After the drop of the “Stranger Things” season five finale on New Year’s Eve, many fans felt unsatisfied with the way their decade-long favorite show came to an end. So much so that many came up with an alternate theory: Conformity Gate. 

Conformity Gate is a theory that predicts that the finale, which played on Netflix and in theaters, was not real. Instead, it was the teleoptic villain of the show, Vecna, who was controlling what lead character Mike Wheeler saw, making Mike an unreliable narrator. Mike Wheeler is one of the main characters who was involved in almost every moment of the finale episode.

The theory quickly spread, and fans started to analyze scenes frame by frame to find what they thought were hidden clues. People analyzed everything, from the characters’ posture to the color of their graduation gowns.

As the theory spread, it became clear that it was more than a few disappointed fans who believed it. Videos predicting the secret ninth episode got millions of views, and people became certain that Netflix was going to release something.  Millions began believing that a secret episode would drop on Netflix on January 7th, revealing that the whole finale was all a big lie. 

The excitement for the ninth episode gave disappointed fans something to look forward to, which changed fans’ reactions from frustration into hope that the show was not actually over. 

Even with the lack of actual evidence, some were still very adamant about the drop of the secret episode. People threw parties and stayed up until the middle of the night, awaiting the drop of the episode. 

However, as January 7 came to an end, it became obvious that no new episode was about to drop or even existed. Although the Duffer brothers, who created the show, were hinting that there was going to be more footage dropping on January 12, they confirmed that it was going to be a documentary on the making of the season and that Conformity Gate was, in fact, not happening. 

Some fans refused to accept these explanations, which shows how hard it is for audiences to let go of long-running shows, especially shows like “Stranger Things,” which was first released in 2016 and continued for almost a decade until 2025.

Instead of releasing a new episode, they released a behind-the-scenes documentary about the filming of the final “Stranger Things” season. After watching the documentary, fans realized that the small mistakes that were mistaken as clues in the finale were actually just a result of bad writing.

For a lot of people, believing in Conformity Gate is less about actually believing there is a hidden episode and more about coping with the show finally ending. So, are people becoming more delusional, or are they just struggling to say goodbye?