• Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.

J-Wood

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,749
Just finished. Wow that was incredible. I'm very sad Eddie is gone. Incredible character.

Cannot wait for next season.
 
OP
OP
Conditional-Pancakes

Conditional-Pancakes

The GIFs of Us
Member
Jun 25, 2020
10,829
the wilderness
Very fun ranking of all the characters in season 4:



I don't necessarily agree with everything in her ranking, but it really doesn't matter. Spookyastronauts (Emma) is my favorite Youtube horror movie/TV show reviewer, and I thought I could promote her here. She's absolutely amazing. Go check out her channel!
 

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
115,532
"i don't know if there are actually american bullies who point and laugh like this"

Oh, you have no idea, Emma. You have no idea. Yes, that rollerskate attack was catharsis for anyone who lived through middle school/early HS in the 80s or 90s.
 

krpiper

Member
Oct 28, 2017
354
I have a weird question, im kind of a baby about horror films (literally my least favorite genre) but I've Heard so much about this so... should I dive in? Will it give me nightmares?
 

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
115,532
I have a weird question, im kind of a baby about horror films (literally my least favorite genre) but I've Heard so much about this so... should I dive in? Will it give me nightmares?

Let me ask you a follow-up question. What is the aspect of horror that fucks with you and gives you nightmares? This show isn't extremely gory, and it's not really a jumpscare show either (a few jumpscare moments notwithstanding). It's more of a vibe, a kind of Stephen King meets Stephen Spielberg (in the early seasons) that grows more King-esque the further on it goes.
 

carlsojo

Member
Oct 28, 2017
33,761
San Francisco
I love this!


Neither could El 😏

Me too! It's getting memed to death all over Twitter today and I'm here for all of it.

As cliche as it may be, I hope we actually see Eddie resurrected into a version of Iron Maidens Eddie to help save the day once again. He deserves it and we need to see an undead hero. Tie it all in with Number of the Beast playing as well.

Me too. I don't give a shit about clliches, give me more Eddie. Have him rock out with a whole band of undead in the Upside Down.

Eddie on Guitar
Barb on the Bass
Billy on the Drums
 

bananab

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,854
I have a weird question, im kind of a baby about horror films (literally my least favorite genre) but I've Heard so much about this so... should I dive in? Will it give me nightmares?
I am a horror movie fan and would say the show plays quite a lot with the artifice of a horror movie but is completely non-scary and is something I would feel pretty comfortable recommending to a non-horror fan. Take that for what it's worth though since again my baseline is enjoying horror. It's mostly "monster movie" style spooky.

I feel like this last season would be the toughest for you because it contains some body horror elements, but by the time you get this far you'd already know whether you like the show.
 
Last edited:

Tavernade

Tavernade
Moderator
Sep 18, 2018
8,617
I have a weird question, im kind of a baby about horror films (literally my least favorite genre) but I've Heard so much about this so... should I dive in? Will it give me nightmares?

Other than characters in jeopardy I don't think it's that scary, though I do have a friend who was fine until the new season and it just hit something deep in her fight or flight response and she couldn't finish.

It can be a bit gory at times, but probably not much more than a Star Wars or MCU movie.
 

carlsojo

Member
Oct 28, 2017
33,761
San Francisco
Other than characters in jeopardy I don't think it's that scary, though I do have a friend who was fine until the new season and it just hit something deep in her fight or flight response and she couldn't finish.

It can be a bit gory at times, but probably not much more than a Star Wars or MCU movie.

Ehhhh it's definitely much more gory than Star Wars or MCU.

Bob being eaten, Vecna's method of killing, but most of all the people melting in S3.
 

Tavernade

Tavernade
Moderator
Sep 18, 2018
8,617
Ehhhh it's definitely much more gory than Star Wars or MCU.

Bob being eaten, Vecna's method of killing, but most of all the people melting in S3.

To be honest I found the Vecna kill special effects so plasticky that I couldn't find them that scary. Forgot about the people melting bit in S3 though.
 

kIdMuScLe

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,561
Los angeles
I wonder if part of the resolution of the conflict will require somebody to go into the Upside Down and somehow pacify it. It seemed like it was a relatively chill place prior to Henry screwing everything up. Demogorgons just ignored him and the Mind Flayer was just hanging out being a cloud.

I imagine Will is gonna stay behind since he's pretty attached to the upside down world. Kinda like how Frodo had to leave middle-earth.
 

carlsojo

Member
Oct 28, 2017
33,761
San Francisco
I wonder if part of the resolution of the conflict will require somebody to go into the Upside Down and somehow pacify it. It seemed like it was a relatively chill place prior to Henry screwing everything up. Demogorgons just ignored him and the Mind Flayer was just hanging out being a cloud.

My personal dream is for Max to gain the power to control/tap into the Hive Mind and "free" the inhabitants of the Upside Down. Kind of like Kerrigan from Starcraft.

