Is Stranger Things S02E07 "Lost Sister" the most unnecessary episode ever?

It wasn't just unnecessary. It was bad.

Unnecessary doesn't mean bad. They could have had an episode that doesn't advance the overall plot but is still well-written and develops the character. Instead, this episode of Stranger Things introduced us to uninteresting characters and gave us a boring side story. I welcome more side story episodes in the next seasons but I want them to do a better job.

I loved it! I thought the characters she ran into were real fun. Sure - maybe a writer said "punk X Men" in a writing room at 3:00 am and it stuck - but I really enjoyed the ep.

To each their own I suppose.

Those saying the episode was completely pointless are being disingenuous. The episode:

-Established a world outside of Hawkins, expanding the setting outside of their small town.
-Set up the idea of other super powered kids like Eleven, which is good fodder for future seasons or spin-offs
-But most of all, it served as needed character growth and development for Eleven. Her anger and belittlement from Hopper throughout the season built up to this moment. It was an important episode for her character to understand what family meant, and make the choice to choose the folks of Hawkins over her "sister."

Lacking in execution and poorly placed in the overall pacing of the season? Sure. Unnecessary and pointless? Nah.

It was awful

Gin & Phonics said:

Those saying the episode was completely pointless are being disingenuous. The episode:

-Established a world outside of Hawkins, expanding the setting outside of their small town.
-Set up the idea of other super powered kids like Eleven, which is good fodder for future seasons or spin-offs
-But most of all, it served as needed character growth and development for Eleven. Her anger and belittlement from Hopper throughout the season built up to this moment. It was an important episode for her character to understand what family meant, and make the choice to choose the folks of Hawkins over her "sister."

Lacking in execution and poorly placed in the overall pacing of the season? Sure. Unnecessary and pointless? Nah.

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I completely agree. Most specifically with it being fodder, episodes like this make for great jumping off points later in the series, and with the way Season 2 resolved so much of the greater plot, these sort of points are going to be really valuable in the future. Also binge-watched or not, breather episodes are not a bad thing provided they don't overtake the core plot.

Eleven's friends were annoying.

Oh it's a terrible fucking episode, but I think it was some heavy handed laying foundation for a future season.

Basically just the way a terrible writer would try to force this in

Wamb0wneD said:

If that emulation occured over the course of multiple episodes (like, you know...the rest of the show is handled) I wouldn't have had that many problems with it. This isn't some mannerisms we are talking about, we are talking about a full blown character change over the course of one episode. It's not well executed. At all.

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She never changes her character though. It was shown that she was getting angry with being locked up with the Sheriff. She never does anything that breaks her development or steps outside her arc throughout the season.

I think I should stop watching second seasons of television shows I liked the first season of. American Crime Story, True Detective, Stranger Things... I just hated them all.

Embarrassing episode to watch. Season 2 was pretty subpar in general.

Vonnegut said:

It wasn't just unnecessary. It was bad.

Unnecessary doesn't mean bad. They could have had an episode that doesn't advance the overall plot but is still well-written and develops the character. Instead, this episode of Stranger Things introduced us to uninteresting characters and gave us a boring side story. I welcome more side story episodes in the next seasons but I want them to do a better job.

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Right. Contrast this with a couple episodes in The Leftovers Season 1 (the one about the casino and the one about Nora's conference). They're both side stories that don't really concern the main plot (iirc), but they're masterfully told and unbelievably engaging. I remember even the people who hated the show on GAF, which seemed to be most of the show thread, wwent gaga over those two episodes.

I like just about everything in the episode itself. But in the overall narrative it feels like a very clunky side quest, that only seems to exist as a test pilot for a spin-off show about this group of people. She runs away, learns to control her powers better, and comes back. Okay. She couldn't do that in the woods or something? Again, the episode taken by itself, I love the look of it, the style, the tone, but in the overall story, it sticks out like a sore thumb.

But no this is not the most unnecessary episode ever. That title belongs to LOST - Stranger in a Strange Land

It's literally the only episode of that show that I didn't love.

