The creative team behind the latest installments of Stranger Things appears to have gotten some of their Hawkins facts upside down. Shortly after the first part of Stranger Things‘ fifth and final season hit Netflix last week, several fans noticed that a few details from the show appeared to have changed from previous episodes, specifically several tidbits surrounding Will Byers’ younger years.

A line in which Winona Ryder’s Joyce Byers says that her son disappeared at age 11 contrasts with a missing poster that listed him as being 12 years old at the time of his abduction. Viewers also pointed out other discrepancies surrounding the construction of Casa Byers, as described by Will’s older brother Jonathan back in Season 2, per Entertainment Weekly.

“We stayed up all night building Castle Byers, just the way you drew it,” Will, played by Charlie Heaton, recalled in “Chapter Eight: The Mind Flayer.” “It took so long because you were so bad at hammering. You’d miss the nail every time. And then it started raining, but we stayed out there anyway. We were both sick for like a week after that. But we just had to finish it, didn’t we? We just had to.”

Eight years later, Jonathan’s story of sibling bonding appears to have become moot. “Sorcerer,” the fourth episode of Season 5, features a flashback of the pair crafting Castle Byers not in pouring rain, but on what appears to be a sunny autumn afternoon. It’s an inconsistency that did not go unnoticed by some of the show’s most dedicated fans.

“Inconsistencies are kinda driving me crazy ngl,” one viewer wrote of these two mishaps in a post recently shared to X. “First, Joyce saying Will was 11 when he was taken when he was actually 12, and him remembering the building of Castle Byers with Jonathan during a clear day.”

“Jonathan once said that when he and Will built Castle Byers, it was pouring rain and they both got so soaked they ended up sick for a whole week,” observed another fan, noting that the brothers had originally built the fort when their father left their family. “It also makes no sense for them to act so normal when it’s literally the day their father left the house.”

The Stranger Things continuity errors, for some particularly cynical viewers, are more than just annoying but potential harbingers of future disappointment. The errors have sparked concerns that the series’ final episodes may contain even more mistakes.

“The reason this concerns me is because I don’t want Stranger Things to end up like Game of Thrones and many others,” one fan explained in a Reddit post, citing several other mishaps, including errors in Holly’s age, changes to Vecna’s backstory, and the general energy of Hawkins surrounding the show’s Season 4 finale. “The ending needs to be near-perfect if not perfect,” they added. “If there are so many continuity problems now, imagine how many more there could be as we move towards Vol. 2 and the finale?”

The Duffer Brothers Previously Sparked Anger With 2022’s ‘Birthdaygate’ Error

Image via Netflix

This isn’t the only time Stranger Things‘ team has found themselves in hot water over seemingly small mistakes, the outlet added. Back in 2022, the Duffer brothers issued an apology for a controversial error dubbed “birthdaygate.” That controversy came from the Season 4 episode “Vecna’s Curse,” which took place on March 22, previously revealed as Will’s birthday. That fact is never acknowledged anywhere in the installment, implying the youngest Byers brother’s special day was promptly ignored by his loved ones.

“That would mean his mom forgot his birthday! It’s too mean,” Ross Duffer told Variety of the error shortly after the season premiere. “It was obviously a mistake, and we’re sorry. We apologize to the fans.”

Volume Two of Stranger Things‘ fifth season is slated to hit Netflix on December 25. The series’ finale will be released on December 31.