Indigo and Stranger Things. 153 00:05:39,790 --> 00:05:42,190 Indigo sounds really weird now, but that 154 00:05:42,190 --> 00:05:43,600 was sort of the runner-up. 155 00:05:43,600 --> 00:05:46,540 And one fun thing we did, and this is if you do 156 00:05:46,540 --> 00:05:51,820 want to take a beat away from your blue-skying, 157 00:05:51,820 --> 00:05:55,750 we sort of mocked up each title in Photoshop 158 00:05:55,750 --> 00:05:57,810 in a font that we thought was sort 159 00:05:57,808 --> 00:06:00,098 of what we wanted to actually do for the show, that got 160 00:06:00,100 --> 00:06:01,440 across the vibe of the show. 161 00:06:01,440 --> 00:06:03,190 Well, I was always Team Stranger Things, 162 00:06:03,190 --> 00:06:04,520 and it looked good. 163 00:06:04,522 --> 00:06:05,982 It looked like a Stephen King book. 164 00:06:05,980 --> 00:06:07,840 Maybe because it just made me think of needful things. 165 00:06:07,840 --> 00:06:09,790 It may have not been any more difficult 166 00:06:09,790 --> 00:06:12,250 or complicated than that, but for whatever reason, 167 00:06:12,250 --> 00:06:13,520 that's why we liked it. 168 00:06:13,520 --> 00:06:15,940 And that's why the show is now called "Stranger Things." 169 00:06:15,940 --> 00:06:16,570 Let's look at that. 170 00:06:16,570 --> 00:06:17,860 Actually look at the doc again. 171 00:06:17,862 --> 00:06:19,122 You can do title in that. 172 00:06:19,120 --> 00:06:20,600 That's one of many elements. 173 00:06:20,600 --> 00:06:24,640 So let's go through and sort of step through this little-- 174 00:06:24,640 --> 00:06:26,890 it's going to be a little chaotic looking at the doc, 175 00:06:26,890 --> 00:06:30,830 but this was exactly what we did back in the day. 176 00:06:30,830 --> 00:06:32,810 And you're going to see our thought process. 177 00:06:32,810 --> 00:06:34,810 MATT DUFFER: So we'll start off with characters. 178 00:06:34,810 --> 00:06:37,150 The first thing we wrote is, "Sam Rockwell, opposite 179 00:06:37,150 --> 00:06:38,610 of McConaughy, lives on a beach." 180 00:06:38,608 --> 00:06:40,398 So this is Hopper that we're writing about. 181 00:06:40,400 --> 00:06:41,740 Again, I don't have to specify that we're 182 00:06:41,740 --> 00:06:42,620 talking about Hopper. 183 00:06:42,615 --> 00:06:45,315 This is just for us, as long as we understand what we're 184 00:06:45,310 --> 00:06:46,510 writing, it doesn't matter. 185 00:06:46,510 --> 00:06:49,720 Also Sam Rockwell means a lot of things to me and Ross. 186 00:06:49,720 --> 00:06:52,660 We know what type of character we're describing 187 00:06:52,660 --> 00:06:54,170 when we say Sam Rockwell. 188 00:06:54,170 --> 00:06:55,390 This is not for anybody else. 189 00:06:55,390 --> 00:06:56,110 It's just for us. 190 00:06:56,110 --> 00:07:00,220 So Sam Rockwell is shorthand for like, a book of things. 191 00:07:00,220 --> 00:07:02,140 Well, and I think the most important thing, 192 00:07:02,140 --> 00:07:04,180 and I think this is opposite of McConaughy, 193 00:07:04,183 --> 00:07:06,353 in this "True Detective" was coming out of the time, 194 00:07:06,350 --> 00:07:08,330 but I think that by Sam Rockwell, 195 00:07:08,330 --> 00:07:11,170 we meant that he's not your typical Hollywood hero. 196 00:07:11,170 --> 00:07:14,890 This isn't-- we didn't say, if we wrote Tom Cruise lives 197 00:07:14,890 --> 00:07:16,200 on a beach, that gives us-- 198 00:07:16,200 --> 00:07:16,910 Very different. 199 00:07:16,908 --> 00:07:20,258 Very different, very different vibes, you know. 200 00:07:20,260 --> 00:07:21,970 Dwayne Johnson lives on a beach. 201 00:07:21,970 --> 00:07:23,050 Very different vibe. 202 00:07:23,050 --> 00:07:25,610 And then we start talking a little bit about plot, 203 00:07:25,610 --> 00:07:26,200 you'll see. 204 00:07:26,200 --> 00:07:30,190 "They've opened a portal, you don't understand, snatchers." 