Anthony Mackie Was Right All Along: The 80s Classic Behind Stranger Things

Anthony Mackie once made a spicy comparison that sounded wild at the time: Stranger Things is basically The Goonies with monsters. Seven years later, that take has aged better than you might expect.

What Mackie said back in 2017

At MCM London Comic-Con in 2017, Mackie went off on the state of Hollywood, arguing that the rise of superhero movies has pushed old-school movie stardom to the sidelines. He also said the business had shifted to making films for 16-year-olds and China, and that a bunch of the classics we grew up on would never get greenlit today.

Then he connected the dots between Stranger Things and The Goonies. His shorthand version was basically: a pack of kids teams up, crawls through hidden underground spaces, runs into a not-from-here creature, takes it down, and yes - there is even a slide. Is that an oversimplification? Absolutely. But is there a real lineage there? Also yes.

So, did The Goonies actually feed into Stranger Things?

The Duffer Brothers built Stranger Things as an 80s mixtape on purpose, and Richard Donner’s The Goonies is one of the clearest tracks in that blend. Quick refresher: The Goonies opened June 7, 1985, was directed by Richard Donner, is based on a story by Steven Spielberg, grossed $70,376,964 at the box office, and sits at 77% on Rotten Tomatoes and 7.7/10 on IMDb.

"It's hard to come up with an original story. I think we're all influenced by the stories that came before us... The worst films just refer to other movies. The best films connect you to something that you've actually experienced. 'Stranger Things' has done that very well."

That’s Spielberg praising the show, which makes sense since Stranger Things doesn’t just reference - it captures a feeling. Monsters and the Upside Down aside, both projects center on kids who take charge and solve problems without waiting for the adults to catch up.

• Leader energy: Sean Astin’s Mikey in The Goonies and Finn Wolfhard’s Mike in Stranger Things both corral their friends and set the mission.
• The crews echo each other: Mikey, Chunk, Mouth, and Data have obvious parallels to Mike, Dustin, Lucas, and Will.
• The vibe: bikes, flashlights, secret routes, and that classic kids-on-a-quest momentum.
• Visual rhymes: Stranger Things even has a slide moment that feels like a direct nod.
• Audio winks: the show sprinkles in 80s needle drops and tonal cues that hit the same adventurous, scrappy sweet spot.

Eleven’s season 5 look: a straight-up Goonies nod

If you clocked Eleven’s new outfit in season 5 and thought, wait, Josh Brolin in The Goonies, you’re not imagining things. Costume designer Amy Parris told the New York Post that Eleven’s look was "a mix of Josh Brolin from The Goonies and then Punky Brewster [Soleil Moon Frye], with her mish mash of cut up clothes that she just kind of grabbed as she went." She said she pulled from real yearbook photos too - not just Brolin - and fully expected fans to notice. They did; there was even a viral tweet on November 27, 2025 from a fan admitting it took them embarrassingly long to make the connection.

The bottom line

Mackie’s plot summary was a little loose, but the core point stands: Stranger Things absolutely drinks from The Goonies well. One is a monster mash, one is a pirate-treasure chase, but they share the same DNA - scrappy kids, real stakes, and the thrill of discovering how big and weird the world can be once you leave the front yard.

Want to revisit the evidence yourself? Stranger Things is on Netflix. The Goonies is streaming on Max (via Prime Video).