The Boy Who Lived is the parallel its creators are using to explain the way they see Mike and the other kids’ stories developing. "We’ve been talking about Harry Potter, even though it's weird to compare,” co-creator Matt Duffer tells Empire. "I like that you're revisiting these kids and watching them grow up on a year-to-year basis.”
Expect the story to pick up right where the first instalment left off. “If Netflix want to do [another run], Season 2 would function almost more like a sequel than it would ‘Season 2’. We're leaving that door open if people like the show."
Warning: mild Season 1 spoilers follow
The first season wrapped itself relatively neatly, with only a thread or two left untied ("We didn't want to do The Killing or the Homeland thing where you stretch one storyline out,” stresses Matt Duffer), but the town of Hawkins, Indiana has many secrets yet to spill. "There’s a mythology in terms of the evil that’s happening in the town that we dip our toes into this season,” expands Duffer, "but it isn’t actually explored: it’s only scratching the surface of what this thing is.”
"Without giving anything away, when you open the door to alternate dimensions, there’s a lot you can do. We’re not really boxed in!"
In other words, if the second season gets the go-ahead, we're all set to find out much more about how that so-called Department of Energy programme came into being, the provenance of the Upside Down, and what made that demogorgon so cranky in the first place.
For much more on the show, read Empire’s full interview with creators Matt and Ross Duffer. Stranger Things is on Netflix now.