#nikki baxter

[itswhatyougive]

Nikki Baxter feels like if some twelve year old kid won a sweepstakes to have their self-insert OC featured in an episode of Stranger Things

[ssentinl]

i’m sorry but i need people to be so much angrier about this thing with will. as soon as i heard they were adding her, we knew what they were doing. a “new friend for will”?? really?? like, mike is supposed to be his friend, and they’re making mike and el’s relationship very obvious, so will is basically being sidelined, so they felt the need to add nikki. even if the whole “new love interest” thing is fake, it’s fucking ridiculous to me that they’d even suggest it. there’s already enough gay erasure in media as a whole, but after the shitshow that was his coming out scene, you’d think that they’d try to redeem themselves with tales from 85, but they’re doing the worst possible thing that they could do. the best thing they could do with a relationship between nikki and will is that nikki is lesbian and helps will with his sexuality; but was that not robin’s purpose? in the x reader community there’s already so much will x female readers and ocs, even more so than x male readers/ocs. people who write gay characters x female readers always argue that it’s only fanfiction, but it’s really not. it’s gay erasure, and it’s ignorant of the characters’ sexualities. it’s still incredible to me how openly people are comfortable with expressing their homophobia. fuck you.

[roryrocksbyler]

haha….hahaha….haha

how fun !! lets watch them sideline will, promote milkvan propaganda, completely erase miwi and byler, give steve 90% of screentime, and focus more on fuckass NIKKI !! yay !! yay….

[lesikm]

I appreciate the dedication this account has to posting ragebait.

[whispering-goat]

The curious case of Nikki Baxter

A story about a potential Netflix plant, misinformation on a Family Guy fanon Wikipedia page, and what this all means for "Stranger Things: Tales of '85" and conformitygate.

This is my second attempt at breaking this story, it's very complex and layered and while I had the right hunch the first time, I did not check my sources carefully enough. I'm not claiming Stranger Things: Tales of '85 is fake, just that there are many inconsistencies surrounding it. Thanks to @disastertourwaterdeepedition, @mel01837, @livinglikelarries, @nuffit, @how-obvious and @arubikhandy0707 from the conformitygate discord server for fact checking and helping me gather the proper information!

Edit: Clarification on the source of the Twitter picture

Table of Contents:

A. Stranger Reports

A1. The Reddit Post

A2. The Twitter Post

B. ACTUAL OFFICIAL INFORMATION (thanks to @disastertourwaterdeepedition )

C. Collider: Trust me bro (thanks to @how-obvious )

D. The Shenanigans of a potential anti-byler Netflix plant (thanks to @nuffit and @arubikhandy0707 )

E. Nikki Baxter's mysterious appearance on Family Guy fanon wikipedia (thanks to @livinglikelarries and @how-obvious )

F. Summary and Concluding remarks

A. Stranger Reports

This deep dive starts with the discovery that the articles with the exact same information started popping up, mostly on the 28th of January (2026), one of the dates on my predicted promotional timeline for Stranger Things content.

They all detail how a new character, Nikki Baxter, in the upcoming "Stranger Things: Tales of 85", was sparking controversy, because she would significantly alter the Stranger Things story and time line [paraphrased].

Screen Rant (Jan 26, 2026):

It could be chaotic.

Dexerto (Jan 28, 2026):

After the Conformity Gate saga, a new question has arisen: is Netflix rewriting Stranger Things Season 5? Here’s what you need to know.

International Business Times UK (Jan 28, 2026):

https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/who-nikki-baxter-tales-85-tinker-netflix-using-rewrite-stranger-things-why-fans-are-1774471

Collider (Jan 28, 2026)

Fans want a Season 5 redo — Netflix is offering something else. Stranger Things: Tales From ’85 revisits Hawkins with new twists.

The odd thing was, most of these reports either didn't list their sources at all, or were referring to a Reddit post and/or a Twitter post. Both of those were posted in the time span of one day and are very interesting for different reasons, to say the least.

A1. The Reddit Post

It was posted on Jan 24, 2026. You can fact check this by clicking the link below:

Overall, the post is critical and the comments echo the same sentiment. The source of this post most likely is the synopsis of the Stranger Things: Tales from '85 Chapter Book, listed by Penguin Random House (publisher).

