Millie Bobby Brown, the actress who plays Eleven on Netflix’s Stranger Things, is the youngest person to ever be named on the TIME 100 list. This list of the hundred most influential people on the planet is selected by TIME’s editors, from nominations suggested by the magazine’s readers, writing staff and alumni from previous TIME 100 lists.
As well as starring in both seasons that we’ve seen so far of Stranger Things, Millie Bobby Brown has also nabbed a role in a big blockbuster for next year – Godzilla: King Of The Monsters. She has also been seen in music videos for The xx and Sigma. The 14-year-old actor has 16.2 million followers on Instagram, at the time of writing.
Breaking Bad star Aaron Paul wrote a mini-essay for TIME to accompany Brown’s spot on the list. He recounted meeting Brown for the first time, a couple of years ago:
“She may have been 12 in years, but her spirit and mind were timeless […] A wise woman was speaking from her cherubic face. It was like speaking to a future mentor with a perspective and groundedness that I could only have dreamed of at that age. Or at any age, if I’m being honest.”
Indeed, Brown’s maturity and her groundedness are part of what helped her become a global icon. Her bad-ass performance as Eleven got Brown noticed, but her own persona has played an equal part in making Brown so popular and influential.