We're Still Trying to Solve This 'Stranger Things' Puzzle
While a lot of us just carry on with our lives, concerned with issues of family, work, and current events, some of us can't get random pop culture nonsense out of our goddamn heads. Case in point: Last November, a Stranger Things tie-in book contained a hidden riddle, seemingly providing clues about the upcoming season. And we still don't know what it all means. With the release of a new trailer for Season 3, maybe we finally put this nagging conundrum to bed.
Parts of the riddle cropped up in a promotional video announcing the third season's release date. The video didn't feature any footage from the show. It was mostly comprised of '80s Dick Clark ringing in the new year, perhaps suggesting that the beloved host maintained his youthful appearance through sinister paranormal means. More importantly, it also featured shots of an old computer screen. One passage from the riddle, "When blue and yellow meet in the west," is highlighted. And another, "The silver cat feeds," appears in the form of computer code.
The screen also revealed that the system is owned by Lynx Corp. Lynxes are of course silver cats, and some have pointed out that they are found, among other countries, in Russia. Fans have been speculating that Russians will be the villains of the new season, due to casting information and little clues such as the commercial for the town's Starcourt Mall highlighting Tom Clancy's The Hunt For Red October.
Russians were pretty much the go-to movie villains during the Cold War, so this makes sense. Plus, way back in Season 1, we saw that Eleven's powers were being exploited to spy on the Soviets. Does the new trailer confirm any of this? Well, we briefly glimpse a gun-toting assassin who could easily be a Russian agent. More definitively, as pointed out on Reddit, one dude is wearing a Soviet GP-4 gas mask.
And if we really want to journey down the brain-numbing rabbit hole of over-analysis, the trailer is set to a remixed version of The Who's "Baba O'Riley" -- a song partly named after Indian mystic Meher Baba, who was once quoted as saying "Russia holds the key." Of course, he was talking about World War II, not a bunch of preteens battling interdimensional monsters, but still.
The rest of the riddle reads: "A trip to China sounds nice, if you tread lightly." As seen in the trailer, some kind of dramatic confrontation seemingly goes down in the mall food court, and we know there's an Imperial Panda there. Could the Chinese eatery hold some special significance? Let's just say yes and get back to basking in the joys of the real world.
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