205 00:07:30,190 --> 00:07:32,060 So, again, snatchers is not a good name. 206 00:07:32,058 --> 00:07:33,848 That eventually becomes demogorgons, right? 207 00:07:33,850 --> 00:07:36,100 But that's the origin of the demogorgons right there. 208 00:07:36,100 --> 00:07:38,530 "People are going missing, you understand, 209 00:07:38,530 --> 00:07:41,350 that's the third person that's gone missing, they've drowned, 210 00:07:41,350 --> 00:07:43,790 they're saying they drowned in the lake or the ocean." 211 00:07:43,792 --> 00:07:46,002 Remember this used to be set right next to the ocean. 212 00:07:46,000 --> 00:07:47,380 "You don't believe that, do you?" 213 00:07:47,375 --> 00:07:49,905 So this is the idea that its government lies, right? 214 00:07:49,900 --> 00:07:51,610 We even ask ourselves questions in this. 215 00:07:51,610 --> 00:07:52,780 We write down our questions. 216 00:07:52,777 --> 00:07:54,337 "How do we keep these kids involved?" 217 00:07:54,340 --> 00:07:55,800 And then we say, "maybe the sheriff 218 00:07:55,798 --> 00:07:57,038 isn't the major character." 219 00:07:57,033 --> 00:07:59,203 So it's interesting that we actually started it out, 220 00:07:59,200 --> 00:08:00,370 and that's probably why we started out 221 00:08:00,370 --> 00:08:01,570 writing about Sam Rockwell, is we 222 00:08:01,570 --> 00:08:03,490 had Hopper was going to be the main character. 223 00:08:03,487 --> 00:08:05,737 Well, if you remember it started with prisoners. 224 00:08:05,740 --> 00:08:07,660 So, again, that's the-- you know, 225 00:08:07,660 --> 00:08:10,840 you've got this police character as the lead. 226 00:08:10,840 --> 00:08:14,080 But I think we made a mental note to, wait, 227 00:08:14,080 --> 00:08:16,420 can we steer this more towards the kids. 228 00:08:16,420 --> 00:08:18,100 How do we keep these kids involved? 229 00:08:18,100 --> 00:08:19,990 We didn't know the answer, and that's okay. 230 00:08:19,990 --> 00:08:21,460 You can ask yourself, like Matt's saying, 231 00:08:21,460 --> 00:08:22,480 ask yourself questions. 232 00:08:22,480 --> 00:08:24,280 We don't know how this is going to work, 233 00:08:24,280 --> 00:08:26,770 but we know we want to keep the kids involved 234 00:08:26,770 --> 00:08:28,780 in the investigation of their missing friend. 235 00:08:28,780 --> 00:08:30,590 But then we say, "kids are dying, 236 00:08:30,590 --> 00:08:32,290 getting yanked into another dimension, 237 00:08:32,289 --> 00:08:35,379 his bike is just sitting there, where the hell did he go?" 238 00:08:35,375 --> 00:08:37,755 So we're starting to introduce some imagery that actually 239 00:08:37,750 --> 00:08:40,510 did end up in the final show, and actually 240 00:08:40,510 --> 00:08:41,800 on the poster for the show. 241 00:08:41,799 --> 00:08:42,909 "What happened to him. 242 00:08:42,909 --> 00:08:44,739 Everybody's looking for this kid." 243 00:08:44,740 --> 00:08:47,140 And then we reintroduce the sheriff. 244 00:08:47,140 --> 00:08:50,410 So that's huge right there, that early 245 00:08:50,407 --> 00:08:51,487 brainstorming right there. 246 00:08:51,490 --> 00:08:53,200 We started to develop some of the core-- 247 00:08:53,200 --> 00:08:54,040 Core elements. 248 00:08:54,040 --> 00:08:55,290 Core elements of the plot. 249 00:08:55,290 --> 00:08:56,850 What that drive is. 250 00:08:56,850 --> 00:08:59,190 Another thing that we get into in this document 251 00:08:59,190 --> 00:09:00,490 is worldbuilding, right? 252 00:09:00,490 --> 00:09:04,830 So we go into, "are the two worlds bleeding into our world. 253 00:09:04,830 --> 00:09:06,690 The wormhole is expanding. 254 00:09:06,690 --> 00:09:09,180 You see, you need to be able to get into the other world. 255 00:09:09,180 --> 00:09:10,410 There are openings. 256 00:09:10,410 --> 00:09:12,060 Mouths to this world." 257 00:09:12,060 --> 00:09:14,790 "Perhaps one of the kids accidentally goes into it. 258 00:09:14,790 --> 00:09:15,990 It draws you in. 259 00:09:15,990 --> 00:09:16,890 With what? 260 00:09:16,890 --> 00:09:19,080 Something trance-like, enticing. 