Something strange is happening at Hawkins Middle School, and the Hawkins Investigators Club is on the case in this first book in an original

On there, it says the story is for ages 6 to 9. This is pretty weird, as the story officially takes place between S2 and S3 and would require context from the original Stranger Things show, but that one has always been for at least 13+.

A2. The Twitter post

This post haunts me. It was also posted on Jan 24 (2026) on Twitter. This is the ONLY post used by mainstream media that has a supposed picture of Nikki Baxter. Unlike the Reddit Post and the Chapter Book, who refer to the new character as just "Nikki", this Twitter Post uses the character's full name, and this is where all the recent articles are getting it from.

As we can see, the picture is pretty bad quality-wise. It seems like it is a photo taken sneakily with a (phone) camera from another screen. Edit: it was altered to look that way. According to this tweet, it shows a character, Nikki Baxter, wrapped in vines. It raises four questions:

Where does the name Nikki Baxter come from?

Why do people call her "a tinker"?

Why does "BradleysBigBuy" have this picture?

Why do people trust "BradleysBigBuy" as a credible source?

The first two questions will be answered in "Collider: trust me bro" and the last two questions will be answered in "The shenanigans of a potential anti-byler Netflix plant". Before we get into that, we need to know what information is 100% trustworthy.

B. ACTUAL OFFICIAL INFORMATION

Besides the Chapter Book for Stranger Things: Tales of '85, we have two other pieces of official information about the animation.

The official announcement trailer on the official Netflix YouTube Channel, Nov 6 (2025):

This is the ONLY teaser trailer existing of this animation. @disastertourwaterdeepedition works in a related industry and has concluded, using their expertise in the field, that this trailer looks more like a display of concept art than an actual finished product. All the other trailers on YouTube are fan made, probably with AI (ew). Note: this announcement trailer does NOT include Nikki Baxter.

The IMBD page with information on the director, writers, voice cast, producers, sound department, visual effects team, animation department and music composer:

Stranger Things: Tales from '85 (TV Series 2026– ) - Full cast & crew - IMDb

Stranger Things: Tales from '85 (TV Series 2026– ) - Cast and crew credits, including actors, actresses, directors, writers and more.

Note: Only Episode 1, of unknown length, has been confirmed. The character list does NOT include Nikki Baxter. There is NO voice actor that is assigned to voice Nikki Baxter.

Edit: the original picture of Nikki Baxter has been found by @digitalembersphinx. It was posted on Twitter on Nov 6 (2026), at the same time the announcement trailer was released. My point still stands: why did mainstream news articles collectively source @BradleysBigBuy 's shitty edit and why is @Updates_SThings the only source of information on this picture?

C. Collider: trust me bro

I traced back the first time Nikki Baxter was described by full name and as "a tinker" to Collider, through the Wikipedia page for Stranger Things: Tales from '85:

Stranger Things: Tales From '85 footage was shown at Annecy. Find out the release window, plot details, and what the footage showed.

This is an article from Jun 11 (2025). Apparently, a sneak peak was shown at the Annecy Animation Festival in France, accessible to invited guests and the press, but not for the general public. And, the author of this article took some... rough notes.

This is where the name Nikki Baxter and her being called "a tinker" come from. In the notes it's also mentioned that the Duffer brothers keep their cards close to the chest. Maybe too close, considering Nikki Baxter has still not been shown in the announcement trailer half a year later, Nov 6 (2025). Not to say that this is not a trustworthy source, but it is surprising this is where this crucial information stems from: word of mouth. Where is Nikki Baxter if she was shown at Annecy Animation Festival? Why did we only get a couple of minutes of concept art in the announcement trailer, when it's half a year later since the Jun 2025 Collider article? Why is her voice actress still not listed on Wikipedia or IMDB?

What's even more interesting though, is that the description from the article of Nikki Baxter's features, "pinkish hair that's short on the sides", matches the Twitter Post.

