The Stranger Things cast is reportedly getting an incredible pay raise for season 5 of the series after a successful round of negotiations with Netflix. Stranger Things season 4 took the world by storm after it debuted last year on Netflix, with suspenseful episodes that were filled to the brim with horror elements, maybe even more so than any other season of the series. The new season of Stranger Things also stood out due to the movie length of its episodes, with most of the season’s 9 entries clocking in around 75 minutes and the big season finale being a bona fide movie, almost reaching a runtime of 2 hours and 30 minutes.

A comprehensive report from Puck reveals that the Stranger Things cast united to renegotiate their deals for the final season of the show. According to the report, Stranger Things 5’s extensive cast was separated by Netflix into four tiers during the round of negotiations. Tier 1 ($9.5 million): Winona Ryder and David Harbour, the adult stars of the series; Tier 2 (just over $7 million): the four boys—Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp, and Finn Wolfhard—plus Sadie Sink, who pleaded Max’s importance to the show and got added here; Tier 3 (just over $6 million): the other main stars, including Joe Keery, Natalia Dyer, Maya Hawke, and Charlie Heaton; Tier 4 includes everybody else. Star Millie Bobby Brown gets paid for the series through a separate, and very lucrative, overall deal with Netflix.

These Huge Payouts Aren’t The Highest TV Salaries Ever

While the Stranger Things season 5 salaries grant the cast millions of dollars for the 8-episode final season, Netflix is keeping the math as diluted by 10 episodes to aid future negotiations on other shows. The respective fees are pretty tame compared to different known payouts from shows whose popularity is akin to Stranger Things. The cast of The Big Bang Theory, whose united front when renegotiating deals became well-known, was making $900,000 per episode during the show’s final season for a whopping $21.6 million for the entirety of season 12.

Another comparison could be made to HBO’s Game of Thrones, which paid its main stars $500,000 per episode, putting the series below Stranger Things. Still, the Netflix series’ cast fees don’t come close to the highest TV salaries ever, such as Charlie Sheen’s $1.8 million per episode on Two and a Half Men or The Terminal List for which Chris Pratt got a sum of $1.4 million per episode.

What These Cast Salaries Say About Stranger Things Season 5

Stranger Things will have to kill Vecna in the final season, the greatest villain the show has presented so far. Vecna displayed a wide array of powers during Stranger Things season 4, which required extensive special effects work, especially with the long runtime of episodes. The huge salaries the cast has renegotiated for Stranger Things season 5 show that Netflix means business, as the streamer will be spending an enormous amount of money before shooting a single scene of the final season. With that level of confidence from Netflix, audiences can rest easy knowing Stranger Things season 5 will have the budget it needs to present the ending Netflix’s most popular show deserves.