261 00:09:19,080 --> 00:09:22,860 Dancing particles, almost like moths, fluttering around. 262 00:09:22,860 --> 00:09:24,510 The wormhole is expanding. 263 00:09:24,510 --> 00:09:27,030 This universe is bleeding into our own." 264 00:09:27,030 --> 00:09:29,820 What I think is interesting about this 265 00:09:29,820 --> 00:09:32,550 is some of these ideas don't make it into season one, 266 00:09:32,550 --> 00:09:34,980 but some of them make it into later seasons. 267 00:09:34,980 --> 00:09:37,290 We do have a mouth to another world, which 268 00:09:37,290 --> 00:09:38,500 does make it into season one. 269 00:09:38,498 --> 00:09:40,248 MATT DUFFER: We end up calling it the rip. 270 00:09:40,248 --> 00:09:42,538 What didn't make it as the trance-like thing 271 00:09:42,540 --> 00:09:44,790 or the dancing particles. 272 00:09:44,790 --> 00:09:46,980 Dancing particles was really the prototype 273 00:09:46,980 --> 00:09:50,270 for what would become the Mind Flayer in season two. 274 00:09:56,700 --> 00:09:58,480 We started to get overloaded with ideas, 275 00:09:58,477 --> 00:10:00,057 so you'll see as we move into outline, 276 00:10:00,060 --> 00:10:04,690 that's just an idea that just didn't make it into that pilot 277 00:10:04,690 --> 00:10:05,190 script. 278 00:10:05,190 --> 00:10:07,050 But again, no ideas are bad ideas. 279 00:10:07,050 --> 00:10:09,000 This all came around. 280 00:10:09,000 --> 00:10:11,710 The fact that this world is bleeding into our own, 281 00:10:11,710 --> 00:10:14,430 that also became a core element of season two. 282 00:10:14,430 --> 00:10:17,460 It didn't really play a role in season one. 283 00:10:17,460 --> 00:10:19,650 But again, we're just throwing out these ideas. 284 00:10:19,650 --> 00:10:22,410 And this is day one of brainstorming. 285 00:10:22,410 --> 00:10:24,660 And you can see how much we're already coming up with. 286 00:10:24,660 --> 00:10:26,040 I'm going to skip a little bit, 287 00:10:26,035 --> 00:10:28,115 but I'm going to go into what is probably 288 00:10:28,110 --> 00:10:32,220 the most important five minutes of brainstorming in our lives. 289 00:10:32,220 --> 00:10:36,000 And you'll see it all as we were writing out in real time, 290 00:10:36,002 --> 00:10:36,962 back in, what was this? 291 00:10:36,960 --> 00:10:38,490 Looked like April 14. 292 00:10:38,490 --> 00:10:40,620 We said, "there's a world underneath this world. 293 00:10:40,620 --> 00:10:41,650 Two worlds." 294 00:10:41,650 --> 00:10:43,540 So that's the upside down, obviously. 295 00:10:43,537 --> 00:10:45,117 "This world is encroaching into ours." 296 00:10:45,120 --> 00:10:48,030 We're repeating something we've already said, but that's okay. 297 00:10:48,030 --> 00:10:50,100 "Increased military presence. 298 00:10:50,100 --> 00:10:51,510 They've unleashed this thing. 299 00:10:51,510 --> 00:10:52,920 It's not going to stop. 300 00:10:52,920 --> 00:10:54,180 Maybe it's a kid with powers. 301 00:10:54,180 --> 00:10:54,900 Is that weird. 302 00:10:54,900 --> 00:10:56,580 Or maybe a girl of sorts. 303 00:10:56,580 --> 00:10:58,950 Certainly can take inspiration from that. 304 00:10:58,950 --> 00:11:01,980 Then we have this kid who can't connect with anyone, who begins 305 00:11:01,980 --> 00:11:03,300 to connect with this girl. 306 00:11:03,300 --> 00:11:04,230 She kisses him. 307 00:11:04,230 --> 00:11:05,180 Very ET-like." 308 00:11:05,180 --> 00:11:05,680 Who-- 309 00:11:05,680 --> 00:11:06,940 And that's talking about Mike now. 310 00:11:06,940 --> 00:11:07,440 Mike. 311 00:11:07,440 --> 00:11:08,220 "Very ET-like. 312 00:11:08,220 --> 00:11:09,390 Who are you? 313 00:11:09,390 --> 00:11:11,130 I was experimented on. 314 00:11:11,130 --> 00:11:12,480 Explodes his head." 315 00:11:12,480 --> 00:11:15,690 So that didn't-- that didn't make it in, but that could be 316 00:11:15,690 --> 00:11:16,440 cool. 317 00:11:16,440 --> 00:11:17,910 "This place, it's going to open up. 318 00:11:17,910 --> 00:11:18,810 Don't you get it? 319 00:11:18,810 --> 00:11:20,010 Something more innocent. 