The Duffer Brothers' hugely successful Stranger Things is now into its fifth and final season, bringing to a close the '80s-infused horror sci-fi series that kicked off all the way back in 2016.
Nostalgia for the decade that gave us the Compact Disc and Prozac is a huge part of Stranger Things' appeal, and we've already seen pop culture icons like Ghostbusters, Dragon's Lair and Transformers referenced in previous seasons.
Video games are featured again in season five, but it seems that the researchers behind a particular scene in the third episode didn't do quite enough groundwork.
In the scene, Derek Turnbow (Jake Connelly) is seen playing on his beloved NES, but the game on the TV is a title that never actually launched on Nintendo's best-selling 8-bit: 1988's Ghouls 'n Ghosts.
Granted, the NES famously played host to that game's forerunner, 1985's Ghosts 'n Goblins, but the only consoles the sequel was only ever released on were the Sega Master System, Sega Genesis / Mega Drive and NEC SuperGrafx (the latter of which was never released officially outside of Japan).
You might assume this was a case of someone being asked to source footage of the NES port of Ghosts 'n Goblins and getting mixed up, but no – when Turnbow's sister swipes the cart out of the console, it clearly has a Ghouls 'n Ghosts sticker on it.
So, this is clearly an intentional choice – but I have no idea why that's the case.
And regardless, it's hard for me to feel too smug about this observation, because, in the alternate reality in which Turnbow resides, every kid has a Hang-On cabinet in their bedroom. The lucky gits.
The Ghosts 'n Goblins series would continue with titles such as Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts, Ultimate Ghosts 'n Goblins, and Ghosts 'n Goblins Resurrection.
Thanks to Shiryu for pointing this out!