D. The shenanigans of a potential anti-byler Netflix plant

We return to examine the cursed @BradleysBigBuy. Since the picture in their post matches the description of the Jun 2025 Collider article, let's evaluate if @BradleysBigBuy is posting leaks or just misinformation. It was verified that this account was created in May 2025 and has an instagram of the same name. The name of the Twitter account has changed three times, the last alteration being in July 2025. The handle itself is quite interesting already, it references Bradley's Big Buy, which is a Stranger Things in-universe supermarket located in Hawkins. The WSQK actually promotes ads from it (about one minute into the Twitter video):

Most of their retweets and likes are quite regular for a Stranger Things fan, perhaps with an anti-byler slant. However, occasionally, they throw in posts that seem to be leaks or clues:

This wouldn't be noteworthy in and of itself, as many Stranger Things fan accounts exist that create fake leaks or AI edits and try to hint at conformitygate.

However, together with this being the ONLY source used by mainstream media with the Nikki Baxter picture, it reveals a pattern: the account holder might be somewhat in the know or has some access to BTS information. Nikki Baxter is such a deep cut, it is confusing why someone would doctor an image of her... Unless this is a real leak. Edit: This account did tamper with the OG picture. But...

What's even worse though, regardless if this is a misinformation or a leak account, is that mainstream news outlets are citing it as if it's an official source of information!!! It's honestly infuriating.

This would be the place to wrap up this story, if we didn't stumble onto more conveniently placed misinformation. We have to talk about Nikki Baxter's mysterious appearance on Family Guy fanon Wikipedia.

As an aside, here are a couple of arguments for why @BradleysBigBuy could be a leak or even a Netflix plant account. This is not conclusive evidence.

- It is the ONLY source used by mainstream media of the Nikki Baxter picture and it matches a previous description of her from the June 2025 Collider article.

- The only picture of Nikki Baxter is of her being wrapped in vines... a plant. (idea by @nuffit )

- Most main stream news outlets used it as a "trustworthy" source of information in their reports around Jan 28 (2026). Either they collectively lost their minds and journalistic integrity or they know more than we do about it and were instructed to use it behind the scenes by the Netflix and Stranger things PR and social media teams.

- Through a conformitygate lense: This account is named after a Stranger Things in-universe supermarket, Bradley's Big Buy. It is trying to sell us BTS information. In the same way, the supermarket sells its ads on the semi-fictional radio show the Squawk (WSQK), which is run by Vance and Mindy Flare (Vecna and the Mind Flayer). That radio show is known for selling a false narrative in the same way the entirety of Stranger Things Season 5 has done. Is this Twitter account trying to sell Stranger Things: Tales of '85 to us? Is it trying to convince us that byler is not real? (some thoughts inspired by @arubikhandy0707 )

E. Nikki Baxter's mysterious appearance on Family Guy fanon Wikipedia

This might be the wildest and most confusing find while going down the Nikki Baxter rabbit hole. Mistakes were made in the first version of this post due to the nature of this particular misinformation. Thanks to @how-obvious for pointing it out to me. While looking up Nikki Baxter on the preferred search engine Duckduckgo, a Family Guy fanon Wikipedia page pops up that wrongfully names a character from Rooster Teeth's web series Camp Camp as Nikki Baxter instead of her real name, just "Nikki":

Nicholette "Nikki" Baxter is the tertiary protagonist of the Rooserteeth animated series, Camp Camp. She appeared in the Family Guy episode,

Nicolette, who prefers to go by Nikki, is one of the main characters of Camp Camp. She is an Adventure Camp camper at Camp Campbell but was

If you follow the Family Guy fanon Wikipedia paper trail, you first encounter the story of Max and Nikki from Camp Camp, where each episode they try to escape a summer camp, and fail. This parallels the story of Max and Holly, trying to escape Vecna's mind, dubbed Camasotz, and fail (potentially). A classic conformitygate reading.

Then, eventually you come across this piece of information:

This does NOT happen in "Cat Fight". @livinglikelarries and her friend had taken the arduous task of watching Season 18 Episode 5 of Family Guy. They confirmed the following:

- Camp Camp and Nikki and Max are NOT featured in S18E05.

