Credit: Stranger Things
Jamie Campbell Bower is a man known to many. After all, he plays a wonderful character on a show most beloved by most. Though the character and the actor only showed up in season four, it seems he’s made quite the mark. He was credited as playing the role of Vecna from Stranger Things, but also another character. As it happens, those unfamiliar with the show are not sure what to think. He’s credited online as playing Henry Creel/One/Vecna, and then there’s news that the Stranger Things star is also a character called Peter Ballad. What is going on?
Where Did Vecna Stranger Things Come From?
The release of season four in 2022 brought Vecna to light. He’s not a good guy at all. He gets off on murdering people and leaving them with imploded heads and broken bones. His special love of killing people involves finding those who have dealt with their own trauma in the past and killing them. First, however, he likes to make them relive the horrors of their lives by getting into their heads and making it feel that they are going through their own nightmarish hell once more. That’s when he breaks bones and causes heads to explode and all that fun television stuff.
However, when Vecna appeared, no one knew who he was. It was later revealed that he had been the man behind so many things that happened in Upside Down in the past. For many, this made a lot of sense. But, for some who pay close attention, it led to another question. Who is Peter Ballad?
Credit: Stranger Things
Who is Vecna Stranger Things and the Peter Ballad Character?
It turns out that the actor was listed as playing the role of Peter Ballad before the fourth season aired. The character of Peter Ballad was listed as a rather bland and generic type. He’s working in a psychiatric hospital. There was not much else said about the character, but it was the one the network listed as Jamie Campbell Bower’s character. Was this so fans would not learn he was Vecna or suspect that he was someone worthwhile? And who is Peter Ballad?
Here’s what Bower had to say about it when he was finally able to talk about being One/Vecna Stranger Things’ bad guy. “I have no idea where the name Peter Ballad came from. I can only apologize to fans of the show for being part of such a massive red herring. I remember seeing it and being like, ‘Okay, guys. Cheers! That’s going to be a tough one if anybody asks me, but I’ll just go with the party line’.” It was a lie, and he knew this from the start. However, he was not free to say anything or give anything away.
How Does Jamie Campbell Bower Feel About Vecna Stranger Things?
At the end of the day, fans know more about him than they did when the first began. We’ve only known about him for a few months, but the actor loved playing the character. For him, being the bad guy was easy. He loved it, and he loved all the makeup and prosthetics. However, the voice was a problem. He didn’t feel he had the voice for this role and worked hard on it. He had everything else but struggled to find the right voice. We do, however, think he found it. The one thing he didn’t find difficult was the character’s feelings. Being Vecna in Stranger Things was not difficult. He could feel the character.
Credit: Stranger Things
He knew what the character wanted. How the character felt. He knew how the character would behave. But, it took him some time, a lot of recordings, scary music, and a lot of back-and-forths to figure out the sound. He did, though; we cannot imagine Vecna sounding another way.
What About Season Five
The fifth and final season hasn’t begun filming. It’s rumored it might release sometime in 2024, but we have no idea. The script is not written as far as we know, so what might happen to Vecna in the future does remain a mystery. For the time being, however, this character is more powerful than most thought. Peter Ballad, on the other hand, doesn’t exist. The character was made up and used for the sake of not telling fans who this actor might play.
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