Cody
The following contains some Stranger Things SPOILERS.
In the summer of 2016, the first season of Stranger Things came along and blew me away with its fun, likeable characters and glorious ‘80s throwback sci-fi horror vibes. I enjoyed revisiting the characters and their twisted version of the ‘80s with the release of every new season… and now, the fifth and final season has come and gone. As with pretty much everything these days, the last episodes of the show were met with complaints and conspiracy theories online, but I found the finale to be a satisfactory conclusion. In the end, I’m only left with one troubling question lingering in my mind: what the hell happened to Dr. Sam Owens?
Played by Paul Reiser, Owens was introduced in the second season of the show. He was assigned to clean up the mess that the experiments conducted at Hawkins Laboratory had caused in the town of Hawkins, Indiana – and, unlike his predecessor at the lab, he was actually a good guy who was empathetic to the locals. He tried to help the traumatized Will, he kept an eye on the gate to the Upside Down, and he made sure that Hopper was able to adopt Eleven. In a standout sequence, he guided the ill-fated Bob Newby through a building populated with demo-dogs – and it’s not his fault that Bob chose to stop running before he was safely out the front door!
When Russians opened another gate to the Upside Down in Hawkins during season 3, it was again Owens who was called in to deal with the issue. When Eleven needed to regain her lost powers so she could face off with Vecna in season 4, who was there for her? Owens! Along with her “Papa” Martin Brenner, he gave her the boost she needed – and when Brenner’s true, domineering colors started to come through, it was Owens who stood up for Eleven and told “Papa” that the girl should be allowed to make her own decisions.
This is when things get murky. Throughout season 4, Eleven is being pursued by the U.S. military, represented by Lt. Colonel Jack Sullivan. Soldiers raid the desert base where Owens and Brenner are working with Eleven and massacre the staff. Brenner is killed. The last time we see Owens, he has been beaten and handcuffed. His fate was left up in the air – and season 5 never bothered to tell us what happened to him!
Sullivan is still present and being a jackass in the final season, hanging out with the unscrupulous Dr. Kay in Hawkins and the Upside Down, but Owens is never once directly referenced by the heroes or the villains. There’s one line about a bunch of innocent doctors being massacred in the desert, but we’re never told for sure if Owens was imprisoned, freed, or executed.
As episode after episode of season 5 went by with no mention of Owens, I found it more and more troubling that we never found out what happened to him. We know Sullivan was a bad guy who would kill without hesitation, but was he evil enough to execute Owens after he had him down and handcuffed? Stranger Things creators The Duffer Brothers decided we didn’t need to know. At least Sullivan gets some degree of comeuppance in season 5, even if Kay gets away with more than she should have.
Of course, there are spin-offs in the works that could answer the question of what happened to Owens. We won’t find out from the animated series Stranger Things: Tales from ‘85, since that takes place between the second and third seasons, but I have my fingers crossed for the spin-off that the Duffers have described as being “a completely different story and a completely different location with completely different actors and characters.” Maybe Owens could make it onto the show through a supporting character loophole. Or maybe he’ll pop up in some other story down the line. I hope he will.
Whatever the case, Owens was a good guy who deserved better than having his existence ignored in the final season of Stranger Things.