- The B plot of Cat Fight is Chris, Lois and Meg ending up in some Christian cult and having to escape. Then, Meg goes home with a Japanese family, thinking she's finally free from her OG family and the Christian cult. But, she actually realizes that she ended up in an oppressive family yet again and is part of an anime. (Angry she's in another prison world, she kills the family. Edit: last part only acc to the fanon wiki btw)

Meg has the same name as the protagonist of A Wrinkle in Time. Meg being stuck again and again in worlds she doesn't want to be in (og family, cult, japanese family, anime), parallels both Camasotz from A Wrinkle in Time and and Vecna's mind in Stranger Things. Another classic conformitygate reading.

Mistakenly taking the information on the Family Guy fanon wikipedia page at face value, leads you into one direction only: interpreting Nikki Baxter as more conformitygate proof!

Of course, knowing that this is misinformation, we cannot make those parallels. Or can we? Anyone can edit the Family Guy fanon wikipedia page, since the majority of fanon wikis are fanfic projects anyway. The question is: Was this a coincidental mistake, a troll or intentional bait?

That's left up to the reader to decide, but consider that the combination of names, Nikki Baxter, does not exist outside of the Stranger Things: Tales of '85 context.

F. Summary and concluding remarks

We stumbled upon multiple glaring oddities:

0. Many articles report the exact same information and criticism on Jan 28 (2026), pointing out the weirdness surrounding Stranger Things: Tales of '85 and a supposed new character, Nikki Baxter.

1. She is only mentioned as Nikki in one official source: a synopsis of Chapter Book for Stranger Things: Tales of '85, which claims to have 6-9 year olds as a target audience, while context is needed from the show's content that is rated 13+. This Chapter Book was referenced by a Reddit post on Jan 24 (2026) that is one of the two sources in most articles reporting on the animation.

2. In both an official announcement trailer on Netflix's YouTube channel and on the IMDB page for the animation, she is not mentioned, does not have a voice actor and no character design. There is also only one episode listed.

3. There is one mention of her first and last name and a small description of her character design in a dubious Collider article from June 2025.

4. Only one picture of her exists, where she's wrapped in vines. It was posted on Jan 24 (2026), on a suspicious Twitter account called @BradleysBigBuy. This is one of the two sources for most articles reporting on the animation.

5. A Family Guy fanon Wikipedia page lists misinformation about Nikki from Rooster Teeth's web series Camp Camp that conveniently creates parallels between A Wrinkle in Time, Camasotz and Vecna's mind.

As Mr. "There are no coincidences", in my opinion, Nikki Baxter is one of the many puzzle pieces in the Stranger Things meta narrative, social experiment and ARG. I urge the reader to try and explain why we are observing all of this at the exact same time. Just this one character is involved in 5 major inconsistencies, that cannot really be explained outside of a conformitygate perspective.

Either you believe all news sources are spreading misinformation by sourcing an AI/fake image, or you think they are referencing an actual leak account and/or Netflix plant Edit: OR THEY ARE SOURCING A HIGHLY FAN EDITED PHOTO, WHILE THERE IS CONCEPT ART ON ANOTHER MORE CREDIBLE TWITTER ACCOUNT

Regardless, why are news outlets not being corrected or given additional context by Netflix and the Stranger Things social media and PR teams?

While I don't think the animation doesn't exist at all, I am actually quite certain there is an animation of some kind due to the IMDB page, I believe that the secrecy around it and the listing of only one episode of unknown length is at least suspicious, considering this animation should have already been months if not a year in the making.

The minimal content we've been provided, the couple of frames and concept art, the Chapter Book with no cover art, that one Twitter "leak", it points to the animation not quite being what it seems. Is it perhaps a narrative device inside this Stranger Things ARG, rather than a television show for 6-9 year olds? I don't know for sure, but I have gathered facts that seem to point towards that conclusion.

Especially the negative focus on Nikki Baxter in the press and the misinformation about Nikki from Rooster Teeth's Camp Camp leads me to believe we are supposed to notice that something's off. Rather than a bunch of coincidences, these inconsistencies seem intentional and purposeful.