320 00:11:20,010 --> 00:11:21,270 The government wants her. 321 00:11:21,270 --> 00:11:23,620 They're tracking her down," et cetera. 322 00:11:23,620 --> 00:11:24,220 So, and then-- 323 00:11:24,220 --> 00:11:25,720 How do we get to this other place? 324 00:11:25,720 --> 00:11:27,030 I can show you. 325 00:11:27,030 --> 00:11:27,880 Like the "Matrix." 326 00:11:27,880 --> 00:11:30,160 So this right here is the creation of Eleven. 327 00:11:30,155 --> 00:11:31,785 So this is when we came up with Eleven. 328 00:11:31,780 --> 00:11:34,740 So I don't know if this is an hour worth of brainstorming 329 00:11:34,740 --> 00:11:36,690 or less, but we started with a show 330 00:11:36,690 --> 00:11:41,160 about a sheriff investigating a missing kid to introducing 331 00:11:41,160 --> 00:11:44,130 the idea of the Upside Down and a girl with psionic abilities, 332 00:11:44,130 --> 00:11:47,860 and the whole ET aspect of the show, which is, I think, 333 00:11:47,860 --> 00:11:50,610 really essential to why it was successful, 334 00:11:50,610 --> 00:11:51,880 was generated right here. 335 00:11:51,880 --> 00:11:53,880 And we're even questioning, is this a good idea? 336 00:11:53,880 --> 00:11:55,740 Is that weird? 337 00:11:55,740 --> 00:11:57,860 And obviously, we got excited about it 338 00:11:57,860 --> 00:11:58,860 because we kept writing. 339 00:11:58,860 --> 00:12:00,540 When I think that's the thing we talked about 340 00:12:00,540 --> 00:12:02,130 too in the big idea phase, it's like, 341 00:12:02,130 --> 00:12:03,670 does this open a lot of doors? 342 00:12:03,670 --> 00:12:06,630 And so suddenly we're going, as you can see, 343 00:12:06,630 --> 00:12:10,050 one door opens-- the girl suddenly opened the door to, 344 00:12:10,053 --> 00:12:11,973 wait a minute, now she can have a relationship 345 00:12:11,970 --> 00:12:14,740 with our protagonist boy character. 346 00:12:14,738 --> 00:12:15,778 Well, that's interesting. 347 00:12:15,780 --> 00:12:17,160 So that opens up a door as, wait, 348 00:12:17,160 --> 00:12:19,560 now, she can show him where Will is. 349 00:12:19,560 --> 00:12:22,840 So earlier a couple paragraphs before we said, 350 00:12:22,840 --> 00:12:25,260 how do we get the kids involved in this investigation? 351 00:12:25,260 --> 00:12:27,330 We just got our answer right here. 352 00:12:27,332 --> 00:12:29,792 And then you can tell we got excited about this character 353 00:12:29,790 --> 00:12:31,290 because we keep writing about her. 354 00:12:31,290 --> 00:12:32,920 "She's not from another dimension." 355 00:12:32,923 --> 00:12:35,343 So there we're clarifying she's not from this Upside Down. 356 00:12:35,340 --> 00:12:36,390 "She's one of them. 357 00:12:36,390 --> 00:12:37,920 They captured her. 358 00:12:37,920 --> 00:12:40,350 I was born here," meaning in the laboratory. 359 00:12:40,350 --> 00:12:42,270 "We can do her backstory. 360 00:12:42,270 --> 00:12:45,360 Telepathy, powers, experimentation. 361 00:12:45,360 --> 00:12:46,770 No one understands it. 362 00:12:46,770 --> 00:12:49,680 And we have to overlay that with the everyday evil, suburbia, 363 00:12:49,680 --> 00:12:50,520 depression." 364 00:12:50,520 --> 00:12:55,470 Okay, so there we're starting to move from just very rapidly 365 00:12:55,470 --> 00:12:58,600 from character and story into themes. 366 00:12:58,600 --> 00:13:02,370 So we're going-- we're talking about what can we do 367 00:13:02,370 --> 00:13:03,720 thematically with this story. 368 00:13:03,720 --> 00:13:06,030 Again, this is why it's a little bit chaotic and all 369 00:13:06,030 --> 00:13:07,350 over the place. 