Like I love that show so much but that episode was awful. I was scratching my head the whole time.

It was about as subtle as that backdoor pilot about Shrute Farms that they tried to shove into The Office. Blatant attempt to capitalize on popular thing with a spin off. See also anything being produced that says "From the producers/writers/stars/people who brought you Stranger Things".

I thought it was set up for season 3. A villain with psychic powers.

I don't actually know anything about season 3, though.

This series doesn't know to payoff. It ran out of steam halfway through Season 1. Then became merely lame and boring halfway through Season 2. The episode in question finally killed off any interest I once had in continuing with the series.

umop 3pisdn said:

To risk accusations of hot takes I kind of thought the second season itself was unnecessary.

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I'd say this is a fair take. Am I wrong that the series was originally intended to follow an anthology format? Maybe they should've stuck to that.

Loved Stranger Things and I couldn't not skip it

Gin & Phonics said:

Those saying the episode was completely pointless are being disingenuous. The episode:

-Established a world outside of Hawkins, expanding the setting outside of their small town.
-Set up the idea of other super powered kids like Eleven, which is good fodder for future seasons or spin-offs
-But most of all, it served as needed character growth and development for Eleven. Her anger and belittlement from Hopper throughout the season built up to this moment. It was an important episode for her character to understand what family meant, and make the choice to choose the folks of Hawkins over her "sister."

Lacking in execution and poorly placed in the overall pacing of the season? Sure. Unnecessary and pointless? Nah.

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Here's the thing, to your first two points, I don't want either of those things. Stranger Things is not Stranger Things when it's not in shitty small towns like Hawkings. I also don't want more superpowered kids, I'd be happy if Eleven was the only one with powers for the rest of the show's run.

To your last point, yeah, I think everyone can agree that character growth and development is a must in any show but people don't like when it's delivered in such a poor way.

You obviously never seen an anime filler episode.

I'm not at all opposed to filler episodes in ST and wish they would experiment with more stuff like that, but this episode was just so dumb.

Yeah it is.

That episode was terrible

I agree felt out of nowhere and felt like an entirely different show. To me it looks like they want to do a spinoff series and this was there method of planting the seeds.

I hope it doesn't.

KrigareN- said:

this episode was so out of place, out of character, unnecessary fanservice shit ever.

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It wasn't any of those things. It progressed the story by introducing us to other people like Eleven. It's certainly in character for a girl who just wants to belong to conform to other people, and the whole point of the episode is entirely fitting with her character, and served as a moment of growth and maturity.

Gin & Phonics said:

Those saying the episode was completely pointless are being disingenuous. The episode:

-Established a world outside of Hawkins, expanding the setting outside of their small town.
-Set up the idea of other super powered kids like Eleven, which is good fodder for future seasons or spin-offs
-But most of all, it served as needed character growth and development for Eleven. Her anger and belittlement from Hopper throughout the season built up to this moment. It was an important episode for her character to understand what family meant, and make the choice to choose the folks of Hawkins over her "sister."

Lacking in execution and poorly placed in the overall pacing of the season? Sure. Unnecessary and pointless? Nah.

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Yeah, definitely this. The episode is a strange side story because of where it's placed, but if they'd spread it out across multiple episodes and started it earlier, maybe instead of rehashing the Eleven/Hopper arguing for the fourth time, it would have woven into the overall season much cleaner and more strongly. It's a part of Stranger Things' continual problem of not having its characters grow over the course of the season and instead just doing it in one big burst at the end, which leads to the middle of both seasons dragging, like so many Netflix shows do. In season 2 only Steve really has any growth during the middle of the season, everyone else just stalls around until the last two episodes.

I didn't enjoy it but it seemed necessary to bring Modine back to life and introduce plot expanding beyond the town.

If all the episodes weren't available day 1 and you had to wait a week for the next episode id give some credence to the people who complain about it messing with the momentum. But since it was all there day 1 I feel people really are overreacting about it. It was an episode about charcter growth and expanding the show beyond Hawkins which needs to happen in the next few seasons.

