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The Pop Culture Flayer: Iron Maiden, David Bowie + Prince Shine In Stranger Things Finale
- Tiana Speter
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
Whether you loved it, hated it, obsessed over it or just felt mild ambivalence, it was hard to avoid the fact that Netflix's monster breakout series Stranger Things came to a close after almost a decade as revellers rang in the 2026 new year (FYI, there are some minor spoilers ahead here, so don't read on unless you've watched season five. Or do it anyway. I'm not your mum).
With its fifth and final season dropping in three parts throughout December (and us Aussies getting the final 2 hours and a bit episode on New Year's Day), Stranger Things had a heck of a lotta storyline to cover, even with the girthy runtimes of the concluding season. A series shrouded in nostalgic pop culture nods and year-appropriate musical cues, the true might of the Stranger Things soundtrack wasn't just in its time capsule-esque sonic selections; it also proved to be a catapult for a heap of 80s songs, not just skyrocketing them back into relevance but also seismically onto the charts and the record books.
An early highlight from season one was The Clash's Should I Stay or Should I Go, with the track linked to Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) and brother Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), also mirroring the early peril Will faced from day one. But it would ultimately be in 2022 when season four dropped that the use of music in Stranger Things took on an entirely new form, with Kate Bush's 1985 single Running Up That Hill exploding from a recurring leitmotif for character Max Mayfield (Sadie Sink) into becoming the most streamed song on Spotify in several countries, taking out the #1 spot in multiple countries significantly decades after its original release, including Australia, hitting over a billion streams, and reaching an entirely new audience in the process (many of whom wouldn't have even been alive when song was originally was released). Season four also saw Metallica's Master of Puppets hit the Billboard Hot 100 for the first time since it was released three decades prior, courtesy of an unforgettable guitar solo delivered by Eddie Munson amid a battle of good and evil.
If you're a metal fan and watched the show the entire way, the sight of character Eddie Munson (Joseph Quinn) in season four clutching an Iron Maiden Piece of Mind cassette and bellowing "THIS IS MUSIC" did not go unnoticed (Eddie holding Eddie, no notes Duffer Brothers). And Eddie of the Iron Maiden variety did get an actual memorable moment in the closing moments of the series, with Iron Maiden's The Trooper blasting out after Dustin Henderson (Gaten Matarazzo) went from valedictorian to Hellfire bad boy at the core group's graduation ceremony towards the end of season five, episode eight The Rightside Up. And Iron Maiden themselves commemorated the moment on their socials, writing in a caption: "Stranger Things HAS happened...and Eddie got his moment!"
While it's too early to tell how significantly Stranger Things may have impacted Iron Maiden's chart standings and/or popularity (The Trooper was already the band's most popular song on streaming pre-series), the inclusion of Prince's Purple Rain and When Doves Cry saw both songs more than double their streaming numbers on Spotify alone post-finale, with Variety reporting last week that Purple Rain saw a 243% increase on Spotify streams, and When Doves Cry snagging a 200% increase on Spotify streams. Notably, these two songs are a rarity when it comes to TV or movie syncs, so undoubtedly a heap of younger fans have been gifted the magic of Prince for the first time ever. And also it would be remiss of me not to shout out a long-time 80s favourite of mine that also copped an earlier feature in season five: Tiffany's cover of I Think We're Alone Now, released by the mononymous Tiffany in 1987 at the age of 15, and a track that returned to the charts this year for the first time since 1988.
But as for the final, final musical end boss for the show? It was in fact a song that had featured more than once earlier in the series. Previously using Peter Gabriel's cover of David Bowie's stunning 1977 track Heroes in season one and season three of Stranger Things, it was Bowie's own original that took centre stage as the credits rolled for the last time. And it was Steve "The Hair" Harrington (Joe Keery) who we can thank for that fact.
“It was actually Joe Keery who suggested that we do the Bowie version,” Ross Duffer told Netflix's Tudum. “Once Joe said that, we immediately knew that was the right song to end the show on because it is, in some ways, an anthem for Stranger Things. To use the original Bowie version just felt fitting for the conclusion.”
BY TIANA SPETER
