What happened to Vecna in ‘Stranger Things’ season 4? Vecna’s fate explained

The following article contains spoilers for the fourth season of Stranger Things.

The fourth season of Stranger Things managed to successfully hype fans up for the fifth and final season of the series, bringing all our favorite characters back to Hawkins for one last fight. Season four also introduced fans to one of the best characters in the series: Vecna. 

Vecna, played by Jamie Campbell Power, was the main villain of the fourth season of Netflix’s hit series. Using his supernatural powers from his haven in the Upside Down, Vecna murdered a few of the Hawkins teens in a bid to create new gateways and merge the Upside Down with Hawkins. Unfortunately for Vecna, Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) and her friends manage to throw a spanner in his plan, rebuffing him for the time being. But what happened to Vecna while he was enacting his plan?

What happened to Vecna in Stranger Things season four?

We know through flashbacks throughout season four of Strangers Things that Eleven was the reason Vecna exists. Originally known as Henry Creel, Vecna was a peculiar boy who drew pictures of the Mind Flayer, just like Will (Noah Schnapp). Young Henry found himself disinterested in life after discovering his powers and turned on his family. After he killed his mother and sister, Henry was taken away to Hawkins Laboratory where Dr. Brenner (Matthew Modine) experimented on him. 

During his time at Hawkins Laboratory, Dr. Brenner came to mistrust Henry and his abilities, implanting a device in him that greatly reduced his powers. Henry lived at the lab for years where he was an orderly of sorts. It wasn’t until he befriended Eleven – who was being bullied by other children in the lab – that he managed to get rid of the inhibitor, unlocking the full potential of powers once more. 

Henry proceeded to go on a rampage and massacred the doctors, security, and the children in Hawkins lab. Eleven, enraged at the children’s death and that she was being manipulated into giving Henry back his powers, used her own powers to their fullest potential and opened a door to the Upside Down for the first time, sending Henry through. It was in the brutal environment of the Upside Down where Henry transformed into Vecna. 

Does Vecna die in Stranger Things season four? 

After it was revealed that Vecna was really Henry Creel – also known as “Number One” since he was the first experiment at Hawkins Laboratory – the Hawkins kids knew they would have trouble going up against him, especially without Eleven or her powers. Eleven would come through in the end, piggybacking off of Max’s (Sadie Sink) memories to try and defeat her adversory, but Vecna managed to overpower Eleven, bringing her to the Creel house in the Upside Down where Vecna forced Eleven to watch on as he killed Max. At this point, Vecna revealed that he was behind every monster that came from the Upside Down. 

Mike (Finn Wolfhard) inspired Eleven to fight back and she managed to defeat Vecna. Unfortunately for everyone involved, Vecna may have lost the battle but won the war, as he merged Hawkins with the Upside Down, tearing Hawkins apart in the process. Vecna, however, was seemingly far from gone. Based on the goosebumps traveling up the back of Will’s neck at the end of season four, there is no way that Vecna won’t turn up in the fifth season of Stranger Things. 

When Vecna does return, will he be joined by an army of monsters from the Upside Down? Or now that Hawkins and the Upside Down have merged, will Demodogs be roaming the streets of Hawkins? It does seem that Vecna is intended to be the overall villain of Stranger Things, unless some other creature was manipulating him all along.

We’ll know exactly what happened to Vecna at the end of season four when the fifth and final season of Stranger Things is released. As of writing we only have a vague idea of when that might be, for while the Duffer Brothers have said that the gap between seasons four and five will be smaller than the gap between seasons three and four, they have yet to begin writing the fifth season. Regardless, we will most likely get a fantastic send-off for Stranger Things, whenever the final season does release. 

Seasons one to four of Stranger Things is available to stream on Netflix.