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'SNL' spoofs 'Stranger Things' with Natalie Portman as Eleven

Nosebleeds are nothing compared to the disturbing side effects suffered by the other special kids in this parody.

Gael Cooper
CNET editor Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, a journalist and pop-culture junkie, is co-author of "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s," as well as "The Totally Sweet '90s." She's been a journalist since 1989, working at Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, Twin Cities Sidewalk, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and NBC News Digital. She's Gen X in birthdate, word and deed. If Marathon candy bars ever come back, she'll be first in line.
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Gael Cooper

"Stranger Things" fans received a sneak peek at the show's third season Saturday night. OK, not the real third season, but a parody imagined by "Saturday Night Live" that cast host Natalie Portman playing as Eleven.

More from 'SNL'

Fans of the real Netflix show know Eleven, played by Millie Bobby Brown, possesses supernatural powers, but when she uses them, she gets tiny nosebleeds. In the sketch, Eleven meets up with a variety of other special kids, and learns their powers also come at a cost. A weird, creepy, sometimes super-disturbing cost.

Fourteen (Beck Bennett) can start fires with his mind, but he throws up in his mouth a little each time. Nine (Cecily Strong) can read people's minds, but with a flatulent side effect. And the other kids' powers get more disturbing from there.

The skit came less than a month after a Twitter thread that pointed out Brown and Portman look alike.

As for the real "Stranger Things" third season, devotees likely will have to wait until 2019 to return to spooky Hawkins, Indiana.