10 Clever Stranger Things Season 3 Easter Eggs You Might Have Missed

Warning: This story includes spoilers for all aired episodes of Stranger Things.

After waiting nearly two years for the latest season of Stranger Things, most fans couldn’t help but binge all eight episodes in a row. But now that we know how it all went down, with Billy Hargrove being taken over by the Mind Flayer and Jim Hopper’s tragic (maybe) death, it's time for us to reprocess the season ... and rewatch it all over again.

While giving the season a second watch, keep an eye out for all the clever Easter eggs sprinkled into each episode, including several references to classic 1980s movies, earlier Stranger Things episodes, and unexpected connections we had never imagined were possible.

1. Peter Gabriel could be hinting at a major plot twist.

Arguably the most heartbreaking scene in Stranger Things history came in the final episode of season 3, “The Battle of Starcourt,” when Eleven reads the scrapped letter Hopper wrote for her and Mike. Viewers at home cried along with Millie Bobby Brown's character as she prepared for life without her “dad,” but one element in the scene might be a hint that Hopper isn’t really dead.

The song that starts playing just as Eleven finishes up reading the letter is Peter Gabriel’s cover of David Bowie’s “Heroes,” which is the same rendition of the song that played in the season 1 episode “Holly, Jolly,” when it was believed that Will had been killed. Of course, he turned out to be very much alive, meaning the same could (hopefully) happen for Hopper.

2. Jim Hopper is channeling Martin Brody.

Stranger Things has never shied away from paying homage to classic movies. And Redditor LucasLeArtist noticed that one of Hopper's season 3 lines was a direct quote from Jaws. When Hopper is about to leave Enzo’s after Joyce stands him up, he’s told he can’t take the alcohol with him, to which he drunkenly responds, “I can do anything I want, I’m chief of police.” This mimics a scene in Jaws where Chief Brody said the same line before taking a swig of his drink.

3. Murray Bauman’s phone number is real.

One of the more eccentric characters in Stranger Things, Murray Bauman, turned out to be extremely helpful this season, as he served as translator for Hopper and the Russian scientist Alexei. In one scene, Murray’s phone number is shown—and it turns out that it's a working phone number ... which does indeed belong to Murray. As CNET reported, when you dial 618-625-8313, you get a lengthy, and hilarious, answering machine message from the character.

4. Billy Hargrove’s nod to Stand By Me.

While Billy Hargrove surprisingly turned into a character you felt sorry for by the end of season 3, his scenes in the first episode proved he was still just as much of a bully as he was in season 2. One example of this is when he’s lifeguarding and yells at a kid for running by the pool. Billy calls him a “lard-ass,” which doesn’t just remind you of how mean of a person he is, but is also a borrowed line from Rob Reiner's classic 1986 film Stand By Me. As IndieWire pointed out, that particular insult was famously used in the movie during the scene in which Gordie tells his friends a memorable story about a pie-eating contest.

5. Dustin Henderson is crushing on Phoebe Cates.

When Dustin returns to Hawkins from camp, he shocks everyone with the reveal that he now has a girlfriend. Of course, the first reaction from his friends (Steve included) is that she isn’t real. Dustin keeps the story going, however, telling everyone that her name is Suzy and that she's better looking than Phoebe Cates—as in the actress best known for her role in 1982’s Fast Times at Ridgemont High. In the season’s final episode, we learn that Suzy is indeed real. And when Robin is trying to get Steve a job at the video store, he falls into a cardboard cutout of Cates as Linda Barrett (her Fast Times character) before stopping to admire it.

6. Dustin and Robin recreated a scene from 1992's Sneakers.

A Twitter user pointed out an unexpected callback to the 1992 River Phoenix film Sneakers, as Dustin and Robin recreate one of its scenes when getting the “complete blueprints” of the Starcourt Mall. It's almost word-for-word, with the only difference being that in Sneakers, they’re looking at the Playtronics Corporate Headquarters.

7. Eleven visits the house from A Nightmare on Elm Street.

During Eleven’s scariest venture into the Void this season, she tries to find the missing lifeguard Heather. As she approaches Heather's home, the red door is reminiscent of the house that belonged to Nancy Thompson’s family in 1984’s A Nightmare on Elm Street. A Twitter user claimed the number on both doors was the same, but Stranger Things changed it by one number, as Heather lives at 1438. We’re not sure if they had to change it because of legal matters or if was just a coincidence—but in a show full of horror movie references, the similarity would seem a little too coincidental.

8. Steve Harrington can't keep his Michael J. Fox projects straight.

When Dustin, Erica, Steve, and Robin manage to escape the Russians in the seventh episode, “The Bite,” they end up in the movie theater at the mall, which is showing Back to the Future (1985). Steve and Robin soon leave, and while very high—and trying to analyze what they just watched—Robin hilariously says she’s pretty sure “that mom was trying to bang her son,” referring to Marty McFly and his mom, Lorraine. A confused Steve replies, “Wait, wait, the hot chick was Alex P. Keaton’s mom?” Alex P. Keaton, of course, was the name of Michael J. Fox’s character in the hit NBC series Family Ties, not Back to the Future.

9. "Weird" Al Yankovic's Reality Bites link.

In episode 2, “The Mall Rats,” Winona Ryder's Joyce ends up ditching Hopper to go find the kids’ science teacher Mr. Clarke, only to find him jamming out to "Weird" Al Yankovic’s parody song “My Bologna.” A Twitter user pointed out that this could be a nod to 1994’s Reality Bites, which features a memorable scene of Ryder dancing to the original song, “My Sharona.” Ethan Hawke is also in the scene, who is the real-life dad of Maya Hawke, who plays Robin in Stranger Things.

10. The post-credits scene that hints at Hopper's survival.

Perhaps the most important detail in the entire season comes during the post-credits scene, which includes another major hint that Hopper is still alive. Viewers are taken to the Russian base, where prisoners are being fed to the Demogorgon. One soldier then says, “No, not the American,” before moving on to the next person held captive. Fans are convinced the American would have to be Hopper, although there are plenty of theories floating around about other Americans that character could be. Now we’ll just have to wait until season 4, which has not been announced yet, to know who it is for sure.