Stranger Things' Jamie Campbell Bower Explains Why He 'Sympathizes' With Vecna

This article contains spoilers for "Stranger Things" Season 4.

The fourth season of "Stranger Things" has given fans plenty to talk about, but one of the most popular topics has been Vecna, the season's most disturbing monster and the newest entity to be introduced from the parallel dimension, the Upside Down. Vecna fascinated, perplexed, and terrified fans with his systematic approach to stalking and murdering traumatized and guilt-ridden Hawkins High School students. As Vecna's reign of terror continued, it was hard not to wonder what his endgame was and if Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) and her friends could stop him.

Vecna's actions were unforgivable, and when it was revealed that Vecna is also Henry Creel — a psychic boy who harbors a vendetta against the entire human race and murdered his mother and sister without remorse — the feeling that Vecna was irredeemable only deepened. But there's one person who admits to sympathizing with the character: the actor who plays him, Jamie Campbell Bower. In a conversation with Looper and other outlets, Bower explained why he understands and even loves Vecna.

In order to play Vecna, Jamie Campbell Bower did a deep dive into the character's psyche and came to deeply relate to him, even drawing from emotions from his own life to get to know him better. "For me, [Henry's transformation into Vecna] was about building on that feeling of being isolated and sitting in that hatred ... The thought process [for Vecna] that I would often write down or that I would say to myself over and over again is, 'You took everything from me. Now I'm going to take everything from you.'"

"I don't know if that comes from personal experience actually, of being isolated, of feeling isolated," Bower continued. "Time can be a very interesting thing when you're in those places, particularly for me. Time can pass quite quickly and days and nights don't seem to mean anything. They just become a bit of a blur. So maybe I was drawing on my own personal experience from that."

All of his work to understand Vecna led Bower to sympathize deeply with the character. "In terms of, 'Do I find him to be sympathetic?' Not particularly. But do I sympathize with him? 100%," Bower shared. "I have to. As an artist and as an actor playing the role, I have to love the person that I'm playing and justify. But I did see him as this 'righteous justice in this very cruel, oppressive world,' to quote the script. So I could relate — had to relate — but can relate."

Every episode of "Stranger Things" Season 4 is now available on Netflix.