Writer takes Stranger Things creators to trial for allegedly stealing his idea

A while back, writer Charlie Kessler sued Matt and Ross Duffer for allegedly stealing his idea for a sci-fi show set near an abandoned military base and turning into Netflix’s massive hit Stranger Things, which is, admittedly, about that, more or less. A lot of Kessler’s case is based on a conversation he had with the Duffers at the 2014 Tribeca Film Festival, where he allegedly gave them the idea. He also wrote a 2011 film called Montauk, about allegedly skeevy government experiments that went down at the Montauk Air Force Station on Long Island, and alleges that the Duffers could have lifted material from that. In their motion for summary judgment, the Duffers were having none of it:

"Charlie Kessler asserts that he met the Duffers, then two young filmmakers whom Kessler never had heard of, and chatted with them for ten to fifteen minutes. That casual conversation — during which the Duffers supposedly said that they all ‘should work together’ and asked ‘what [Kessler] was working on’ — is the sole basis for the alleged implied contract at issue in this lawsuit and for Kessler’s meritless theory that the Duffers used his ideas to create Stranger Things."

The Duffers alleged other facts, including that they couldn’t have stolen the idea for Stranger Things from Kessler because they were talking about it and planning for it long before they met the guy, citing emails sent as far back as 2010. According to their motion, they were already scouting locations when they attending the film festival. Still, per The Hollywood Reporter, Los Angeles Superior Judge Michael Stern has rejected their motion for summary judgment, basically because the Duffers can’t definitively prove a lot of their defensive claims to the point where they’d justify summary judgment. As for whether the Duffers and Kessler intended to enter into an implied contract in the Tribeca Film Festival, those issues are best decided by a “trier of fact.” Basically, it looks like this case will go to trial in early May.

And that could be awkward for Stranger Things fans, because it’s possible that details about the third season — to drop on Netflix July 4 — could come out in the trial. The Duffers are already trying to seal portions of the trial, reasoning with the judge that “public disclosure threatens substantial harm not only to [the Duffers’] legitimate privacy interests, but also as to their ongoing commercial efforts, including by revealing confidential information that may be included in future episodes of Stranger Things and weakening the Duffers’ (and Netflix’s) position in future commercial negotiations.”

Basically, it’s a No Spoilers motion. This is the future.

Kessler is looking for damages equal to a third of what the Duffers have made off the show, which is probably a whole hell of a lot. Apart from the Stranger Things spoilers, it’s possible we’ll something through this trial about Netflix’s finances, a subject the streaming giant is loathe to discuss. At the moment, the trial is scheduled to begin May 6.

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