Stranger Things S04

The good

Most of the character work is improved.

Hopper is no longer a blustering idiot (though, surprise-not-surprise, he’s alive, as the Duffer brothers couldn’t wait to show you in last season’s finale credits scene, or in essentially all of the advertising from Netflix), and while his non-death feels like an annoyance to have to look past, and he does almost nothing for the rest of the plot this season except survive in Russia, his story is fun to watch and heartfelt, particularly his reunion with Joyce. A welcome reprieve from his two-season-long fight with Eleven.

Mike is no longer a total idiot boy, and displays some understandable and more grown-up thoughts about his relationship with Eleven, actually voicing insecurities rather than simply talking about how girls have cooties last season. Mike also is interestingly played to have understood that Will has developed a crush on him, which is again a departure from his usual aloof character, and was a nice moment. Speaking of, Will’s queerness being actually dealt with this season was very satisfying, and feels like a nice continuation from the thread that had started in the last season: Will wants the party to stay together because he doesn’t want to grow up, but also because he does not understand his friends obsession with girls. As they start to do the ‘normal’ high school things and discover their sexuality, Will feels stuck as an outcast; the boys are all he has.

Eleven’s work with Dr. Brenner, and Owen’s betrayal of her confidence (continuing to walk a moral tightrope as he has done well since being introduced) in delivering her to him, was all great. Again, Dr. Brenner being alive with not more than a scar is whatever, sure, but at least we got to see that story line pick up where it left off. Eleven having grown up more now, yet still reverting to a child-like dependency on “papa” was very interesting to watch, as was all of her exploration of the mass killings in Hawkins Lab, which was a fun mystery to unravel (and which finally answers the question of what happened to the rest of the kids!). Her final goodbye to Brenner felt like a much more satisfying conclusion to their story, and that entire penultimate episode felt like one great set piece.

Lucas and Max both had great heartfelt moments, showing a much more mature and healthy relationship toward each other. While they had conflict this season keeping them apart at first (which felt like a well-done and natural response to Max’s grief, and which was smartly used as a tie-in to the main plot with Vecna), the way Lucas eventually broke through to Max, and the way he treated her in general, showed a much deeper love and respect. Her ‘death’ scene in the finale was particularly great from Lucas, that got me. Also, Lucas’s little sister Erica had a much better run this season, not just being a teetering-on-annoying brat, but being a fun addition to the team, now that she respects the ‘nerds.’

Eddie was a very fun character. I disliked him when he was very first introduced in the lunch table scene, but that seemed to be a good way to contrast how he was portrayed (or portrayed himself) in school and to the broader community versus his softer side toward Chrissy and the rest of the kids. In particular, watching him DM for the Hellfyre Club was incredibly endearing to me, as to me (as an avid D&D player and fan of actual-plays) it felt like you could see his love for the game and being able to provide his players with such a fun fantasy. I was convinced until the end that his character was meant to replace Steve, and was sad to see him go, but his death made sense as a completion for his arc.

The bad

Speaking of Steve, we can discuss the characters that were let-downs. Which is Steve. And thus also Nancy, and Jonathan. The writers seem to have done nothing with Steve’s character since season one. He ‘grew up’ and got with Nancy, and then immediately in season two got dumped and has just been twiddling his thumbs ever since, seemingly waiting to get back with Nancy? Having inexplicably split up half the cast to California, including Jonathan (who spent the season being a nothing character outside of some nice moments with Will at the end), I guess the writers saw an opportunity to introduce this love triangle again, but it was extremely boring to me. Nancy and Steve flirted all season, nothing between Jonathan and Nancy ever had time to resolve in the slightest way, so we simmer on this all season with no resolution in sight. I was sure that Steve would die and Eddie would take over as the ‘dad’ figure to all the kids, because Steve had death flags growing out of his ears by the end and surely that’s the only way to square this circle once and for all, moving things along for Nancy either to go back to Jonathan or to be heartbroken and guilt-stricken and break up with him. Yet for some reason, the writers decided to just let the situation essentially go nowhere, leaving the entire thing feeling pointless. Just do something already! Anything would be more interesting than this.