We saw too that Dart was pretty chill when it wasn't getting ordered around by the Mind Flayer.

It is difficult to say exactly if the inhabitants are chill by nature. Those sharp teeth aren't for show, those are for eating meat.
 

Ether_Snake

Banned
Oct 29, 2017
11,306
Lucas with Max, Dustin with Suzie, Mike with El. What will happen with Will? :/

As cliche as it may be, I hope we actually see Eddie resurrected into a version of Iron Maidens Eddie to help save the day once again. He deserves it and we need to see an undead hero. Tie it all in with Number of the Beast playing as well.

Happening for sure. El will be raising people from the dead to defeat Vecna just like Dustin said they needed to do. Max is already the first case, it just so happens that Vecna broke her body beforehand.
 

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
115,532
Happening for sure. El will be raising people from the dead to defeat Vecna just like Dustin said they needed to do. Max is already the first case, it just so happens that Vecna broke her body beforehand.

He never said you need to raise people from the dead to fight Vecna, he said that (wrongly) about fighting a mindflayer.
 

eyeball_kid

Member
Oct 25, 2017
10,227
Just finished up the season. It was great, a hell of a lot better than last season. The Russian stuff was over the top even for this show, but it had heart and gave the adults something to do. At first I didn't like that the kids were split up into two groups, and it did limit character interactions, but I think it allowed them to focus more on particular relationships. I feel like the last episode was really a bit too packed. I don't know how long it was, but it probably should have been 30 mins longer or found some way to do a 10th episode. The cut away to "Two days later" was awkward, and we never got any resolution to what happened to the Russian prison guard. Like yeah he wasn't a major character, but he was a good guy and I wanted him to get a proper sendoff. Everything just felt rushed.

I'm going to be pretty disappointed if Max is out of commission next season or for good. She's become one of my favorite characters and they did her dirty. I mean they did Eddie dirty too, but he had death flags for half the season. He at least got to go out the way he wanted. (except did they really just leave his body in the upside down? that's pretty messed up) Max just had all control and agency taken from her.

What I didn't like is the idea of four kills means the gates open. They were referncing a lot of cheesy '80s horror movies this season, but that kind of arbitrary, hokey trigger for the gate to open didn't feel right for something so fundamentally important to the show. Like why four kills? Why not five? Or three? Elle's powers are superhuman, but they make a certain sense within the show. She is so powerful that she blasted a hole through the worlds (and sealed it). If there's some in-universe explanation for why his gate would open because he sucked out four souls, they didn't do a good enough job to sell it.
 

SpankyDoodle

Member
Oct 25, 2017
6,082
I have a weird question, im kind of a baby about horror films (literally my least favorite genre) but I've Heard so much about this so... should I dive in? Will it give me nightmares?
I'm also pretty weak for scary stuff, but I wouldn't call Stranger Things "scary" as much as it's spooky, and tense with a creepy vibe but IMO in a fun way. There are jump scares, but not very many, and the first two seasons are pretty light on violence, gore, and body horror. Season three is HEAVY on the gore with a couple relatively quick scenes of human/animal body horror. Without giving too much away, people and animals are liquified from the inside-out, and used to create a giant monster made entirely of meat and bone and guts. My favorite subtitle introduced in ST3 is "wet squelching" lmfao. Season 4 has less gore but is heavier on the body horror, but it's quick and there's plenty of lead time so you know when it's going to happen and can look away.

I would definitely recommend it, and there's enough of a ramp-up with the blood and guts stuff over the 4 seasons that you'll have a pretty good idea of how you like it by the time it happens. It's probably my favorite "horror" thing because it's really more like.. fun horror than it is chilling outright scary horror. For reference my favorite genre is probably horror-comedy and my favorite movie is Ghostbusters but I can't watch the subway scene in GB2 even now at 37.
 
Last edited:

Tomasoares

Member
Oct 28, 2017
4,514
I have a weird question, im kind of a baby about horror films (literally my least favorite genre) but I've Heard so much about this so... should I dive in? Will it give me nightmares?

Season 1-3 have some light horror stuff, which I didn't bother at all (I don't like horror films either, btw). Season 4 is a lot more scary and I wouldn't watch it until the end if it wasn't Stranger Things (particularly the final scene of episode 1 is scary as fuck, by far the most scary shit of the series)
 

Hrodulf

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,301
Hahaha no I know I'm the same way, IMO nobody has to die to "show stakes" in a story, and it's kinda telling in a way that even when characters do die they're never the "right ones" lol

Like we got two deaths plus a third character is literally brain dead but those deaths don't count because they're not the right characters dying and the third isn't dead enough
The problem isn't so much that they aren't "the right ones", but this show has a pattern of introducing characters in each new season that end up being killed in the back half of the final episode of each season.

