!!!A Wizard of Earthsea
In the last episode of season 3, Suzie is reading ''Literature/AWizardOfEarthsea'' and says she's almost to the part where the character Ged is about to face his shadow to vanquish it (something he's been running from for fear of being made its puppet for the whole novel), and soon after Billy has to face the Mind Flayer, which has turned him into its puppet, fighting off its influence over him.

!!!Different Genres, Same Story
A tumblr user named letstalkabouttrek made an [[https://letstalkabouttrek.tumblr.com/post/148757070061/the-best-part-about-stranger-things-is-that-they interesting observation]] about the first season.

To summarize, as mentioned on the fridge page, every storyline in the first season is played out like a different genre of film. Hopper being in a conspiracy thriller, Joyce is in psychological horror, Nancy and Jonathan are in a classic monster movie, etc. Every one of them tries to accomplish their goal/figure out the bigger picture but they can't because they're confined within the cliches and limitations of their genre.

It's only when they get together and their respective storylines finally synch up that they are able to figure out what's going and are able to get to the bottom of Will's disappearance by viewing things from a different perspective, i.e a different genre.