'Stranger Things': 11 amazing fan art homages to the show's kick-ass women

Sure, Netflix‘s new creepy, retro-inspired horror hit, Stranger Things, has great male characters, including a gang of bike-riding, mystery-solving boys, a grizzled, gruff police chief, and a mad scientist. But the women of the show—Eleven, Nancy Wheeler, and Will’s mom Joyce Byers—provide a lot of the strength, intelligence and perseverance required to defeat the monstrous thing that plagues the town of Hawkins. At first they each seem like typical damsels in distress, but they each turn out to be so much more. And among those of us who have fallen in love with the ladies of Stranger Things are artists. There’s so much Stranger Things fan art, and so much of it is glorious: Benny! Barb! Dustin! Lucas! Someone even created VHS packaging for the show!!!

But the illustrations and graphics we love best are the ones that celebrate the kick-ass women in the series. Below, some of the most amazing ones we’ve seen:

1. Artist Big Mike Walton calls this a “digital doodle,” but it captures Eleven’s intensity more than you’d think something called a “doodle” ever could.

2. Ohio illustrator Lisa Sterle put Nancy Wheeler in a T-shirt you can buy from Human.

3. Ryan Maniulit sketched Nancy armed and ready (with Jonathan and his nail-bat) as well as Eleven and some of her outfit changes.

4. Artist Glen Brogan imagined the show as a classic ’80s Dungeons and Dragons book.

5. English illustrator Emmeline Pidgen made this beautiful animated gif of Joyce Byers and her lights.

6. Simple, yet so cool: Matheus Bitencourt of Brazil has created some minimalist, retro Stranger Things pixel art… more here!

7. Cheyne Gallarde is an artist and illustrator who lives in Hawaii, and his drawing of Joyce cradling her lights is hauntingly beautiful.

8. Illustrator Brandan Ray Leathead sketched a much, much more frazzled Joyce. Hello from the Upside Down!

9. Adrien ADN Noterdaem made the Simpsons version of Eleven! More Simpsons’d Stranger Things characters here. (Dustin looks a lot like Nelson Muntz!)

10a, 10b. Marilia Feldhues’s drawings of Nancy and Joyce really capture the wary vigilance, anxiety and paranoia. It’s all in the eyes.

11. Lastly: How incredible is this Eleven diorama by Cuddles and Rage—complete with tiny Eggos?!?!?

Ugh. That was 11 but here are a few more, by Miranda Meeks, Crystal Graziano, and Edwardian Taylor, because I can’t resist. I just love Eleven so much.

Oh, and there’s this:

Bonus: What if Stranger Things were a video game?