Even in the case of Max, it took several attempts until, of course, the back half of the final episode, and there's basically zero chance she's staying in the state she's in, either.

People expecting the show to go full on Game of Thrones or something is silly, but the way the show handles character deaths has become very predictable and not very well done.
 

Danielsan

Member
Oct 26, 2017
5,632
The Netherlands
Finished S4 up last night. I wish I like it more, there were definitely a good amount of memorable moments. But as a whole the series just requires too much suspension of disbelief at this point, and a lot of the writing is conjuring up serious eye rolls for me.
 

krpiper

Member
Oct 28, 2017
354
Let me ask you a follow-up question. What is the aspect of horror that fucks with you and gives you nightmares? This show isn't extremely gory, and it's not really a jumpscare show either (a few jumpscare moments notwithstanding). It's more of a vibe, a kind of Stephen King meets Stephen Spielberg (in the early seasons) that grows more King-esque the further on it goes.

Good question, jump scares definitely get to me and just a overall feeling off heightened anxiety.

From what everyone is saying I think I will give it a shot and we will see!
 

Kalentan

Member
Oct 25, 2017
44,624
Correct me if I'm wrong but has Steve had ANY scenes with Joyce and Hopper? Or even Eleven? Like he's been in the same physical location obviously but like actually interacting.
 

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
115,532
Correct me if I'm wrong but has Steve had ANY scenes with Joyce and Hopper? Or even Eleven? Like he's been in the same physical location obviously but like actually interacting.

Steve has interacted with Hopper a couple of times but I don't think he's said much to Joyce or El. He's typically the kids' guardian when El isn't around, so it makes sense they haven't paired up much.
 

Thornquist

Member
Jan 22, 2018
1,499
Norway
Man, talk about ruining the great Cthulu inspired monster from S2. Im not a fan of everything being the machinations of this rival of Elleven.

It was also more of an ensemble cast in the first seasons. Now its really the El+support show.

The new guy died - predictable.

Pretty disappointed in the final two episodes.
 

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
115,532
It was also more of an ensemble cast in the first seasons. Now its really the El+support show.

I don't really think this is the case at all. Nancy has pretty firmly stepped into the shoes of Hawkins Protagonist and Max got an absolutely huge amount of focus this year.

Eleven is the "main character" of the show but the heavy lifting has SIGNIFICANTLY fallen off of her shoulders as far as plot progression goes. She's more like the Goku of the series now, if anything. She's the 'big gun' they bring in at the end of every season to fight the big bad but most of the show revolves around everyone else.
 

Dr. Mario

Member
Oct 27, 2017
13,841
Netherlands
The problem isn't so much that they aren't "the right ones", but this show has a pattern of introducing characters in each new season that end up being killed in the back half of the final episode of each season.

People expecting the show to go full on Game of Thrones or something is silly, but the way the show handles character deaths has become very predictable and not very well done.
So it's not that they're not the right ones, but they're not the right ones. It's silly to expect Game of Thrones killing of the main characters but they should kill the main characters.

Predictable isn't bad in genre homages. Besides there's enough unpredictable in the series.
 

PlanetSmasher

The Abominable Showman
Member
Oct 25, 2017
115,532
tvline.com

Stranger Things Co-Creator Responds to Millie Bobby Brown’s Call for More Deaths: ‘This Is Hawkins, Not Westeros’

"Stranger Things" star Millie Bobby Brown and one of the series' creators debate needs for more "Game of Thrones"-caliber deaths.

Speaking from a screenwriting and a story writing perspective, the Duffers are right. People really don't understand how devastating it can be to a story to callously kill off a character. Character deaths can't be handled lightly, you have to do so much work to math it out before pulling that trigger.

That's one of the biggest problems later-days Game of Thrones had - after they did the Red Wedding and got a huge amount of press for it, D&D didn't CARE about the long-term implications of character deaths and what they meant to the story.

Like in the story I'm working on right now, I initially planned to kill off one of my "leads" at the end of the first act, but after I changed course on her and decided to keep her alive, the narrative calculus of her continued presence in the story basically blew a hole through a wall I had been struggling with getting through for a while. Characters aren't just bodies to be thrown into a meat grinder, they're narrative entities that have presences far beyond their immediate residence in the moment of the story.
 

CrazyDude

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,727
Pretty good interview by Duffers.

DEADLINE: Game of Thrones and The Sopranos were big touchstones for you both. And when they ended, the creators got criticized. Game of Thrones, for wrapping things up hurriedly, and The Sopranos for an ending that left a lot of people confused. How much have those criticisms been on your mind and did you like the way those shows ended?


ROSS DUFFER: I did. Both of those endings are representative of those shows. Game of Thrones, the whole show has been pulling the rug out from under the viewers. And Sopranos? David Chase changed the game in terms of what television can do. So, narratively to make a bold choice like that, I thought was brilliant. But again, something like Sopranos, just like the show, it's not something that in the moment you just stand up and cheer. It's something that you mull over and you think about and then it resonates with you like a great novel would.


