Stranger Things

[Kracker]

Kate Bush made $2.3 million dollars in the last month thanks to “Running Up That Hill” being popularized by the new season

Amazing what can happen when you finally decide to license out your music.

[tenia]

The last two episodes of S4 dropped today and the finale is clocking in at 2.5 hours. What kind of streaming audience, with attention spans exponentially-reducing by the day, is asking for bulk-sized bites of content like this? Props to the creators for just doing what they want I guess, since plenty of us who swore off the show keep coming back to touch the stove anyways.. I doubt they're losing viewers

I don't think audiences were asking for this. I also wonder how the runtime of this 4th season could have perfectly been split into 50 min episodes instead.
I've read people saying there were going to binge the season 4B and I was like "it's only 2 episodes, though".

[therewillbeblus]

But it’s the equivalent of like the first season timewise. It’s also so bloated and the finale is basically one long forced cry. Maybe the worst, or at least most excruciating episodes of TV I’ve seen.

[Mr Sausage]

Flaws aside, I'm mostly astonished at how they could take such an unwieldy mass of material and craft such a comprehensible story from it. There is just so much stuff here, so many characters, plot lines, situations, etc., and at no point are you ever lost or confused, the story is never hard to follow, and the way each section fits together is never unclear. It's a remarkable feat of organization, because the slightest misstep and this whole baggy thing would collapse. And it doesn't. Yeah, the need to maintain coherence often means the material has no emotional heft or, you know, life, leading to many, many attempts to generate emotion or effect through sheer mechanical effort. But still, I'm kind of impressed.

Stray thoughts:

SpoilerShow

-The show seems to realize what was apparent in season 2: Mike's character is not important any more. He was the centre of season 1, the Henry-Thomas-in-E.T. role. But once Eleven was was out of his basement and the plot stopped being about 1 creature, there was nothing for him to be at the centre of. Since season 2, the situations have all been way too big for him to play any central role in (someone with more authority had to take that role) and he can no longer know anything crucial other characters don't. And because his role in season 1 was defined by his relationship with Eleven, he has no other role to play in subsequent seasons. He's Eleven's bf, that's it. So the show addresses it with a weird speech about Mike being 'the heart' of the group. Which is nice in theory, but both A. untrue generally, and B. not actually how the show characterizes him, since his arc every season involves him being super self-involved and having to learn to recognize others.

-The show has a bad habit of taking popular characters and beefing up their roles by making them obnoxious butts of humour. Like Hopper in season 3 modeling himself on Magnum P.I., or here, with Maya Hawke's character turning into a weird bumbler who prattles on endlessly. Wasn't she a sharp, sarcastic character who was self-aware in season 3?

-Lotta 'isn't being gay so tragic!' stuff this season. And with two separate characters! Jeez. Honestly, the best thing the show could do is have Mike realize he's actually gay, too, and date Will. Then you get less weepy unrequited love nonsense, and Mike would actually be interesting again.

-They killed off Mathew Modine again? Surely the dramatic option is to save him for at least one face-to-face with Vecna, right? Not shooting him in the desert.

-Eleven watching while Lucas cradles the dying Max was super effective. Most of the emotional beats this season were perfunctory, but that one worked. I wonder if she is actually dead, and Vecna has hidden away in her empty mind somewhere, making her the villain next season. Or if she'll just wake up and everything's fine.

[therewillbeblus]

Great thoughts, Maya Hawke was the only redeeming aspect of S3 and they completely mutilated her character. I'm mostly just astonished that everyone involved seems to believe that they're doing something novel each season, when they're fighting the same threat, with the same basic approach/interventions, and having the same kind of emotional experiences. It's so rote, banal, and not self-aware in the least. Something like the ending bit with Modine, while ridiculous, was at least a new setting/way to engage with that character and concept... sorta

[Mr Sausage]

Was musing on the show's attitude towards heavy metal (a big part of the theme for this season). In Season 2, heavy metal was used to characterize Billy, one of the minor antagonists. He listened mainly to the popular glam metal stuff, sure, but right before his father abuses him and he goes off looking for Max in his big, final aggressive act of the season, I remember he listens to Metallica's The Four Horseman (interesting for a glam metal guy to have what was then an underground record). Seems plain the heavy, aggressive music is meant to suggest something about his negative character traits.

But now we have the new season, where heavy metal has been incorporated into the sympathy-for-the-outsiders theme the show has going. Heavy metal is now like D&D in the show: an outsider passion unfairly used to ostracize and demonize people, but knowledge of which gives the characters power to fight evil. Outsider culture as a secret force for good and a positive aspect of one's character. And this is communicated with another Metallica song, Master of Puppets, which plays a central role in the episode and becomes a key part of one character's arc.

