The Duffer Brothers want you to know “Stranger Things” Season 2 is full of “Indiana Jones” references

It started as a very simple question, aka me just wondering why there aren’t more Indiana Jones references in Stranger Things? Innocent enough, right? As a child of the late ’80s, it’s one of my favorite trilogies and I just feel like there could be a lot more references to snakes in Stranger Things. Because why did it have to be snakes?

There’s a scene halfway through Season 2 of Netflix’s breakout series, in which Hawkins Police Chief Jim Hopper momentarily loses his hat. Rather than leave it behind, and even though he is in the face of danger, Hopper reaches back for it. I took it as a clear nod to Temple of Doom — because that is something Indiana Jones does. After chatting with The Duffer Brothers, Matt and Ross, on the Stranger Things red carpet, they want you to know it is a reference to Temple of Doom.

I then, however, pressed The Duffer brothers for more Henry Jones Jr. nods, and that’s when they excitedly informed me that I had basically missed a dozen of them during the second season.

“There were a ton, what are you talking about?” Matt said, clearly disappointed in me. “How many more [do you want]?”

In the clearest indication that these two are brothers, and share one joint Stranger Things mind, they then rattle off all the references — and obviously what follows is a bunch of spoilers:

Ross: It's all the Hopper in the tunnel stuff, I mean with the torch and he's got his hat. Matt: The vines, the snakes. Ross: That's very Indiana Jones. Matt: Nancy and Jonathan when they're [going to bed], that's Temple of Doom, that's the whole bedroom dance. Leaving the bedroom, fighting, going back out, coming back, that's Temple of Doom. Ross: So, there's a lot, but yes, Andrew Stanton, who directed [the] episode [added the hat in because] it wasn't in the script, but he's like, 'Hopper's gotta leave his hat and he's gonna grab it.' See, none of us can stop ourselves from doing these [1980s] references, it's so much fun. Matt: We know some critics are gonna slam us for it. Ross: But it's too much fun. Matt: Yeah, who cares?

I do not care, and I welcome the nods, even though I clearly missed them all. So excuse me, I have to go rewatch all of Season 2 to figure out what else went right over my head.