The title “Stranger Things” may perfectly fit the bizarre supernatural events unfolding in Hawkins, Indiana, but one star was not a fan of it.
David Harbour, who played Jim Hopper in all five seasons of “Stranger Things,” spoke about his initial disdain for the title and revealed the name he wished creators Matt and Ross Duffer had kept. “I hated it,” he told radio host Zach Gelb in 2025. “It was called ‘Montauk’ originally … and I loved that title. I just think that title’s so strong when you turn on the TV, it’s like ‘Montauk’ comes at you. And then it was like ‘Stranger Things.’ There was something about it that felt like, ‘Well, stranger things have happened.’ I don’t know, it just felt cheesy or something.”
During a live appearance on the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast, the Duffer Brothers recalled Harbour passionately opposing the title during the show’s early development. “At some point I should just publish this email from him,” Matt said. “We didn’t know him very well, we had one meeting with him. We just cast him in the show, and then I got the longest email about how awful the new title is.”
How Stranger Things got its title
Originally set in the real town of Montauk, New York, and based on the conspiracy theory known as the Montauk Project, the plot of “Stranger Things” underwent numerous changes before Season 1 premiered on Netflix in 2016. In the same interview, Matt and Ross Duffer explained how they went from “Montauk” to “Stranger Things” while trying to figure out the sci-fi horror show’s identity.
“We had lived with [the title ‘Montauk’] for over a year, and that’s what David and everyone signed up for,” Ross said. “It was just very hard to wrap our heads around what to call the show.”
Matt then shared that their title dilemma dragged on long enough for Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos to get involved. “Ted Sarandos got so fed up with us not settling on a title that … he gave us two weeks,” Matt remembered. “He was like, ‘By the end of that day on Friday you’ve got to give me a title,’ and he’s like, ‘You’ll get used to it, I promise.’ And we gave him ‘Stranger Things.'”
