Every Stranger Things Monster, Ranked By Terror

For five seasons, “Stranger Things” has stood as one of the best sci-fi shows streaming on Netflix, crafting a coming-of-age story with paranormal stakes. More than just mixing ’80s nostalgia with government conspiracies, the show featured several memorable monsters that terrorized the story’s small-town setting of Hawkins, Indiana. Inspired by “Dungeons & Dragons” creatures, reflecting the main characters’ interest in the tabletop game, these otherworldly entities fueled the show’s more overtly horror-oriented elements.

Though the “Stranger Things” series finale left big questions unanswered, what remains clear after its conclusion is how scary some of its monsters were. Even in the weaker episodes, these beasts always commanded full attention whenever they were on-screen, driving the story’s suspense. Hailing from the extra-dimensional realm known as the Upside-Down, these monsters are utterly merciless as they prey on anyone unfortunate enough to cross their path. Here is every “Stranger Things” monster appearing in the main television series ranked by terror, culminating in the scariest Upside-Down creature of them all.

A small, leech-like creature that grows to the size of an amphibian, Dart is found by Dustin Henderson (Gaten Matarazzo) rummaging through his garbage in Season 2. After nicknaming his new pet D’Artagnan, Dustin is horrified when Dart not only grows at an alarming rate but eats the Henderson family cat. By the end of the season, the seemingly adorable creature has grown into a lethal monster that joins a pack of its fellow kind.

Yes, Dart is technically a Demo-Dog and we’ll get more into the rest of that monster type in greater detail later. But Dart gets an entry because he’s one of the few explicitly named and recurring monsters, making waves when Dustin unveils him in the episode “Night of the Living Booger.” That said, it isn’t particularly scary on its own, with Dustin still able to talk him down, at least temporarily, after the creature matures. That mitigates Dart’s frightening potential significantly as the least scary monster in the series, no matter what it grew up to be.

The most populous type of monster in “Stranger Things,” at least from what is seen on-screen, Demo-Bats swarm the Upside-Down’s skies. These creatures make their debut in the fourth season, forcing characters venturing into the extra-dimensional realm to flee and seek cover. The winged monstrosity swoops down at its prey, ensnaring them with tentacles before tearing into them with their fanged, suction-like maws. Traveling in flocks, the Demo-Bats frequently overwhelm their victims, attacking them from multiple points to bring them down.

On its own rather than in a flock, the Demo-Bat appears to be the physically weakest of the creatures from the Upside-Down. But what it lacks in individual stopping power, it far makes up for through strength in numbers as they swarm their targets. Given that the creatures cut short Joseph Quinn’s fan-favorite performance as Eddie Munson, they are certainly not something to be taken lightly. With that said, the subsequent monsters on this list are still terribly formidable and frightening on their own as they are when they attack in groups, which the Demo-Bat is not.

The Demodogs are a variation of the larger Demogorgon, debuting in the second season of “Stranger Things” and serving as its primary monster. In addition to contrasting size, the Demo-Dogs are quadrupedal and are capable of running at great speeds, often pouncing on their victims. A pack of the monsters are able to overwhelm the military and government staff at the Hawkins laboratory, with the creatures able to withstand gunfire. The Demodogs resurface in the fourth and fifth seasons, continuing to menace the characters as agents of the Mind Flayer.

Like many of the monsters in “Stranger Things,” the overall strength of the Demodogs is never clearly established. In one sequence from the final season, the monsters are tanking assault rifle gunfire, and in the next, Lucas Sinclair (Caleb McLaughlin) is able to briefly lay one out with a kick. But there are scenes towards the end of Season 2 when the Demodogs are legitimately terrifying as they prowl around Hawkins. Swift and voracious, these monsters are among the most nimble and murderous horrors to emerge from the Upside-Down.

The original “Stranger Things” monster, the Demogorgon is still one of the most memorable for the series and constant throughout the show. A single one of these monsters is seen capable of decimating the military at the Hawkins laboratory while another rampages through the armed personnel at a Soviet gulag. The first Demogorgon is only defeated thanks to the immense psionic powers from Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) rather than conventional weapons. Subsequent versions of the monster are defeated by other means, but not without great effort.

The Demogorgons’ strength and endurance has never been all that consistent, shaking off gunfire but visibly wounded by everything from blades to broken wine bottles. This demystifies the beast considerably, especially as blooper reels show the Demogorgon’s funkier side, but whenever one surfaces, it’s still a higher threat level. The first set of episodes from Season 5 proved that the creature could still pack a terrifying punch, particularly when they attacked the Wheeler residence. This makes the Demogorgon still a monster to be reckoned with, even if there’s a degree of familiarity to them now.