His monologue in episode seven felt a little on the nose, though I enjoyed at least having a mystery to unravel. Having essentially a human be “behind it all” for the prior seasons in what seems to be a clear slight-retcon does seem a little cheap. I want to understand the Upside Down and its creatures, what they want, what the mind flayer wants or is, how this realm came into being and what it represents, etc. That seems like the greater mystery instead of just following a guy who ended up there and took advantage of the place.

That being said, as a villain I found him menacing and fun to watch. This season upped the horror quite a bit (particularly in the first episode), which was a welcome change of pace and well-done overall. The effects on his killings were a little bit in the uncanny valley for me, but for the content of what was happening they were scary and cool. His voice and dialogue felt mostly well-done, though him saying Chrissssyyyyy in a strange modulated voice in the first episode did make me laugh initially—it got much better from there. Most importantly, he felt like an inevitability, which is quite different to the rest of the series. His background as 001 is a satisfying context for Brenner’s work, and I did not see the reveal coming. His lair in the upside down, both the house and the greater outside world (with it’s updated look and “demobats”) were really cool, and all the set pieces with him and the upside down were overall great fun (in particular, Eddie’s “Master of Puppets” shredding was awesome and a great sequence).

1. The pacing was terrible. Steve et al. were being strangled for twenty minutes essentially. Not as in oh they cut away for a long time to something else, but like it is implied when Vecna says that he can feel Max’s friends dying, and it cuts to Steve et al., y’know, dying, that that is when that is happening, that is what Vecna is referring to. And then a whole bunch of other shit happens! That all took at the very least like five minutes in real-time! What the hell happened, did Vecna decide to give them a light BDSM play-strangle while he monologued? There was a very elongated sequence where everything was going to shit, almost every character was on the brink of dying essentially (again, great theming in terms of making Vecna feel like an inevitability! They couldn’t win!), and it all got resolved on the turn of a dime and most all of that went away. This made the sequence’s stakes feel cheap all the sudden.
2. The power-scaling was terrible. Everyone was dying until they weren’t. Steve et al. got strangled to death but not really I guess the slimy vines aren’t powerful at all, Eleven was completely helpless against Vecna’s slimy vines (even though she has the power of the sun at times) until she thought real hard and was able to pull the vines back all the sudden because they’re not powerful at all I guess and then she was able to finally hit Vecna real hard this time, Lucas decided he could finally punch back and then immediately knocked out satanic-panic-cop-boy in one hit, Hopper was able to cut through the Demogorgon’s head in one swing even though all season and series we had seen it eat multiple army’s worth of bullets without so much as a scratch (it’s the same process of breaking skin!) because it has impenetrable skin until it gets burned a bit I guess in which case the skin magically changes properties, Vecna can get defeated with a couple shotgun blasts now if he gets burned a bit I guess in which case he gets reminded he has a normal human body, etc. This all made Vecna and the Demogorgon feel weaker than they’d been extremely recently established to be, and all felt too convenient.
3. The lore and mechanics of what’s going on with the Upside Down got much more complicated all the sudden. Hopper et al. make their way through the Russian prison to find out that the Russian government has collected the mind flayer smoke-remnants I guess, somehow, sure, but also is…growing more Demogorgons? Keeping them in stasis somehow? or making them reproduce and then keeping them in stasis somehow? (As we all know, if a being is in fluid in a glass box, it simply goes into hibernation). This could be explained well in the fifth season, but I don’t have faith that it will be anything other than “the Ruskis are up to no good!” and when I saw this I sighed.
4. The ending epilogue makes no sense. We saw the grounds of Hawkins be ripped apart, the earth opening up to the Upside Down like the gates of hell and swallowing massive portions of the town, which was awesome to see (real consequences! Yes!). And then it cuts to news report of an earthquake and we essentially don’t see the fissures again up close at all. Mike’s dad scoffs that there are rumors that gates to hell have opened up. I’m sorry, did they see what we saw? Because what we saw was insane apocalypse stuff, and if it’s like any of the other mini gates we saw all season, there is a fleshy membrane leading to the upside down in miles long and hundreds of feet-wide ravines. There’s no hiding that! There’s no thinking that it’s something natural. Why is the world not losing its mind? The series seems to want to have its cake and eat it too, either have massive real-world consequences or don’t. There is no explanation or implication given that this is being covered up by anybody as in the past, and this is overall too large to cover up. It was completely jarring and soured everything for me.