So the show's attitude to culture can be weird. It can both embrace 80s mainstream attitudes as character shorthand (heavy metal = aggression and danger) while later embracing the counter attitude (heavy metal = unfairly maligned outsider passion). I'm sure the show does this in other areas, it's just weird to see it doing that so nakedly by using the same band to communicate mutually exclusive things.

[MV88]

Like most of the people who have commented here thus far, I have very mixed feelings about this season overall. The ensemble continues to be incredibly likable, which at this point is really what's keeping me interested enough to watch. But beyond that, this season in particular relied far too much on exposition for my taste (including not just one but several instances of the "longwinded villain monologue" trope), and the pacing of the multiple storylines was a bit frustrating at times. This was also the first time in the series that I really felt the weight of how repetitive it's starting to become, with certain plot points and climactic moments essentially amounting to slightly altered rehashes of things done in previous seasons.

My biggest gripe, though, is that it's becoming increasingly clear that the show isn't so much interested in exploring the themes it brings up as it is in simply using them as either convenient plot points or, worse yet, as empty references that serve only to make the more ardent '80s pop culturists among the fan base feel pleased with themselves for catching. And yes, I know that it's to some extent been doing that since the very beginning, but the problem I'm having is that more so than previous seasons, this season seems to think it's doing something deeper when it's really only peripherally acknowledging those deeper themes without actually engaging with them in a meaningful way. The first season managed to incorporate some heartfelt moments while overall adhering to the lighter tone typical of the '80s pop culture it referenced, but by this point it's apparent that the Duffer Brothers want this to be seen a (relatively) serious show that's not afraid to address dark subject matter and is much more than just a fun throwback to the pop culture of their youth. The problem is that they don't fully commit to it, which more often than not results in the sort of inability to let serious moments play out without immediately undercutting them with winks to the audience typical of more contemporary pop culture such as the MCU. It wants to have its cake and eat it too in that respect, and that makes for a wildly inconsistent tone that's actually becoming quite grating to my sensibilities.

For instance, this season brings in a plot device that seems to draw a direct correlation between nostalgia (or more broadly, the sort of comfort we derive from our favorite pop culture and memories of childhood friends) and coping with the darkness in the world, but it doesn't do more than scratch the surface of that idea. The series has been going for long enough now that it really should have outgrown the purely fan-service-level nostalgia it initially sold itself on and evolved into something more like a commentary on nostalgia itself. In other words, it could easily -- and I would argue should -- have ventured into being a show about nostalgia rather than merely one rooted in it (which are a dime a dozen these days). But it doesn't take the time to do that. Like other potentially intriguing ideas it brings up, it glosses over it to the point that its function is simply a brief aside subservient to the series' increasing focus on exposition-driven narrative propulsion. And given the length of the episodes (the last one a full 144 minutes), there's no excuse for not taking the time to actually explore the themes it only tangentially touches upon en route to getting to the next big reveal or repetitive battle sequence.

I hesitate to compare this favorably to Stranger Things because it is admittedly not on the same level overall, but just as a sort of unsung example of how nostalgia can be used as a more self-reflexive tool even in children's media (which, granted, Stranger Things probably doesn't qualify as anymore), the 2018 film Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween presents a scenario in which the adults in the story are unable to effectively combat the evil because they rely entirely on how they remember the Goosebumps books from their own childhoods, and the only way the evil is defeated is when the children write their own original stories to progress beyond the trappings of the past. I'm not claiming this was all intentionally done as a commentary on nostalgia (although it may have been), but to me, even that is a more interesting take on the idea of nostalgia for the pop culture of our childhood than Stranger Things has been doing lately. For a show that brings up as many progressive issues as it does, the fact that it never actually dives deep into any of them makes it feel like it wants the credit for looking forward despite its feet still being firmly stuck in the past, both in terms of its treatment of '80s pop culture and, sadly, its own growing tendency to rehash what's worked for the show in previous seasons.

Still, I hope I'm not sounding too harsh, because again, I do think the cast is the show's saving grace, and I enjoyed this season on the strength of their chemistry. There's still plenty to like, but I'm personally finding that watching the series is becoming far more of an inconsistent experience than it has been, and that's largely because my frustrations relating to the show's apparent desire to be taken seriously constantly being at odds with its reluctance to actually grow into that ambition.