370 00:13:07,350 --> 00:13:08,820 That's good and fine. 371 00:13:08,820 --> 00:13:11,170 So we're saying, "but it's an evil. 372 00:13:11,170 --> 00:13:14,400 We have to overlay that with the everyday evil, suburbia, 373 00:13:14,400 --> 00:13:16,020 depression, evil. 374 00:13:16,020 --> 00:13:18,810 How perfect everything is, but everything is not perfect. 375 00:13:18,810 --> 00:13:20,610 We put on a face for the public. 376 00:13:20,610 --> 00:13:21,870 The inner darkness. 377 00:13:21,870 --> 00:13:23,280 That's what it's about." 378 00:13:23,280 --> 00:13:26,430 So suddenly we're going, okay, what is the theme of this show? 379 00:13:26,430 --> 00:13:28,560 For some people, their process is, 380 00:13:28,560 --> 00:13:31,650 that's the starting kernel of their idea. 381 00:13:31,650 --> 00:13:33,330 That's not how Matt and I work. 382 00:13:33,330 --> 00:13:37,620 What we do is we're coming up with that story with characters 383 00:13:37,620 --> 00:13:40,110 that resonate with us and with the drive. 384 00:13:40,110 --> 00:13:42,660 And through that, as we're developing it, we go, okay, 385 00:13:42,660 --> 00:13:43,320 that's-- 386 00:13:43,320 --> 00:13:45,180 there's something more about this story 387 00:13:45,180 --> 00:13:47,140 that I think can be impactful for people. 388 00:13:47,140 --> 00:13:53,200 So, in this case, it's sort of Matt and I grew up in suburbia. 389 00:13:53,200 --> 00:13:55,500 So it's going, okay, maybe there's-- 390 00:13:55,500 --> 00:13:59,160 everything seems perfect, but beneath it, there's more. 391 00:13:59,160 --> 00:14:01,830 And I think that got us excited about, okay, 392 00:14:01,830 --> 00:14:03,220 this story can be more. 393 00:14:03,220 --> 00:14:05,730 It's not just about finding a kidnapped kid. 394 00:14:05,730 --> 00:14:08,300 It's not just about kids fighting monsters. 395 00:14:08,297 --> 00:14:10,377 There's something a little more resonant about it. 396 00:14:10,380 --> 00:14:13,500 So, again, that can be something that you come up 397 00:14:13,500 --> 00:14:15,330 with when you're discovering your big idea, 398 00:14:15,330 --> 00:14:19,830 or like us, it can come through the process of blue-skying it. 399 00:14:19,830 --> 00:14:23,400 But hopefully your story starts to take on more resonance 400 00:14:23,400 --> 00:14:25,080 as you're developing it. 401 00:14:25,080 --> 00:14:27,780 Now the one thing that you're not going to see, 402 00:14:27,780 --> 00:14:31,260 if you sort of zoom in and read through this document or pause 403 00:14:31,258 --> 00:14:33,298 the screen, the one thing you're not going to see 404 00:14:33,300 --> 00:14:35,850 is a lot of us talking about location or setting. 405 00:14:35,850 --> 00:14:39,240 And that's really because part of the big idea 406 00:14:39,240 --> 00:14:40,750 was this is set in Montauk. 407 00:14:40,747 --> 00:14:42,327 We didn't really feel the need that we 408 00:14:42,330 --> 00:14:45,390 needed to go into a lot of detail blue-skying that. 409 00:14:45,390 --> 00:14:46,500 We knew what it was. 410 00:14:46,500 --> 00:14:48,180 I actually think it is a good idea 411 00:14:48,180 --> 00:14:50,640 to write out some ideas about the location 412 00:14:50,640 --> 00:14:52,510 because that can lead to story ideas. 413 00:14:52,513 --> 00:14:54,183 Like, even then, we didn't do this here, 414 00:14:54,180 --> 00:14:55,930 but I think it would have been a good idea 415 00:14:55,930 --> 00:14:58,920 to start talking about what are some cool locations we could 416 00:14:58,920 --> 00:15:02,760 explore within the world of, say, Montauk, or eventually 417 00:15:02,760 --> 00:15:03,810 Hawkins, right? 418 00:15:03,810 --> 00:15:05,160 You can talk about the arcade. 419 00:15:05,160 --> 00:15:07,270 You can talk about the movie theater, the mall. 420 00:15:07,273 --> 00:15:08,943 You could talk about the kids' basement. 