When it comes to sheer body horror, there are few monsters that are more grotesque in “Stranger Things” than the meat monster. When Nancy Wheeler (Natalia Dyer) and Jonathan Byers (Charlie Heaton) are investigating a hospital in the third season they’re attacked by the Flayed, those possessed by the Mind Flayer. Their attackers graphically dissolve into viscera and form into a monster made of raw organic tissue resembling a roaring creature made of, for lack of a better term, meat. This creature is capable of shifting from a solid to a revolting near-liquid state, once again taking the show’s body horror to a whole new grisly level.

If this list was based on “Stranger Things” monsters ranked by their gross-out factor, the meat monster would rank much higher. Seeing the creature formed from its Flayed victims is definitely one of the goriest moments in the entire series, which provides its own kind of terror. Just conceptually, there is a repulsive aspect to the meat monster that makes it particularly disturbing in the pantheon of the show’s enemies. But when it comes to Season 3 creatures, there is something even bigger and grosser than the meat monster.

Dozens of Hawkins residents are possessed by the Mind Flayer over the course of the third season, giving it a particularly high body count. As the entity’s plans to establish a foothold outside of the Upside-Down escalate, it turns its possessed individuals, the Flayed, into a gory monster. Dissolving into raw viscera, as it had for the much smaller meat monster, the Flayed turn into a spider-like creature resembling the Mind Flayer itself. This culminates in a massive Season 3 battle in a shopping mall as Eleven leads her friends to destroy the creature.

The meat flayer, also nicknamed by fans as the meat spider, takes all the grotesque sensibilities of the meat monster and dials it up to a grander frightening scale. Even more victims are used to fuel its terrifying creation and the beast features more raw, destructive potential. Among the meat flayer’s most horrifying attacks is biting prey with long tentacles, infecting them with disgusting, squirming leech-like creatures in the process, with even Eleven getting bitten. A more ambitious portrait in vile body horror, the meat flayer presents the first time Eleven directly confronts the Mind Flayer, setting up their eventual climactic showdown.

There is a strong sense of tragedy when it comes to the Flayed, those who have become fully possessed by the insidious Mind Flayer. Will Byers was arguably the first Flayed individual in Hawkins, with only his friends’ combined efforts driving out the villain’s influence from him. The Flayed in the show’s third season were far less fortunate, possessed by the Mind Flayer to enact its agenda outside of the Upside-Down. The first person possessed in the season was Billy Hargrove (Dacre Montgomery), who forcibly led many other townspeople to follow his grim fate.

What makes the Flayed so unnerving is that they still appear as they did before their possession, albeit visibly sweating due to the parasite’s preference for cold environments. After being turned, the possessed are completely uncaring or sympathetic to their host’s loved ones, preying on their families. That makes things all the more tragic when the Flayed dissolve to form larger, more gory constructs for the Mind Flayer to use, essentially making them human fuel. Billy has one of the saddest deaths in the series trying to resist those he led to possession, underscoring the terrible (and terrifying) human cost of the Flayed.

Introduced in the fourth season, Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) was presented as the big bad who had apparently been pulling the strings all along. Growing in power, the nightmarish villain preyed on the teenagers of Hawkins, taunting them with images of a grandfather clock before telekinetically killing them. As the season continues, it’s revealed that Vecna is actually the transformed Henry Creel, the first test subject experimented on by Martin Brenner (Matthew Modine). After having an inhibitor device removed from him by Eleven, Creel goes on a murderous rampage before Eleven exiles him to the Upside-Down where he undergoes his monstrous transformation.

Henry was a terror long before he became Vecna, using his psionic powers to torment and murder his own family as a child. Vecna looks different in “Stranger Things” Season 5, having grown more powerful and taking on a more armored appearance. Though ultimately revealed to be not as in control of the Mind Flayer as he claimed, Henry is far from being considered a victim. The “Stranger Things” finale didn’t redeem Vecna, with the adversary too far gone in his sadistic worldview to seriously contemplate atonement.

Though there was some debate if Vecna or the Mind Flayer is the true overarching antagonist in “Stranger Things,” by the series finale, it’s clear that it’s the latter. First glimpsed as an ethereal spider-like entity in the Upside-Down in the second season, the extra-dimensional monster is a continual presence moving forward. The Mind Flayer’s true form is seen in the series finale as it all ends for the Hawkins gang in one epic last battle. Though the monster prefers children to fuel its psionic strength in opening dimensional rifts to the real world, it certainly doesn’t discriminate in its choice of prey.

The Mind Flayer is a physical menace that can insidiously possess those it comes into contact with and its true form is even more repulsively frightening, resembling a large spider. The monster is responsible for all the body horror and lesser creatures borne from the Upside-Down as the source of all extra-dimensional evil. That innate ability to corrupt and malevolently empower, especially someone as sinister as Vecna, makes the monster exceptionally terrifying. The true villain and an absolute horror to witness when it roars onto the battlefield, the Mind Flayer is the scariest monster in “Stranger Things.”