The best sketch from the recent Saturday Night Live episode hosted by Lin-Manuel Miranda apparently unraveled on of the biggest mysteries from Netflix’s hit show Stranger Things: Where are Lucas’s parents? SNL gave us the answer, but there’s a problem — we’ve actually seen Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair on-screen before.
In SNL’s sketch, the Sinclairs are hilariously ticked off that their son (played by cast member Sasheer Zamata) has allegedly been off fighting the Demogorgon and trying to find Will in the Upside Down with his best friends Mike and Dustin. When Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair hear it from their son directly, they don’t buy it. In the sketch, written by Zamata, Lucas’s parents are played by Leslie Jones and Kenan Thompson, and are introduced as if they were left out of the show completely (another high point is when Thompson and Jones immediately put their hands up and scream when Chief Hopper shows up).
The problem for any Stranger Things superfan is that the sketch ignores the fact that the Sinclairs showed up in” Chapter 5: The Flea and the Acrobat.”
It's unspecified, but Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair.
They can be seen standing behind Lucas, grieving along with their son at Will’s funeral. Granted, they don’t have any lines and they aren’t seen ever again in the season, but that’s definitely them. They’re excluded from the show, but it’s for reasons of economy.
They just aren’t as important to the narrative of the show as, say, Mike’s parents. But, to be fair, if Jones and Thompson showed up as their version of the Sinclairs in Stranger Things Season 2, we wouldn’t complain.
Hopefully SNL — or the second season of the show — eventually answers the real question: Just where exactly are Dustin’s parents?
