A 4 Part Review of "Stranger Things" Season 2
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A 4 Part Review of "Stranger Things" Season 2

Oh yes, there are spoilers ahead.

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A 4 Part Review of "Stranger Things" Season 2
Blending Cool

(Caution! Spoilers ahead)

I hope that you all had a good Halloween weekend. The air was crisp, the leaves were falling, and of course, midterms have been piling up. So who doesn't love getting dressed up like your favorite monster, character or meme and hitting up the town with a couple of friends and forgetting about our woes? Sure as hell not me! But I didn't do any of that. Yep, I had something more pressing to do this past Halloween weekend. Something that I had been waiting for all year long.

The second season of Stranger Things.

Oh yes, ladies and gentlemen. You better bet I threw on those pajama pants, grabbed my favorite blanket, snack and drink and binged my heart out for nine flipping hours on one of modern history's finest masterpieces. By the end of it, I had a permanent pizza roll stain on the side of my mouth from all of the senseless snacking. I basically forgot where the light switch was in the room. It was a mess. It was probably for the best you weren't there.

Fast forward a couple of days, and I believe I've now recovered from my pizza roll coma. In addition, I've also been thinking over the new season, reflecting on it and I'd like to tell you all what I think of it.

It is (still) stylistically perfect.

Okay, this was something that struck me ever since the first episode. This is a complement to the whole show, not just this latest season. Everything about the show is perfect in the sense of the style. Just step back and take a look at the details. Pay attention to the kickass soundtrack, the outfits, the interests of the characters, even the fonts they use for the opening sequence, it just all perfectly screams "cheesy 80s thriller". Now, I'm no expert since I didn't live through the 80s, but it's not rocket science when comparing it to the abundance of cheesy 80s films I've seen. It's a perfect match. Besides, I don't believe this show is trying to mimic the reality of the 80s, but more or less portray a caricature of the films and culture that derive from that era. The inclusion of little details like the obsessions with "Dungeons and Dragons", "Star Wars", the communism scare, and things like that which just make me so happy because it takes me back a decade to when I was watching my friends' old VHS's on their couch. It makes me feel like I'm watching "The Terminator" for the first time and there's a special novelty to that.

A strange new conflict.

What I've always loved about "Stranger Things" since the first season is that the story telling makes room for so many layers of conflict. This leads to a variety of smaller plots that branch out underneath the main conflict. This sort of complexity showed itself again in this second season for sure. We have Hopper hiding Eleven in his cabin home outside of Hawkins, that leads to Eleven learning her identity and seeking out her mother. Then, there is the inclusion of Max who wants to be part of the "party," which leads to a conflict when her older stepbrother is an asshole. Then there are Nancy and Jonathan who are trying to reveal the truth about the Hawkins Lab and its connection with Barbara's death in the last season. Not to mention Dustin secretly raising one of the monsters that the characters fought against last season in his bedroom. All of this is wrapped up under the main conflict which is Will being basically possessed by the mysterious "shadow monster" which seems to lead all of the other Upside Down monsters. It's just a wonderful mess of problems that make for good storytelling and interesting twists in all of the right places.

But what did I think about the main conflict of this season? I'm glad you asked! For the first couple of episodes, it was a little difficult for me to wrap my head around the whole thing. Apparently, the monster they fought against and struggled with all of last season was just one of, like, a bajillion. On top of that they have to deal with the big baddy leader of these monsters who has (for some reason entirely unclear to the audience) targeted Will. Was it because he had been trapped in the Upside Down? Hopper and Eleven had been there, so probably not that explanation. Maybe because Will had spent the most time there? Again, it's unclear. All I know is that a big looming entity of pure darkness targeting the innocent middle schooler who had already been through a lot was an intense route to take for viewers. You just have to feel bad for poor Will.

In all, the conflict for this season has done a lot for the story of "Stranger Things" as a whole, and for that, I can appreciate its complexity and ambiguity. Now we know that the Upside Down creatures work like a hive-mind, and that there may be more gifted individuals like Eleven. The wiggle room of this show is growing. When the conflict leads to the expansion of a fictional universe, then I am happy because who knows what will come next season. I'm excited to find out.

The characters are my favorite part.

I have not seen a show in a long time do characters as well as "Stranger Things." At least, not in a way where I can easily accept every single one that comes on screen. In the last season, you have pretty much every single main character go through some sort of personal issue or turmoil, and in the end, they seem to come out on top. The character development only seemed to hit some of the characters we know and love. The main ones being Mike, Eleven, Steve, Hopper, and Joyce. Everyone else's development was much more subtle if there was any at all.

In season two, we have multiple redemption moments for characters that had no development last season. It's like the writers were handing these out like candy, and I can totally dig that. Dustin became a leader, taking responsibility of catching Dart, Lucas became more accepting of Max, Nancy took initiative to bring down Hawkins Lab, and Jonathan became more intimate with people other than his family. This was on top of multiple characters from the last season developing further like Steve when he starts going out of his way for the kids even when he doesn't owe Nancy anything, Hopper growing to be more lenient with Eleven, and Joyce learning to not pressure Will into talking so much about his experiences. The entire show is littered with character development. I love it so much. It makes every experience between the characters so much more real.

Not to mention that I enjoyed the new characters they had added as well. Max, Bob, and Kali were awesome additions.

Things I had a problem with.

Yes, I realize that I've been speaking highly of this season so far, but there definitely are problems that I've had with it. For starters, I'm beginning to tire of the fact that these kids are able to come up with these convoluted ways to defeat these beings of pure evil by comparing them to monsters in Dungeons and Dragons. Somehow, using D&D as a metaphor -- sorry -- analogy gives them some special power of coincidence that makes them right all of the time. It was clever and cute the first time around calling the first monster the "Demogorgon" after a D&D monster but after they went for round two with the whole "mind flayer" thing, I had just about gotten annoyed. Another thing that is rather frustrating is that we still don't know what the hell the Upside Down is. It just happened and spewed monsters everywhere. Before you get two good looks at the damn thing, Eleven goes and closes off the flesh zipper in the wall they call "the gate" and apparently the great evil of the Upside Down is defeated. There's little to no investigation, even by the scientific teams of Hawkins Lab to find out what the hell is going on. Everything just happens. In a way, it reflects the nonsense of a cheesy 80s thriller, like I've been comparing this show to, but in the grand scheme of things, I believe it'd be better if they'd explain things a little more of what this whole mess was about.

Conclusion.

This show is definitely one of my favorites that I have watched in a long time. It's right up there with "Game of Thrones" (though nothing could replace GOT). Its intricacies and complexities along with the stylistic choice has made this show stand out on top of many things we see on Netflix or TV nowadays. Every episode is a thrill, and I like to think of it more as a nine hour cohesive film than I do a nine episode series. The quality definitely seems to resemble that of a film. Season two has been captivating all the way from beginning to end, all the way to the the ending scene at the Hawkins Ball, which is probably one of the most wholesome and heartwarming scenes of any recorded media that has ever existed. The dance itself was a beautiful summary of these kids' friendship: intimate, loyal, humorous, and emotional. Some would call what I did last Saturday a waste of a weekend, but I'm all smiles thinking about the great day I spent in watching one of the greater shows of our time.

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This article has not been reviewed by Odyssey HQ and solely reflects the ideas and opinions of the creator.
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