Stranger Things: The True Crime Story Behind This Fan-Favorite Character
Stranger Things season 4 is arguably the best yet, largely thanks to the introduction of fan-favorite Eddie «the freak» Munson (Joseph Quinn), Hawkins High's resident metalhead and leader of the Dungeons & Dragons club, Hellfire. Eddie stole viewers' hearts back in May when he took Hellfire Club members Mike (Finn Wolfhard) and Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo) under his wing, and endeavored to help cheerleader Chrissy Cunningham (Grave Van Dien) after she became Vecna's (Jamie Campbell Bower) newest target.
But it wasn't just his kindness that drew viewers to him. Eddie's story — the misunderstood outcast falsely accused of murder — shook people to the core, earning sympathy all round. And if his fate wasn't sad enough, the true crime story behind his character is nothing short of heartbreaking.
Stranger Things: Best Eddie Munson Quotes
The Duffer Brothers wear their inspirations on their sleeves with Stranger Things, and revealed in an interview Deadline that ex-death row inmate turned writer Damien Echols largely inspired Eddie's character:
«We wanted to explore the idea of “satanic panic” because we have our kids playing Dungeons & Dragons. It was just this fascinating period that seems ridiculous now looking back, but it was very serious at the time [...] When you talk about satanic panic, Damien Echols was not 80s, but we thought he was caught up in something very similar, this mass hysteria.»
The author of the New York Times bestseller Life After Death, Damien Echols, is best known in the true-crime community as one of the West Memphis Three who, in 1994, were wrongfully convicted of murdering three boys in West Memphis, Arkansas. The case received nationwide attention back in the day, becoming the subject of several
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