As we’ve still got a few weeks to go until Stranger Things 4 concludes with two more feature-length episodes, fans are keeping themselves occupied by analyzing the first seven chapters of season four that premiered last month. Thankfully, there’s a lot for them to work with as this mammoth-sized season is stuffed full of easter eggs, foreshadowing, and more, much of which we’re still trying to decipher the true meaning of.
For instance, fans think they may have just uncovered a major twist when it comes to Vecna’s attacks on the teens of Hawkins. As Twitter fan account @StrangerNews11 pointed out, if you look very closely during her scenes, you can see that Hawkins High guidance counselor Mrs. Kelley (Regina Ting Chen) wears a clock-themed necklace, which brings to mind the Creel house grandfather clock. So is there a secret connection between Mrs. Kelley and Vecna that we hadn’t considered before?
This sly detail may well start theories that Mrs. Kelley is really some kind of accomplice for Vecna, who we know is actually Henry Creel aka One, and is using her position as guidance counselor to somehow prepare or even select his victims for him. It’s worth clarifying, though, that the above tweet is somewhat incorrect in its statement. While Chrissy, Fred, and Max did see Mrs. Kelley, as far as we know neither Patrick or Nancy did, so she doesn’t necessarily have a link to all those Vecna has targeted.
It’s completely possible, then, that Mrs. Kelley’s clock necklace was a purely decorative easter egg. Maybe it was done as a way to hint at how the kids can’t escape their nightmares even in the real world, even when in a supposedly safe place, like a session with a guidance counselor. Alternatively, Mrs. Kelley has a dark secret that’s about to come out in the season’s grand conclusion.
We’ll find out when Stranger 4 volume two debuts on Netflix this July 1.