Stranger Things began as a love letter to the 1980s. Fashions, trends, and needle drops are all pulled from the era, while the story itself referenced coming-of-age adventures like The Goonies and creepy classics like Stephen King’s novels. Perhaps the single biggest influence on Stranger Things, however, is Dungeons and Dragons.
While its monstrous villains often look and act differently than D&D monsters, the Hawkins kids love to dub their foes with familiar names — the Demogorgon, the Mind Flayer, and Vecna are all major Stranger Things baddies that share names with Dungeons and Dragons monsters. Now, as the series moves into its fifth and final season, it looks like one more borrowed villain will appear, and it poses a whole new threat to the Hawkins gang.
Netflix recently released a video for Stranger Things Day (November 6, the day Will Byers went missing all the way back in Season 1) that reveals the titles of this last batch of episodes. Some are just inverted versions of Season 1 titles; “The Rightside Up” is a reference to Season 1’s finale, “The Upside Down,” while another episode called “The Vanishing of [a name that’s been blurred out]” is a reference to the first-ever episode of the series, “The Vanishing of Will Byers.”
But one episode title, “Escape from Camazotz,” references something completely new. Camazotz, much like the Demogorgon, is a name that comes from both mythology and D&D. It’s a deity in the game, while in Maya mythology, Camazotz is the term for bat-like creatures who serve the underworld. This could be the term given to the “demobats” that swarmed Eddie Munson in his final moments in Season 4.
However, there’s another possible explanation for this term. “Camazotz” is also the name of the planet where much of the classic sci-fi novel A Wrinkle in Time takes place. It’s a strange, dark planet where protagonist Meg’s father is trapped, a place controlled by a malevolent figure known as IT. That may sound like it comes from out of left field, but the book cover appeared in a behind-the-scenes photo dump from Stranger Things co-creator Ross Duffer on Instagram, so it seems safe to assume that A Wrinkle in Time will have at least some influence on Season 5.
As a title, “Escape from Camazotz” makes it sound more like a location than a swarm of demon bats, but given Stranger Things’ wide-ranging influences, either explanation would make sense. It’s just a matter of what will win out in the end: the love letter to D&D or the love letter to classic sci-fi.
