From Hawkins Lab to the Scoops Ahoy ice cream parlour, Stranger Things viewers are looking up how to visit fictional places from the show.
The Netflix drama may have ended, but fans seem to be hoping to find ways to relive the series in person. Stream figures for songs included in the finale, like Prince’s ‘Purple Rain’ and ‘When Doves Cry’, David Bowie’s ‘Heroes’ and ‘The Trooper’ by Iron Maiden have all shot up in recent weeks, but that’s not all. According to new data from Yas Island, there were 1.8million UK Google searches for Stranger Things itself over the past week.
Meanwhile, searches for “Hawkins Lab” and “Hawkins Lab real life” are up 89 per cent from the previous month and up 154 per cent in the past week, respectively. And, in the past month, there were 11,000 searches for “Scoops Ahoy”, up a huge 1443 per cent.
While places like Hawkins Lab and Scoops Ahoy don’t exist – and nor does the town of Hawkins, Indiana itself – most of the series was filmed in and around Atlanta, Georgia. Filming of Starcourt Mall scenes, the shopping centre in which Scoops Ahoy was located, took place in Gwinnett Place Mall, 30 miles northeast of the city.
Hawkins Lab scenes, meanwhile, were filmed at the Emory University Briarcliff Campus in Atlanta, using buildings that were formerly part of the Georgia Mental Health Institute.
Scenes from the small town of Hawkins were filmed in the town of Jackson, about 50 miles away from Atlanta. Residents have embraced the showbiz connection, offering tours to give fans the chance to see locations including Hawkins Public Library, Melvald’s General Store and the Hawk Theater.
Stranger Things’ final episode aired on December 31, over nine years after the first season premiered. The two-hour finale saw the group of friends come together one last time to defeat Vecna, and it was praised by critics but proved controversial with fans. Some were disappointed that the fate of Millie Bobby Brown’s character Eleven was left ambiguous, while others subscribed to the now-debunked Conformity Gate theory, speculating that a surprise extra final episode was in the works.
But for fans determined to keep getting their Stranger Things fix, there’s been talk of a live-action spinoff. It’s been reported to be in development since 2023, Finn Wolfhard comparing it last year to David Lynch’s Twin Peaks. Co-creator Ross Duffer told The Hollywood Reporter more recently that they were “very early days on a live-action spinoff”, but confirmed that it wouldn’t involve the characters from the main show.
The series’ actors have been busy since it ended, too. Djo – aka Joe Keery – topped the UK Singles Chart with his single ‘End Of Beginning’ earlier this month, two years after it first appeared on the chart, while he was also in the news for calling out US president Donald Trump and the country’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE).
Last weekend (January 17), Wolfhard hosted Saturday Night Live, and was crashed by costars Gaten Matarazzo and Caleb McLaughlin during his monologue, while the trio also featured in a sketch together.