While Vecna was an original (and terrifying) villain in Stranger Things season 4, the character owed parts of his inspiration to a range of classic horror antagonists and at least one earlier TV hit. Since the Netflix series debuted in 2016, Stranger Things has always been influenced by 80s pop culture. Whether it is Steven Spielberg, Stephen King, Amblin Entertainment, or even the real-life Satanic moral panic, plots in Stranger Things are always built on elements of the cultural landscape of the 80s.
As such, it was no surprise when the primary villain of Stranger Things season 4, Vecna, drew inspiration from a range of major 80s horror antagonists. Vecna’s design, characterization, and modus operandi owed a debt to A Nightmare On Elm Street’s Freddy Krueger, the Hellraiser franchise’s Pinhead, and the classic Stephen King villain Pennywise (of IT fame). Outside these more obvious 80s-based inspirations, Vecna also took some cues from the Night King, a villain who was central to the story of Game of Thrones. Vecna merged parts of each of these earlier characters and, to an extent, the character also resembled Swamp Thing of DC Comics fame.
Freddy Kruger (A Nightmare On Elm Street)
Originally played by Robert Englund (and controversially recast in 2010’s disastrous Nightmare On Elm Street remake), Freddy Krueger is the primary antagonist of director Wes Craven’s iconic slasher series. Englund himself played Vecna’s father in Stranger Things season 4, but this cameo was not the first hint that Vecna’s powers were borrowed from Freddy Krueger’s abilities. Like Freddy, Vecna could pull characters out of reality and into a trippy dream world where he could overpower them and kill them gruesomely. The first time Vecna did this, killing a seemingly comatose Chrissy in front of Eddie, was a direct reference to A Nightmare On Elm Street’s Tina death scene.
However, the Freddy Krueger comparisons didn’t end with this scene. Like Freddy, Vecna sported a badly scarred visage and, like Freddy, he gained these scars when he was killed after being caught massacring children. Vecna also got his supernatural powers from strange Lovecraftian entities found in another dimension, like the Dream Demons of Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare. However, Stranger Things season 4 did change up this detail somewhat, since Freddy Krueger gained the ability to kill by making a Faustian bargain with the dream demons whereas Vecna seemingly shaped the inhabitants of the Upside-Down into his own personal playground without any such bargaining.
Pinhead (Hellraiser)
Released in 1987, director Clive Barker’s Hellraiser was an adaptation of the legendary horror author’s novella “The Hellbound Heart.” Hellraiser’s primary antagonist was Doug Bradley’s Pinhead, a surprisingly eloquent entity that controlled the Cenobites. Amoral demons, the Cenobites existed in a dimension between Hell and Earth where they doled out a mixture of pleasure and pain (erring on the side of the latter). Like Vecna, Pinhead’s Hellraiser franchise origin story revealed that he was once an ordinary, if deeply troubled human who began messing around with paranormal forces, gained great psychic powers in the process, and lost his humanity as a result.
Pennywise (Stephen King’s IT)
While Vecna’s resemblance to Freddy Krueger and the origins of his trademark scars make the Nightmare On Elm Street villain his most obvious inspiration, Pennywise is a close second. The monstrous clown that kills children and feeds off their fear in Stephen King’s IT, Pennywise is a dead ringer for Vecna in numerous ways. Like Vecna, Pennywise can transform into different guises, taking the shape of whatever his latest victim fears most. Like Vecna, Pennywise didn’t die at the end of his first face-off against the Losers Club, instead going into hiding to recoup his powers. However, the comparisons don’t end there.
Pennywise feeds on the fear of children who are bullied, persecuted, and abused in the small town of Derry, Maine. Similarly, Vecna uses the insecurities and secrets of teens living in Hawkins, Indiana against them, relying on the town’s willingness to ignore their deaths and not anticipating that a tenacious group of outcasts will band together to take him down. Vecna’s villainous plan to extend the Upside-Down into Hawkins is similar to Pennywise’s attempts to control the denizens of Derry and, in both cases, the villains fail (at least temporarily) because they underestimated the strength of a group of fearless kids bonded together by friendship.
The Night King (Game of Thrones)
While the Duffer Brothers themselves singled out the third Nightmare On Elm Street movie Dream Warriors as a major inspiration for Vecna in an IGN interview, the character also owes a debt to a hit television show’s most notable villain. The Night King, the wordless leader of the White Walkers in Game of Thrones, bears a visual resemblance to Vecna. While Vecna is a lot more erudite than this villain, the duo also have another trait in common. When Vecna is hurt, his entire army of Upside-Down-dwelling monsters like the Demogorgons and the Demo-bats are equally affected instantaneously. Similarly, defeating the Night King took out his entire army in one fell swoop in Game of Thrones.
Swamp Thing (Swamp Thing)
While Freddy Krueger is the most famous, beloved Wes Craven character that Vecna owes a debt, he is not the only one. The titular antihero of classic comics and an underrated DC Universe TV show, Swamp Thing was previously known as Dr. Alec Holland before he underwent a terrifying body horror transformation and became the massive, mutated Swamp Thing. While Holland is an antihero and Vecna is very much a straightforward villain, Swamp Thing still seems to have inspired the appearance of Stranger Things season 4’s villain, who shares his muscular build, his vein-like vine tendrils, and his scaly skin with the DC Universe version of the character.
Like most comic characters, Swamp Thing has undergone many makeovers across the decades, and the creepy character seen in 2019’s Swamp Thing TV show doesn’t look much like the campy title character of 1982’s Craven-directed misfire Swamp Thing. That adaptation isn’t one of Wes Craven’s most highly-rated movies and its version of Alec Holland would be more likely to prompt laughter from Dustin, Lucas, Max, and company. However, 2019’s take on Swamp Thing bore a close resemblance to Vecna, and, while the Stranger Things villain was not a misunderstood good guy like Alec Holland, his appearance still does owe some inspiration to the character design that was seen in the quickly canceled series.