"Escape From Camazotz," the sixth episode of Stranger Things 5, has been circled in my mind since the episode titles were announced in the fall of 2024. I think fans started putting the connections together between where Max was and A Wrinkle in Time at that point.
It became very clear in Stranger Things 5 Vol. 1 that Max and Holly would be stuck in "Camazotz" as they call it until that episode of the season. And, after watching Stranger Things 5 Vol. 2, it's probably the best episode of the season for a bunch of reasons.
Spoilers ahead for Stranger Things 5 episode 6, "Escape From Camazotz."
One of those is just how impactful the episode was for Max (Sadie Sink) and Holly (Nell Fisher). Let's talk about what Camazotz really is and break down this duo's big escape during the best episode of the season so far.
Camazotz is a reference to A Wrinkle in Time, but it's really Vecna's mindscape
All of the characters in Stranger Things use Dungeons & Dragons and other forms of pop/nerd culture (movies, shows, and books) to understand what's happening to them. It's been happening since, literally, the first episode of the series.
Well, Camazotz is a reference to A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle, which is the book Holly's class is reading in the series. Mr. Whatsit, which is Henry Creel/Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) in disguise, is also a reference to one of the characters in the book.
In the story, Camazotz a distant planet, a Utopia of sorts, controlled by IT, which is a lieutenant of sorts of The Black Thing, which is kind of like The Mind Flayer in Stranger Things. It's also where the father of the main character, Meg, is being held captive, very much like Max and Holly in Stranger Things 5.
When Max finds Holly in the first few episodes of the season, Holly begins referencing where they are as Camazotz.
So, that's the basics of what you need to know about Camazotz. What it really is, the place Holly and Max are being held, within the context of Stranger Things 5 is much more interesting.
In Stranger Things 5, though, Camazotz isn't some faraway planet. It's literally Vecna's mind. Basically, he puts these kids into a trance, and then he welcomes them, not so pleasantly, into his mind where he holds them captive.
We've known for the whole season basically that Camazotz, as Holly dubs it, is just Vecna's mindscape, or his memories. He's basically manipulating Max, Holly, and the other kids to hallucinate that they are in Creel House, or other parts of Vecna's mind. That's not to be confused with the Mind Lair, which is the red "room" of sorts that Max escape back in season 4.
That's sort of confusing for a lot of fans, but it was explained pretty well in Stranger Things 5 Vol. 2. Max and Holly aren't actually in comas. They are simply in a trance controlled by Vecna. He's trapped them, in other words, within his mind.
How do Max and Holly escape Camazotz?
In Stranger Things 5 Vol. 2, Holly panics after learning Vecna's true plan to reshape the world. She runs to Max, is overheard by Derek (Jake Connelly), and must change plans. They have to escape quickly.
To do so, Max takes Holly through her earliest memories of Mr. Whatsit. Even though Holly doesn't remember, Mr. Whatsit has always been there, waiting. Eventually, they make their way through the right memories and get close to escaping, but then Vecna catches them. Luckily, Will (Noah Schnapp) steps in and uses his powers to save Max and Holly.
They run back to the safety of the cave before venturing back out. Thanks to Holly's spyglass, she realizes where they need to go, and they find a hole in the ground to underground tunnels in the desert. There, they see a young Henry Creel get shot by a scientist with a briefcase. This hints at Henry's first encounter with the Mind Flayer in the stage play Stranger Things: The First Shadow, but that's for another time.
Holly and Max forged ahead and hear music, which leads them through a tunnel blocked by rocks. Eventually, they get through, and as we just saw in "Escape From Camazotz," they make their way back to Vecna's Mind Lair to open up portals to get back to their real bodies.
Max can easily walk through the portal to Lucas, who is playing her song, Kate Bush's "Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)." But, she explains to Holly that she needs to find her real body somewhere in this hellscape and make a portal to it, which she does very easily with the power of believing, or we are led to believe.
At the end of "Escape From Camazotz" when Max and Holly run through Vecna's memories and make it back to the lobby of sorts inside Vecna's mind. The only problem is that Holly is very, very far from her home.
My working theory is that, because she's getting powers the same way that Will got powers, through the Mind Flayer/Vecna, Holly might have some special abilities, like Will, that she's just learning how to use. We'll have to wait and see if that's true, though!
We'll find out in the finale of Stranger Things 5 on Dec. 31!