421 00:15:08,940 --> 00:15:09,810 The Fish 'N Fry. 422 00:15:09,810 --> 00:15:13,380 And start thinking about what are cool, like, 423 00:15:13,380 --> 00:15:15,300 mini settings within the larger setting, 424 00:15:15,300 --> 00:15:19,590 and that might actually lead to more ideas and cool ideas. 425 00:15:19,590 --> 00:15:21,840 So it's something that we didn't do as much back then, 426 00:15:21,840 --> 00:15:23,970 but we do it now when we're working on an idea. 427 00:15:23,970 --> 00:15:26,910 We definitely try to think about setting. 428 00:15:26,910 --> 00:15:27,410 Yes. 429 00:15:27,410 --> 00:15:30,720 [MUSIC PLAYING] 430 00:15:34,250 --> 00:15:36,750 As you're starting to throw out all of these ideas, what's 431 00:15:36,750 --> 00:15:39,300 going to have started as, like, a really, really rough sketch 432 00:15:39,300 --> 00:15:41,510 is going to start to get filled in a little bit more. 433 00:15:41,508 --> 00:15:44,188 So, hopefully, what was really blurry at first 434 00:15:44,190 --> 00:15:46,920 is going to start to slowly come more and more into focus, 435 00:15:46,920 --> 00:15:49,670 and you're going to get a sense of what this show is. 436 00:15:49,667 --> 00:15:51,747 Like, we're starting to see "Stranger Things," not 437 00:15:51,750 --> 00:15:53,130 completely, but a little bit. 438 00:15:53,130 --> 00:15:55,530 It's like our vision is getting a little bit better. 439 00:15:55,530 --> 00:15:57,720 But you see how much of "Stranger Things" 440 00:15:57,720 --> 00:16:00,270 came out in the blue-sky process. 441 00:16:00,270 --> 00:16:02,130 That the big idea-- 442 00:16:02,130 --> 00:16:04,230 and I think a lot of people put too much pressure 443 00:16:04,230 --> 00:16:06,450 on every stage, and it is a process. 444 00:16:06,450 --> 00:16:08,650 You've got to take it a little bit at a time. 445 00:16:08,650 --> 00:16:11,990 So this-- Eleven wasn't in the big idea, which 446 00:16:11,985 --> 00:16:13,115 is hard to think about now. 447 00:16:13,110 --> 00:16:14,370 It's hard to think about "Stranger Things" 448 00:16:14,370 --> 00:16:14,760 without Eleven. 449 00:16:14,760 --> 00:16:15,750 She wasn't in that paragraph. 450 00:16:15,750 --> 00:16:16,620 She wasn't in the paragraph. 451 00:16:16,620 --> 00:16:19,410 But now we've got demogorgons, they're called snatchers. 452 00:16:19,410 --> 00:16:22,180 We've got Eleven, she doesn't have a name yet, 453 00:16:22,180 --> 00:16:24,210 but we know there's a girl with psychic powers. 454 00:16:24,212 --> 00:16:25,922 We know that she's going to bond and have 455 00:16:25,920 --> 00:16:29,160 sort of an innocent relationship with our young boy lead. 456 00:16:29,160 --> 00:16:32,400 We've got a broken sheriff, who we're calling Sam Rockwell. 457 00:16:32,400 --> 00:16:34,020 We've got the kid's mom. 458 00:16:34,020 --> 00:16:35,460 We talk about her in here. 459 00:16:35,460 --> 00:16:37,860 It's a lot of what the show's going to become. 460 00:16:37,860 --> 00:16:41,340 [MUSIC PLAYING] 461 00:16:43,542 --> 00:16:45,002 As you're working on this, you're 462 00:16:45,000 --> 00:16:48,060 going to start to explore the tone of your piece. 463 00:16:48,060 --> 00:16:50,640 You're going to start to figure out 464 00:16:50,640 --> 00:16:52,110 what is the mood of the piece. 465 00:16:52,110 --> 00:16:54,480 And that really is what-- what is tone, 466 00:16:54,480 --> 00:16:56,040 when people ask what is tone. 467 00:16:56,040 --> 00:16:58,800 I mean, really it is a feeling. 468 00:16:58,800 --> 00:17:01,560 Like, what feeling does it evoke in you? 469 00:17:01,560 --> 00:17:03,870 What mood does it evoke? 470 00:17:03,870 --> 00:17:05,620 And "Stranger Things," of course, 471 00:17:05,619 --> 00:17:06,869 has many different tones. 