It was a great episode. It's kind of shocking to see so many people complain about an episode like this. It's standard issue in any show, novel, or literally anything to take a break from the main narrative to explore and expand a character. It's basic character development.

Also, can someone explain why this episode gets shit on while GLOW episode 8(which is also great) doesn't?

Rackham said:

I really liked that episode. You guys are whack. It added a lot of character development to 11

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I agree with you, i dont get why the hate against this particular episode, it was great.

Ever? I doubt it. It was the worst episode of a pretty terrible season, though. I didn't think it was that much worse to deserve the rep it gets.

I didn't think any of those characters were believable outcasts.

It's up there; the whole "sister" reveal felt completely unnecessary as she added nothing to the overall story. Her reveal in the very first episode should've been the closing for the 2nd season.

Not for any show.
Its the most unnecessary episode of Stranger Things ever..
Eleven is just an awful character.

Yeah, it sucked.

It's my favourite episode, actually.

Its the Canto Bight of stranger things

The only problem with the episode was its timing. Move it an episode earlier so her visions serve as foreshadowing, and then you don't interrupt the flow after the best cliffhanger of the season.

A cool episode if it wasn't so obviously trying to be a hook for Season 3 and little else. But yay the weird science experiment girl has a real family she can be a real girl with. <3

I'd say the most unnecessary episode of any show ever was the episode of Bones that was one huge product placement for Jame Cameron's Avatar.

They played a trailer of it on their dumb holographic TV projector, and the side plot was several of the characters camping out in front of a theater to see it.

Lost Sister may not be the greatest episode of TV ever, but it is fine IMO. It's fairly stand alone and even if the overall story doesn't tie into the main plot that much, 11 at least has some experiences and realized she doesn't want to be a killer (I think, it's been a while since seeing it).

Really bad episode, it broke the cinematography of the show too, what was once a pretty believable depiction of the 80's suddenly transports to a sleek modern city cop drama style. Clearly intentional, but it's jarring, and + the other complaints that have been brought up you have yourself a remarkable waste of time.

I like 11 but this episode would have fit in better with Heroes S2 than Stranger Things. It was trash and I hope this isn't the direction they have in mind for future seasons

TV shows always have unnecessary episodes though, so I'm going to say no it's not the most unnecessary ever

I feel like like the episode sets up S3.

I mean I see what they're going for, but after teasing the other kids at the beginning of the season, this episode didn't really have the payoff I was hoping for. It would've been better if she had recruited them to help in Hawkins.

It gave us bad ass slicked back hair 11 so it can't be all bad.

I like the episode. But it feels like setup for s3 or some kind of back door pilot. It sort of kills the pacing of the back half of the season.

I'm with the idea that it served as a testing ground for moving the show away from their small town and into a bigger space.

Such a move is a harbinger of doom. The small town nature of the dread and drama are the foundation of the show. Going all fucking Xmen in Chicago is not what anybody is coming to the table for.

Season 2 just made me wish it was an anthology series. That's not to say I didn't enjoy aspects of it, but it also felt unnecessary.

I watched the episode after I was done with the rest of the series. Would have been pissed off if I had watched it in order, because it would have ruined the pacing.

I assume those characters will return in the third season. Unfortunately.

Nah. Episode's fine. It was a satisfying "what if" and I found it to be an interesting change of pace from the Hawkins setting; a different look into the era they're drawing from.

As for the story, it felt necessary. It showed that there are other kids with powers out there and that they don't feel nearly as benevolent about the whole thing as Eleven. It also teased that Brenner survived his bout with the Demogorgon.

That episode also gave Eleven some desperately needed agency after serving as the series' superpowered trump card (who was, let's not forget, wildly undervalued as a human being in Season 1 and the beginning of Season 2). She makes her own decision about revenge, which needed to happen at some point.

It's not perfect, but few things are.