It’s official: the kids who once rode BMX bikes through the sleepy streets of Hawkins, Indiana, screaming about Demogorgons and Christmas lights, are no longer kids. When Stranger Things Season 5 finally lands on Netflix in late 2025, the core cast that stole our hearts back in 2016 will be full-blown adults (some pushing 25), towering over their old props, sporting jawlines sharp enough to cut Eggo waffles, and delivering performances that make the early seasons feel like a lifetime ago.
Let that sink in: Eleven, Mike, Dustin, Lucas, Will, and Max started this journey as awkward 12- and 13-year-olds with bowl cuts and missing teeth. Nine years, four seasons, and one global pandemic later, they’re closing out the biggest horror-sci-fi saga of the streaming era as legitimate grown-ups. And the newly released behind-the-scenes photos from the Season 5 table read and set leaks? They’re breaking the internet for a reason.
Millie Bobby Brown (Eleven) is now 21, engaged to Jake Bongiovi, and fresh off starring in two Enola Holmes movies and a blockbuster fantasy epic. In the latest shots, she’s all cheekbones and quiet intensity, her buzzcut long gone, replaced by a sleek, shoulder-length look that screams “final girl who’s ready to end this.” The shy British kid who barely spoke in Season 1 interviews? She’s now the de facto leader of the pack, casually dropping spoilers in Vogue while sipping iced coffee like it’s no big deal.
Finn Wolfhard (Mike Wheeler) just turned 22 the week these photos dropped, and sweet Jesus, the glow-up is criminal. The bowl-cut babyface that launched a thousand Tumblr edits is now 6 feet tall, sporting stubble, a deep voice that could narrate audiobooks, and a mullet that somehow works. He’s directed short films, fronted a band, and starred in Ghostbusters: Afterlife. The boy who used to hide behind his bike is now leaning against the iconic Wheeler basement wall looking like he pays taxes.
Gaten Matarazzo (Dustin Henderson) is 23 and built like he’s been secretly bench-pressing the Demogorgon between takes. The curly-haired, toothless grin that made him America’s little brother is now framed by a full beard and a chest that has Twitter captioning every photo “Henderson hit the gym and the Upside Down is scared.” He’s on Broadway when he’s not filming, married his high school sweetheart, and still does that perfect Dustin scream — only now it comes from a man who could legally rent a car without a surcharge.
Caleb McLaughlin (Lucas Sinclair) turned 24 in October and has quietly become the most unfairly attractive human on the planet. From the wide-eyed kid protecting his friends with a wrist rocket to a 6’1” leading man who walks onto set looking like he just stepped off the cover of GQ. The Season 5 photos of him in character — still rocking the camouflage bandana — next to a picture of 13-year-old Caleb from Season 1 are being used as evidence that time is fake.
Noah Schnapp (Will Byers), now 21, has grown into the role in ways that feel almost poetic. The terrified boy crying in the Upside Down in 2016 is now tall, soft-spoken, openly queer, and carrying the emotional weight of the entire series on his (very adult) shoulders. Set leaks show him filming what looks like a major Vecna confrontation, and the intensity in his eyes is chilling. He’s studying at UPenn when he’s not saving (or dooming) the world.
Then there’s Sadie Sink (Max Mayfield), 23, who went from “new girl” in Season 2 to the undisputed queen of the show. The floating scene in “Dear Billy” is already legendary, but Season 5 photos of her in the red jacket, older, hardened, and staring down something unspeakable, have fans convinced she’s about to deliver an Emmy-reel monologue that will ruin us all. She’s got The Whale and an upcoming Taylor Swift-directed film on her résumé — Max isn’t just surviving anymore; she’s thriving.
Even the “older teens” are ancient now. Natalia Dyer (Nancy) is 30, Charlie Heaton (Jonathan) is 31, and Joe Keery (Steve Harrington) is 33 and still getting called “babysitter” while looking like a rockstar who accidentally wandered into a monster fight. Maya Hawke (Robin) joined at 26 and is somehow now one of the youngest adults on set.
The Duffer Brothers knew this was coming — they famously shut down production for almost a year during the 2023 strikes partly to let the cast age into the story. Season 5 jumps forward in time (rumored to late 1988 or early 1989), so the “kids” being in their early 20s actually fits. But nothing prepares you for seeing Dustin with a five-o’clock shadow holding the same Cerberus Assembly hat, or Eleven in a flannel shirt that no longer looks like she stole it from Hopper’s closet because it actually fits.
The nostalgia punch is brutal. Side-by-side comparisons are everywhere: Mike’s Season 1 bike next to Finn leaning against a muscle car. Will’s bowl cut next to Noah’s tousled adult hair. Max on a skateboard next to Sadie striding across the Creel house attic like she owns it. The internet is flooded with captions like “I blinked and my children got mortgages” and “We grew up with them and now they’re leaving us.”
Season 5 isn’t just the end of Stranger Things — it’s the end of an era where we watched actual children become legends in real time. When the final episodes drop (reportedly split into two volumes, summer and fall 2025), we won’t just be saying goodbye to Hawkins. We’ll be saying goodbye to the last remnants of the kids we met in 2016.
They started as scared middle-schoolers fighting monsters with fireworks and bear traps. They’re ending it as adults ready to burn the Upside Down to the ground.