472 00:17:06,869 --> 00:17:08,999 We knew it was going to have these horror elements, 473 00:17:08,994 --> 00:17:12,154 but see, as we're discovering this character of Eleven, 474 00:17:12,150 --> 00:17:13,710 the tone is shifting a little bit. 475 00:17:13,710 --> 00:17:18,750 So it's becoming a little less of a cop supernatural 476 00:17:18,750 --> 00:17:21,720 procedural, which honestly sounds a little boring, 477 00:17:21,720 --> 00:17:24,240 and it's becoming-- it's getting a little bit more 478 00:17:24,240 --> 00:17:26,220 of that Spielberg vibe into it. 479 00:17:26,220 --> 00:17:30,930 We're moving a little bit away from some of the darker Stephen 480 00:17:30,930 --> 00:17:35,070 King themes, which were in the original paragraph, 481 00:17:35,070 --> 00:17:36,930 and infusing them with a little bit more 482 00:17:36,930 --> 00:17:38,460 of that Spielberg vibe. 483 00:17:38,460 --> 00:17:40,330 The kids are becoming a bigger part of it. 484 00:17:40,330 --> 00:17:41,760 So the tone is evolving. 485 00:17:41,760 --> 00:17:44,290 And I remember, it's not written down in this document, 486 00:17:44,290 --> 00:17:45,550 but it's something that we talked about 487 00:17:45,550 --> 00:17:47,190 and why we were excited about the idea, 488 00:17:47,190 --> 00:17:49,110 is that it would allow us to explore 489 00:17:49,110 --> 00:17:50,730 a lot of different tones. 490 00:17:50,730 --> 00:17:53,910 It's why we had basically three generations. 491 00:17:53,910 --> 00:17:57,840 We had adults, we had teens, and we had kids. 492 00:17:57,840 --> 00:18:00,390 And each of them was going to be able to allow 493 00:18:00,388 --> 00:18:01,678 us to explore a different tone. 494 00:18:01,680 --> 00:18:03,570 It was something that excited us about TV. 495 00:18:03,570 --> 00:18:05,880 It's like, oh, we can have three different types of movies, 496 00:18:05,880 --> 00:18:07,670 four different types of movies, and kind of 497 00:18:07,672 --> 00:18:08,832 weave them together. 498 00:18:08,830 --> 00:18:10,770 And you can see in the document even, 499 00:18:10,770 --> 00:18:12,600 we do mention certain movies, whether it's 500 00:18:12,600 --> 00:18:15,090 the "Matrix" or a big one when we came up 501 00:18:15,090 --> 00:18:17,730 with the character of Eleven was "ET." 502 00:18:17,730 --> 00:18:21,610 When we write "ET," it brings up a lot of memories for us 503 00:18:21,610 --> 00:18:23,680 and it also brings a specific tone, 504 00:18:23,680 --> 00:18:25,860 which is a tone that you don't see a lot. 505 00:18:25,860 --> 00:18:28,170 And we got excited about, hey, I haven't 506 00:18:28,170 --> 00:18:30,870 seen this a lot in general and I certainly 507 00:18:30,870 --> 00:18:32,970 don't remember the last time I've seen it 508 00:18:32,970 --> 00:18:35,190 on TV, which is your telling something 509 00:18:35,190 --> 00:18:38,010 from the point of view of kids. 510 00:18:38,010 --> 00:18:41,580 But I remember being scared by it as a kid. 511 00:18:41,580 --> 00:18:42,690 Elliott got in danger. 512 00:18:42,690 --> 00:18:43,780 He got really sick. 513 00:18:43,780 --> 00:18:44,850 I was worried for ET. 514 00:18:44,850 --> 00:18:47,340 They find ET and he's dying. 515 00:18:47,340 --> 00:18:49,140 The stakes always felt real. 516 00:18:49,140 --> 00:18:51,050 And I think that was something we realized 517 00:18:51,053 --> 00:18:52,473 early on as we were brainstorming, 518 00:18:52,470 --> 00:18:54,930 this is, we can have fun with these kids, 519 00:18:54,930 --> 00:18:58,500 but at the heart of it, we've got this missing kid and we 520 00:18:58,500 --> 00:18:59,430 got real danger. 521 00:18:59,430 --> 00:19:01,800 And we wanted, even though the kids were young, 522 00:19:01,800 --> 00:19:03,540 we wanted to put them in real danger 523 00:19:03,540 --> 00:19:05,860 and we wanted the audience to feel worried for them. 524 00:19:05,860 --> 00:19:08,820 And I think that was an important part of the evolution 525 00:19:08,820 --> 00:19:10,080 of "Stranger Things." 526 00:19:10,080 --> 00:19:11,760 But I think the bigger point here 527 00:19:11,760 --> 00:19:14,520 is, you don't have to have the tone down. 528 00:19:14,520 --> 00:19:17,790 Let it-- you can discover it, it can change, and it can evolve. 