So, in those senses, I think that they did exactly what they needed to do for those shows. Just as Breaking Bad did, and Six Feet Under, another one that we talk about a lot. Friday Night Lights ended terrifically, twice. How do you do that? You know, so it is possible but obviously not every show ends well. Sometimes it's because they're trying to wrap it up too quickly because the network goes, you got to finish this, and they quickly have to tie some bows. The hope here is, now that we've had time to think about it, not only during the pandemic, but now when we're going back into it, the hope is that we can land it well. But it certainly is nerve wracking.

MATT DUFFER: We're trying not to overthink it or get too anxious because I think that will result in a bad ending. Or make us worry too much about oh, my God, how we please every single person? Because that's simply impossible. We have a small group of writers. We'll do what feels right to us and then, you have to hope that that will resonate with a wider audience. Is it going to make a hundred percent of people happy? No. I think the ending makes a hundred percent of people happy is probably not a very interesting ending. I feel really good about it. It's not really comparable as an ending to any of these shows because Stranger Things is not those shows and so it's not trying to be any of those endings. It's just trying to be an ending that feels right for Stranger Things. It certainly went over well when we pitched it to Netflix. I saw some executives crying who I've never seen cry before. So, that was a good sign.

DEADLINE: They cried just from the pitch?

MATT DUFFER: It was an hour long pitch. Some of it was for the ending and some of it was just like oh, my God, this show that we've all been working on, everyone at Netflix has been on it…Matt Thunell, one of our main executives, he pitched Stranger Things to his bosses at Netflix in his first week on the job. He doesn't know Netflix really outside of Stranger Things. It's been for so many of us and so many people at Netflix, it's just been a huge part of our lives. It's sad not only for this story to be ending but for this show itself to be coming to an end.

https://deadline.com/2022/07/stranger-things-duffer-brothers-interview-season-five-1235058041/
 

CrazyDude

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,727
I just noticed that there aren't any houses mext to Mike's in the upside down, I wonder if that is a clue.
 
Last edited:

Siggy-P

Avenger
Mar 18, 2018
11,865
I like the season though its getting undeniably too big for its own good. Multiple plot lines are fine but you do end up genuinely forgetting about some characters until their story reappears and its like "oh yeah, them I guess."

My biggest issue with the whole season that the demegorgon here is an unstoppable yeet machine yet in season 1 Steve was fighting it off with a baseball bat.
 

mantidor

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,792
My biggest issue with the whole season that the demegorgon here is an unstoppable yeet machine yet in season 1 Steve was fighting it off with a baseball bat.

Yeah sometimes it seems the demo creatures' strength vary according to plot needs but in their defense both Hopper and Steve had melee combats with the demogorgons after they were set on fire.

Also a nice detail is that these characters are physically strong characters, with Steve being an athlete and Hopper a Vietnam veteran, while the kids are just nerds and more frail, like we saw with Dustin trying to go throw the portal and harming his leg doing it while Steve did a backflip showing off lol
 

carlsojo

Member
Oct 28, 2017
33,761
San Francisco
I like the season though its getting undeniably too big for its own good. Multiple plot lines are fine but you do end up genuinely forgetting about some characters until their story reappears and its like "oh yeah, them I guess."

My biggest issue with the whole season that the demegorgon here is an unstoppable yeet machine yet in season 1 Steve was fighting it off with a baseball bat.

The Russian Demogorgon seemed to be an older, stronger, larger version. It's been killing and eating and fighting prisoners for a long time.
 

Forsaken82

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,923
Other than characters in jeopardy I don't think it's that scary, though I do have a friend who was fine until the new season and it just hit something deep in her fight or flight response and she couldn't finish.

It can be a bit gory at times, but probably not much more than a Star Wars or MCU movie.

yeah disagreeing with you there... lol

Stranger Things has a lot of bloodletting for being a TV-14 show, most of it is from the monsters (which they don't shy away from), but you will also occasionally see deep lacerations on human characters, season 3 is probably more violent than a lot R rated slasher films, and Season 4 has shades of 80s horror throughout. It wears it's Nightmare on Elm Street influences on its sleeve very proudly.
 

Maple

Member
Oct 27, 2017
11,722
My biggest issue with the whole season that the demegorgon here is an unstoppable yeet machine yet in season 1 Steve was fighting it off with a baseball bat.

The real reason for this is that they didn't have the budget in season 1 that they do now. And with a much larger budget they can create a faster, more vicious Demogorgon.

But it can work narratively as well - the demogorgon in season could have been younger, inexperienced, and famished. The demogorgon in season 4 was older, more experienced in combat, and exceptionally well fed and nourished. We see this kind of thing with wild animals all the time.