'Stranger Things' to end with fifth season on Netflix

Los Angeles: Netflix's smash hit sci-fi drama series "Stranger Things" will conclude with its fifth season, the show's creators Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer have announced.

The creators penned an open letter to the ardent fans and followers of the series and also revealed that the upcoming fourth season has been divided into two parts.

The first part will drop on the streaming platform on May 27, followed by the second part which will debut on July 1.

"Seven years ago, we planned out the complete story arc for ‘Stranger Things'. At the time, we predicted the story would last four to five seasons. It proved too large to tell in four, but Â- as you'll soon see for yourselves Â- we are now hurtling toward our finale. Season four will be the penultimate season; season five will be the last," The Duffer Brothers wrote in the letter, which was shared on the show's official Twitter handle.

"There are still many more exciting stories to tell within the world of ‘Stranger Things'; new mysteries, new adventures, new unexpected heroes. But first we hope that you stay with us as we finish this tale of a powerful girl named Eleven and her brave friends, of a broken police chief and a ferocious mom, of a small town called Hawkins and an alternate dimension known only as the Upside Down," they added.

The creators said they are grateful to fans and followers for their "patience and support" all this while.

Talking about the fourth season, Matt and Ross Duffer said it was the "most challenging" of all.

"It's been a little while. With nine scripts, over eight-hundred pages, almost two years of filming, thousands of visual effects shots and a runtime nearly twice the length of any previous season, 'Stranger Things' 4 was the most challenging season yet, but also the most rewarding one," they said.

"Stranger Things" is set in the 1980s and takes a look at the fictional town of Hawkins, Indiana, where a secret government lab accidentally opens a door to another dimension referred to as the Upside Down.

The show features Winona Ryder, Finn Wolfhard, Noah Schnapp, Millie Bobby Brown, David Harbour, Caleb McLaughlin, Gaten Matarazzo, Natalia Dyer, Charlie Heaton, Joe Keery and others.

The new season is set six months after season three's Battle of Starcourt, which brought terror and destruction to Hawkins.

"Struggling with the aftermath, our group of friends are separated for the first time – and navigating the complexities of high school hasn't made things any easier. In this most vulnerable time, a new and horrifying supernatural threat surfaces, presenting a gruesome mystery that, if solved, might finally put an end to the horrors of the Upside Down," the official plotline reads.

In 2020, the streamer had confirmed that Harbour's Jim Hopper will return for the fourth season after the character had seemingly died towards the end of the third season, which premiered in July 2019.

New cast members for season four include Jamie Campbell Bower, Eduardo Franco, Joseph Quinn, Robert Englund, Amybeth McNulty, Myles Truitt, Regina Ting Chen and Grace Van Dien.