529 00:19:17,790 --> 00:19:19,590 And you can even see in this stuff 530 00:19:19,590 --> 00:19:21,630 that we were reading to you that it was actually 531 00:19:21,630 --> 00:19:24,660 quite a bit more violent and dark than it ended up being. 532 00:19:24,660 --> 00:19:26,730 So we had Eleven exploding heads. 533 00:19:26,730 --> 00:19:29,580 So we do have her killing agents, 534 00:19:29,580 --> 00:19:31,980 but we don't have the Cronenberg scanners thing 535 00:19:31,980 --> 00:19:33,510 where heads are exploding. 536 00:19:33,510 --> 00:19:35,220 I mean, in our heads, initially this 537 00:19:35,220 --> 00:19:36,750 was going to be extremely gory. 538 00:19:36,750 --> 00:19:39,360 So that ended up kind of going away. 539 00:19:39,360 --> 00:19:41,280 So be patient, allow it to evolve, 540 00:19:41,280 --> 00:19:43,950 and be open to the tone shifting and evolving 541 00:19:43,950 --> 00:19:46,980 as you continue to blue-sky and brainstorm. 542 00:19:46,980 --> 00:19:49,800 There are a lot of tones going within "Stranger Things," 543 00:19:49,800 --> 00:19:52,980 but the tone that we are hoping holds all this together 544 00:19:52,980 --> 00:19:54,660 and holds all these different threads 545 00:19:54,660 --> 00:19:56,190 and different story strands together 546 00:19:56,190 --> 00:19:58,110 is a sense of sincerity. 547 00:19:58,110 --> 00:20:01,140 That's the stories that matter and I fell in love with, 548 00:20:01,140 --> 00:20:06,540 whether it was "ET," or "The Goonies," or any of these films 549 00:20:06,540 --> 00:20:09,210 that made us want to make films in the first place. 550 00:20:09,210 --> 00:20:13,200 If there's a joke, it's out of a result of the situation, 551 00:20:13,200 --> 00:20:16,440 but the stakes are still real, and the friendships are still 552 00:20:16,440 --> 00:20:18,600 real, and we're not making light of anything. 553 00:20:18,600 --> 00:20:21,150 We wanted to put a lot of heart into it. 554 00:20:21,150 --> 00:20:24,240 It really is about friendships, and it's about family, 555 00:20:24,240 --> 00:20:25,830 and not to be embarrassed by that. 556 00:20:25,830 --> 00:20:26,910 To actually embrace that. 557 00:20:26,910 --> 00:20:27,510 It's not-- right. 558 00:20:27,510 --> 00:20:28,770 It's not-- it's not ironic. 559 00:20:28,770 --> 00:20:30,650 We never wanted to be ironic, or meta, 560 00:20:30,647 --> 00:20:32,727 or winking at the audience, or anything like that. 561 00:20:32,730 --> 00:20:35,340 So even though you have all these disparate tones, 562 00:20:35,340 --> 00:20:39,240 in terms of horror, and comedy, and romance, and all of that, 563 00:20:39,240 --> 00:20:41,630 you have something that kind of ties it all together. 564 00:20:41,625 --> 00:20:43,505 So it doesn't feel like a mishmash of things. 565 00:20:43,500 --> 00:20:44,370 It all coheres. 566 00:20:44,370 --> 00:20:47,710 [MUSIC PLAYING] 567 00:20:50,767 --> 00:20:53,097 So now what you're going to do is you're going to take 568 00:20:53,100 --> 00:20:55,140 your big idea and you're going to blue-sky it, 569 00:20:55,138 --> 00:20:57,178 which means you're going to come up, like we did, 570 00:20:57,180 --> 00:21:01,360 a bunch of ideas, almost stream of consciousness that this idea 571 00:21:01,360 --> 00:21:01,860 gives you. 572 00:21:01,860 --> 00:21:03,850 Hopefully it's going to open a lot of doors. 573 00:21:03,850 --> 00:21:06,410 And so you're going to just keep opening those doors wherever 574 00:21:06,407 --> 00:21:06,987 they take you. 575 00:21:06,990 --> 00:21:10,410 Whether it's about setting, or character, or plot, 576 00:21:10,410 --> 00:21:11,820 or mythology. 577 00:21:11,820 --> 00:21:13,950 Just whatever doors open, just follow 578 00:21:13,950 --> 00:21:17,930 the stream of consciousness and just get it all down on paper.