What happened to Chrissy in Stranger Things Season 4?

Stranger Things Season 4 dropped on Netflix today, and fans already think they’ll be haunted by Chrissy’s fate for a while. 

It’s been three years since Eleven and co. fought interdimensional monsters from the Upside Down. However, it seems we needed that time to prepare for Season 4’s big bad: Vecna, a Freddy Krueger-esque monster that’s easily the scariest villain in the series.

The official Netflix synopsis reads: “It’s been six months since the Battle of Starcourt, which brought terror and destruction to Hawkins. Struggling with the aftermath, our group of friends are separated for the first time – and navigating the complexities of high school hasn’t made things any easier.

“In this most vulnerable time, a new and horrifying supernatural threat surfaces, presenting a gruesome mystery that, if solved, might finally put an end to the horrors of the Upside Down.”

Spoilers for Stranger Things Season 4 to follow, you’ve been warned…

Who is Chrissy in Stranger Things Season 4?

While we’re reintroduced to Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown), Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo) and Will (Noah Schnapp), some new characters have emerged in Hawkins. For example, there’s Eddie “the freak” Munson, the leader of the Dungeons & Dragons Hellfire Club.

There’s also Chrissy Cunningham (Grace Van Dien). She’s your classic popular high school teen; not only is she the head cheerleader, but her boyfriend Jacob Carver (Mason Dye) is the also the playmaker on the basketball team.

However, she’s also battling her own demons. In one scene, Max (Sadie Sink) can hear her throwing up in the bathroom, and it’s later revealed that she struggles with her mother’s emotional abuse over her weight.

Chrissy’s death in Stranger Things Season 4 explained

In the series premiere, Chapter One: The Hellfire Club, Chrissy keeps having vivid nightmares and daydreams about her mother’s torment, as well as a ticking grandfather clock and a mysterious voice calling her name.

Chrissy resorts to buying drugs from Eddie, whom she doesn’t remember from their earlier school days. After chatting and getting along, she reveals she isn’t interested in buying weed and asks Eddie if he has any Special K (aka ketamine), and they head back to his house in a trailer yard.

• Read More: Stranger Things review roundup: S4 is bigger, longer & scarier

While he looks for the drugs, Chrissy is thrown into her deadliest trance yet; one from which she’s unable to escape, despite Eddie screaming in her face to wake her up. In her vision, she sees a ghastly version of her nasty mother, before finding her dad downstairs with his eyes gouged out.

As she tries to escape her home, she’s cornered by Vecna, the tentacled, slimy antagonist at the dark heart of the season who uses the fears and anxieties of teenagers to possess them.

“It’s time for your suffering to end,” he tells her, before plunging his hand into her face. Meanwhile, Eddie watches her body as it levitates in the air, before violently contorting; all of her bones break, her jaw dislodges and her eyes are ripped from her skull.

Stranger Things Season 4 Volume 1 is available to stream on Netflix now. Volume 2 will be released on July 1 with the final two episodes.