[feihong]

Speaking of R.L. Stine, I must say that I found the Fear Street movie trilogy a lot more meaningful and interesting than I've found Stranger Things. Of course, the Fear Street films' approach was only possible because of the success of Stranger Things, and the Fear Street films seem to poach some of Stranger Things' more interesting cast members –– including Sadie Sink and Maya Hawke –– but that's a series with actual themes that give the action meaning, for starters (also a series that's not afraid to sacrifice characters you love, not afraid to kill supposed "innocents," either). What's more, the activity that happens in those pictures is more inventive and interesting than what Stranger Things does. The game of tag with the different serial killers in the mall at the end of the third Fear Street movie was, for me, more inventive than any of the cross-cut but totally regurgitated action the Stranger Things series have been able to create so far. But I think what satisfied me most about the Fear Street films is the way they traced the supernatural horror in the town to human actions in the past. The idea that the serial killers are manifestations of our past societal sins––injustices never addressed, but rather buried in infamy––that was just more interesting than however the evil hellmouth was metastasizing in Hawkins. One of the horrors in one of these series is a manifestation of human agency bent towards moral injustice; the other is...well, what is the Upside-Down at this point? Just an alternate dimension populated by mean bats? It hardly represents an unknown evil now. It's role as a dark flipside of Hawkins gets us no thematic mileage, because the town of Hawkins hardly has a character of its own. If it's everywhere USA, then what does an evil doppelganger of the town really represent? I also found the coming together of all the different parties in Season 4 to stop Vechna a really unrewarding payoff for all that I'd had to watch up until that point. It's not only that I don't see how all that worked out with such perfect timing (here the implausibility chafes at me in a way that the super-soakers and serial killers of Fear Street's finale didn't); it's that I also don't see any meaning behind it. Robin says it's a miracle, and it seems like that's the way we're supposed to read it, sort of. It felt so arbitrary to me. Whereas the ending of the Fear Street movies––where they go off to kill the scion of the town's alleged "founding family"––seemed a meaningful culmination of the ideas the series had put forward. Plus, it was funny ("We're going to kill the sheriff. You want in?" "...Let me get my coat."), and the climax ended up genuinely suspenseful. I have not felt any suspense in the horror scenes in Stranger Things from the start. In the first couple of seasons I blamed the sometimes awkward direction––especially where the action/choreography of suspense was concerned––but now that the Duffer Brothers have improved quite a bit in handling mis en scene, I think the real reason the horror never lands for me is because it always seems to be a retread of tropes we've already seen, especially tropes from the catalog of 80s horror movies. In which case, it's imitation that only serves as nostalgia for it's own sake, as MV88 was saying. The horror in Fear Street is a little more densely-layered, drawing at some points on nostalgia for 80s horror, but also putting together thematic connections and narrative setups and payoffs that seem more vivid and meaningful, and the result is a much fresher feeling to the suspense of that film series.

Also, with the dispelling of so many of the mysteries in the Season 4 of Stranger Things (this season seems to give us an origin of the hellmouth breach in the previous seasons, of Season 3's Mindflayer villain, an explanation of sorts of Matthew Modine's research facility, of Eleven's powers, an anatomy of how the Upside-Down works, etc.), it seems to me that the sappy, Spielbergian sentimentality which seemed like an homage in the first season floods forth full-force this time around, not as homage or parody, but rather as spectacle designed to move us. So very many tears are shed throughout this 4th season––so many heart-to-heart talks, so many people telling us, the viewers, exactly what is on their minds. And as the scenes move at a ripping pace, cutting from group to group, action to action or heart-to-heart to heart-to-heart, there ends up being precious little time for any of the emotional beats the show is trying to hit to get real explication. Think about the early part of Nancy's arc in the first season––the flirtation with Steve, and how much of her character gets delineated there. There's the class difference between her and Steve, the apparent difference in experience, there's Nancy ignoring her friend, making compromises in order to have this night with this guy, this might that she thinks will change her life, and then the disappointment that follows...none of that gets "talked out"––it's shown to us as real, vivid experience the character is going through. This season, Nancy gets a shotgun. Any other minimal character development she gets is not visualized. I mean, I guess she makes the plans for everyone. She's maybe interested in Steve again (really wish we'd truly gotten beyond this plot point––I liked the humorous retrofit of Steve in Season 2, but now it seems like every character gets this journey in order to mesh with the group, so Steve's got to pivot to...liking Nancy again?). As for the filmmakers calling out Mike's uselessness...I can hardly applaud them for doing that when it was in their power to write something interesting for him to do, or write him out in some way.

