‘Stranger Things’ creators sued for stealing plot

Stranger Things creators the Duffer Brothers are being sued by a director who claims that they lifted ideas for the smash-hit Netflix drama from his 2012 short film.

Charlie Kessler, who has worked on a number of Netflix series including Daredevil and Luke Cage, claims that he screened the short film, titled Montauk, to Matt and Ross Duffer in 2014, in the hope of developing it into a full-length feature. Kessler alleges that the pair then used elements of the work as the basis for Stranger Things.

According to the lawsuit, Montauk’s storyline features a number of elements similar to those seen in the Netflix series, including children with enhanced thoughts and abilities, a military facility that carries out secret experiments on humans and a monstrous creature from another dimension.

The suit also notes that the Duffers’ series was given the working title of The Montauk Project, with the series originally set in the Long Island town of Montauk before the setting was ultimately changed to Indiana. Both the series and the short film are inspired by rumours of a secret military operation titled Project Montauk, which is said to have conducted experiments on humans.

“After the massive success of Stranger Things that is based on Plaintiff’s concepts that Plaintiffs discussed with Defendants, Defendants have made huge sums of money by producing the series based on Plaintiff’s concepts without compensating or crediting Plaintiff for his Concepts,” Kessler’s suit says.

Kessler is seeking monetary damages and a jury trial over the alleged plagiarism. Netflix and the Duffer Brothers are yet to comment on the lawsuit.

Since its release in 2016, Stranger Things has become a pop-cultural phenomenon, turning its lead Millie Bobby Brown into an international star. Although Netflix does not release viewership information for their series, figures from data company Nielsen suggested that around 15.8 million US viewers watched the first episode of the show’s second season in the three days following its release. Stranger Things has since been renewed for a third season.