Remember me
In the penultimate episode of Stranger Things, Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo) finally reveals the true nature of the Upside Down. Having read Dr. Brenner’s (Matthew Modine) notes, Dustin tells his friends the Upside Down is not the parallel dimension they always assumed it was. Instead, it is merely a bridge to one. That bridge connects Hawkins to another dimension Dustin names “The Abyss,” which is just the latest in the show’s many references to Dungeons and Dragons, as The Abyss, in D&D, is “a realm of pure chaos and evil.”
Rewinding to season 4, while Vecna/Henry Creel (Jamie Campbell Bower) didn’t give a name to this other dimension, the Abyss was where Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) banished him back in 1979. Then, in 1983, when Brenner was having Eleven look for Henry/Vecna, she inadvertently created the Upside Down.
The Abyss, however, was not the original name for this other dimension. Instead, it was “Dimension X.” As Variety has reported, way back in Season 1, Netflix asked series creators Matt and Ross Duffer to explain the show’s mythology. In response, they drafted a 20-page document laying it all out. In that document, what is now the Abyss was called “Dimension X.” That term was also used in scripts and concept art for the series. It’s also explicitly mentioned in the stage show Stranger Things: The First Shadow.
If “Dimension X” sounds familiar to you, that’s because, as Matt Duffer told Variety, Dimension X was a deliberate reference to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which features another realm called Dimension X. While the two Dimension Xs don’t have much in common aside from being the source of some otherworldly evil, this feels like as good a reason as any to take a closer look at the TMNT version and unearth anything its history and lore might reveal about the Duffer brothers’ original vision for the Abyss in Stranger Things.
Image: Paramount
While the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles began as a comic book, it was the 1987 cartoon series which introduced Dimension X. Most importantly, Dimension X is the home dimension of Krang, the evil alien brain who, along with Shredder, is the main antagonist for the TMNT throughout the 1987 series. Back in the 1980s and 1990s, kids cartoons generally didn’t have the same strict sense of continuity that those same viewers would later demand of their movies and TV shows. Because of this, Dimension X is occasionally referred to as a “galaxy” in the 1987 cartoon, but it is most often treated as an entirely separate dimension.
Krang used to rule Dimension X but was banished to Earth (though that’s only ever vaguely explained). Dimension X is home to a handful of other characters, too, most notably the Rock Soldiers, an army of sentient humanoid rocks created by Krang. Also residing in Dimension X are the Neutrinos, a species of human-like aliens that ride in flying hot rods and talk like they’re from the 1950s.
Much like Stranger Things’ Abyss, Dimension X is also “a realm of pure chaos and evil.” In one of the first episodes of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Shredder asks Krang, “Your home dimension is a place of total war, is it not?” Krang replies, “Yes! A war that has been carried on without me since I was banished here.” In this war, Krang was the big bad guy, the Rock Soldiers were his army and the Neutrinos were staunch pacifists, wanting nothing to do with all the conflict going on in their dimension (though who was opposing Krang in the war is never exactly clear).
We see Dimension X many times throughout the 10 seasons of the 1987 cartoon series, as several adventures take place on various planets in Dimension X. The Technodrome, Krang and Shredder’s mobile fortress, is sometimes located there as well. When we see Dimension X, it is generally a hazy, red-tinted realm containing floating rocks. This actually bears some strong resemblance to the little bit we’ve seen of the Abyss in Stranger Things, which is also a hazy, red-tinted realm with floating rocks.
Because there are so many versions of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, there are also several more versions of Dimension X. While it would be tedious to explain them all, one other version of Dimension X kind-of, sort-of is connected to the 1987 version, which is worth noting here.
In the 2012 Nickelodeon cartoon series of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Dimension X is home to the Utroms, a race of brain-like aliens. But in this take, Krang is not an individual alien. Instead, “the Kraang” are an enslaved group of Utroms with a hive mind loyal to a leader called Kraang Prime. (Sort of like the hivemind Vecna uses to control the demogorgons in Stranger Things.)
While the Dimension X from 1987 and the Dimension X from 2012 look only vaguely similar, one episode of the 2012 cartoon suggests that both of them are the same dimension, and they have simply been accessed via two different parallel dimensions within the TMNT multiverse. In a crossover episode where the Turtles from the original cartoon meet the Turtles from the 2012 cartoon, the original Krang is revealed to be a member of the Kraang who had been banished to the 1987 cartoon’s version of Earth. While this episode was one of the most enjoyable of the already excellent 2012 series, the idea that Dimension X is shared between the two universes doesn’t really work, not only for the visual differences, but because it contradicts the little bit that is known about the 1987 Krang’s origins.
Paramount
In one episode of the original cartoon, Krang has a flashback to a time when he was with other brain creatures like himself. In another episode, it is revealed he used to be a dinosaur-like alien and that his brain was removed from that body. Again, back in the 1980s, cartoons didn’t care that much about continuity, so it’s best not to quibble about it.
This, of course, stands in stark contrast to modern audiences, all of whom (myself included) are demanding that every nook and crannie of Stranger Things’ continuity make sense by the end of that finale, which part of me fears it will not. If that’s the case, it may be up to future spinoffs and reboots to try to explain the Abyss once and for all — much like what happened with Dimension X and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
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