I wonder if this speaks to Netflix dependence on the algorithm, that every character we've met in a previous season has to come back in this one? Like every favorite has to put in their appearance, for a specific sector of fan engagement? There's also the sense that the characters can't really change, but rather are condemned to Stan Lee's famous theory that "people don't want characters to change; they want the illusion of change." So everybody lives an arc similar to an arc they had before: Nancy takes charge, Eleven has to learn to use her powers and confront her past, Jonathan has to learn it's okay to be sensitive, but not to care about people so much you neglect yourself, Dustin has to put his faith in some wonky longshot (this time it's that Eddie Munson is a total superhero), Max has to be the victimized outsider, Murray has to be the reluctant action hero, Hopper has to be the reluctant action hero, Joyce has to be the reluctant action hero, Steve has to be a goofy savior of children when all he wants is for a woman his age to take him seriously, Dr. Owens has to be decent after seeming sinister, Dr. Brenner has to be sinister after seeming to have maybe a little shred of decency...We've been through all these beats before. Poor Will Byard can never seem to catch a break. He is doomed to always be sidelined. Now he seems to be the gay best friend who helps Mike and Eleven patch up their couples spat––this unrequited love story might be a little more dramatically meaningful if it was about Will and his choices from the start. But from the jump he is portrayed as Eleven's support blanket, and then Mike's support blanket, and we never get a sense of what his longing really means to him. Now he immediately starts feeling bad juju again, just in time for him to be a passive victim again in Season 5. Swell. I think the whole story seems to be sagging under the weight of it's four seasons. It's not as amusing as it was, and now one has to look forward to a 5th season in which they are all inexplicably living in a Hawkins nearly smote from the Earth, rapidly turning into hellworld which the more sensible residents are just packing up and moving away from, driving calmly at the speed limit. I liked the part of these seasons where the characters were living their real lives more than the parts where they fought the denizens of a hell-dimension. In the finale of Season 4 they kept showing flashbacks to Max and Eleven from previous seasons, going to the mall, reading comic books together, playing video games, skateboarding...I got a genuine feeling of nostalgia from those quick little moments, and a sharp feeling of what was missing from the show this time around. The tortured upping of the stakes in this season is, I think, part of what makes the new season so dull––combined with the way the increasingly large cast of characters seems to keep treading water. Will there be any fun to be had in Season 5? It looks increasingly like the events of the show will be given over to apocalypse.

On the other hand, the filmmaking has become more sophisticated, and the brand value of Stranger Things hardly seems diminished in public––I have heard Kate Bush songs in so many social settings over the last month or so, it gives off the impression that everyone is watching. So maybe it's just me. Does it say something about how basic I am, that I'm getting a lot more out of watching First Kill than out of Stranger Things? First Kill frequently looks like a soap opera, but the scenes have thematic resonance and weight to them. When Calliope's family holds a "ritual" to exorcise her "possession" by her vampire lover Juliette, the analogy to conversion therapy is clear––and that's just one scene where the dramatic elements of the show extend to have meaning in the real world. Stranger Things looks like a movie, but it now seems to play like a soap opera, where you follow your favorite characters and worship them like idols, tolerating everything else the show is trying and failing to do. I'm there for Max, for Dustin, and for Robin and Steve. The other characters are...well, they're also there. The action is made with a far surer hand than before, but it's minor. The story is dense without being convoluted (bravo), but it's also without a lot of thematic or dramatic weight. The vague reaches towards subjects this season, like the bits about bullying and school ostracization, like the too-slowly-burning references to Satanic Panic, and the exorcising repressed guilt which characterizes Max's and Eleven's stories––they never seem to grow into anything, tie into other parts of the drama, or apply beyond the narrow confines of the plot. And the meaning of the Upside-Down has never been more obtuse to me, because finally we see that there is nothing about the town of Hawkins that really relates to this inverted hell-dimension besides geography. In the Nightmare on Elm Street movies, the town is paying for the murder of Freddy Krueger––the haunting has its roots in human action and intent. In the Fear Street movies, action and intent provides the entire backdrop for the haunting of the town, but also for the class-based segregation of the town––which we come to understand is the intended result of the crimes committed in the past, which gave birth and life to the unnatural killers that haunt those stories. In Stranger Things the town of Hawkins has no specific character to it, and there isn't any human origin for this alternate dimension, really. And I think by knowing it more intimately this season, the sort of "psychological" underpinnings of the Upside-Down are somewhat dispelled, as well. Well, whatever. I feel pretty worn-out by this series; but still, I wish it were interesting, instead of just popular. I do think that the actors are mostly really good––and that's what makes the series watchable, from scene to scene, episode to episode. But by the end, it always refuses to add up to any sort of permanent satisfaction for me.