Billy Boyd chides Sean Astin over his Stranger Things death: ‘Why didn't he just keep running?'

A mini-Hobbit reunion at New York Comic Con today turned into a pretty funny conversation about Stranger Things. 

At the SYFY WIRE Live Stage Saturday afternoon, Lord of the Rings stars Sean Astin (Sam) and Billy Boyd (Pippin) got together to spin a few yarns about their time making Peter Jackson's Oscar-winning trilogy. Before long, however, the conversation started drifting to Stranger Things, Specifically, Astin's ill-fated RadioShack manager Bob Newby, who was a major character in the show's second season. But things got really entertaining once Boyd started teasing Astin about how Bob died. 

"When Bob could've ran away from that monster, and he just stopped," Boyd began, echoing a sentiment he'd made the day prior. "Why didn't he just keep running?"

Netflix

Amidst the laughter from the crowd, (partially because Boyd does have a point), Astin took the ribbing from his former co-star in stride and recalled the moment he knew that things were "not going well" for his character as he read through the script. Specifically, action descriptions like "Bob stops running" and "Demogorgon Demodogs crash through the door." 

"At this point, I just put the script down," Astin admitted. "The Duffer brothers were really sweet. They were like 'I couldn't sleep last night, I hated killing Bob so much. It was ripping my guts out, having to kill Bob.' I go, 'Really?' and he goes...[in a suddenly upbeat tone] 'Yeah.'"

Astin also added that his daughter, who after binge-watching all of Season 2, assured her dad that his character had "a good death." When he asked how she felt about his death, she simply replied: "Dad, it's Stranger Things. Somebody has to die." 

Click here for SYFY WIRE’s full coverage of New York Comic Con 2019, including up-to-the-minute news, exclusive interviews, and videos.