Thank you for reading this far :)

[nuffit]

the ship name of nikki baxter and el is nickelback. send post

[pancak3sandbac0n]

Charlie: The Real Will

I'm convinced that T85 is some kind of vision for Mike, and everything we see is from his POV, which means that the Will we see is how Mike views Will.

I think the real Will is represented by Charlie.

What happens to Charlie in T85 mirrors Will's possession story and shows how he can be freed by Mike's love.

The first time we see Charlie, he's wearing a yellow hoodie, which is Will's color.

He gets taken (in the woods) by the vine monster, which grabs him by the face in a way that looks similar to what happened when the Mind Flayer possessed Will on the field.

Charlie ends up being inside the Snow Shark. He's got a vine hooked up to his mouth, so it can use him as a host.

When El rips Charlie out of the Snow Shark, we can see from his eyes that even though he's out of the Snow Shark, he's still possessed. He's still connected to the hivemind just like Will was after he came back from the UD in S1 and got his true sight and again after they got the Mind Flayer particles out of him in S2 and he started getting his "goosies".

The next time we see Charlie, he's wearing a red (Vecna) hoodie. And he keeps wearing it for the rest of the show.

He tells Dustin that he saw a red light at the top of a tower, which looks a lot like the the WSQK tower, which is where the Mind Flayer particles went when Will connected to Henry and got possessed again.

The red shading on Charlie's image of the tower also reminds me of Will's demovision, which aligns with Charlie seeing the tower from the queen's POV.

When they run into Charlie later at the arcade, he's got huge purple bags under eyes, almost like he hasn't been sleeping well.

In detention, Mike, Will, and Nikki get chased through the hallways by the monster. They're about to escape when Will and Nikki remember they had to go back to save Charlie. Interestingly, Mike didn't want to. He just wanted them to save themselves.

If real Will is the builder of this Camazotz type of world that they're in, Mike doesn't really want it to end. He doesn't want to save Will because then they could get out, and he's comfortable here.

Sure there are still monsters, but he's got his safe, seemingly happy relationship with El. T85 is set before S3, which is when he started really overcompensating for his feelings. It's when the lip glances started and when he started making a really strong effort to "grow up."

T85 is also set before he found out that Will's gay, so he didn't have to think about the possibility of them actually being together and be sad that they couldn't be because (he thought) Will was over him.

In this world he (and probably Will as the builder) has created, Mike can go on thinking that he's straight and not in love with Will.

But even in this world that's he's made for himself, Will and Nikki (his queer self-insert) know that they need to save Charlie (real Will), and Mike reluctantly agrees.

The plant monster attacks Charlie, again by grabbing his face, which also looks very similar to the way Vecna places his claw over people's faces. (We don't really get an angle like that when he does it to Will in Escape from Camazotz, but it's the same motion Vecna uses on him.)

They manage to get it to release Charlie, but after this second time he's been attacked, he goes into a trance.

Will says that creature got him once before and wants him back (I'm losing my mind about Will's hospital gown being covered in triangles).

The thing that actually kills the monster is the potato taser that Will throws at it (mixing with the goo Nikki/Mike's queerness poured on it). The electricity sets it on fire.

Remember that this is Mike's vision of Will. He sees Will as the one with the electricity.

Then we get this interaction:

Nikki (Mike's queer self-insert) asks Will if she can still join the party, and Mike leaves that decision up to Will.

Mike's queerness is asking Will whether he'd accept it, and Mike is letting Will say what he wants instead of assuming that his queerness would be unwelcome, which is what he's always done before.

Will says Nikki can join, and that's the moment Charlie stops being possessed.

All Mike needs to do to save Will is stop assuming that Will won't want him and let himself be vulnerable enough to actually ask.

Once Charlie's ok, Mike pulls the fire alarm so that someone will find him.

They don't have sprinklers that go off in the show, but that's what I associate fire alarms with.

Fire and water are often used to represent hate and love, respectively, in art, and I'm convinced that water (love) will play a big roll in the actual ending to the show.

Setting off the fire alarm here subtextually indicates that Mike wants to stop hating himself and allow his love for Will to come through.

[somethingaboutathing]

THIS SHOT IS FRYING ME SO BAD LMAOOOO.

the gang and that one person nobody invited