The Netflix of 2016 and 2017 was ruled by a very unlikely sci-fi television series, Stranger Things. The show was initially unwilling to be picked by any network for a number of reasons — the very reasons that made it a raging success and a favorite among all.

If the initial response to the show (that using pre-adolescent teens was scarring to those actors) had been addressed and changed to instead use millennials or say adults, the show would have been completely different even with the same plot line.

Driven by the five kids, the extra-terrestrial component of the show which could play hot or cold is the trickiest part of the show and as one look is all that determines whether it is accepted or not.

The strategy to use these kids to portray it in terms of their board game and as a geeky-science interest converts that very ET from an alien to an alien that is now accepted as part of our lives.

The slimy-mucousy parallel dimension and its ruler of Demogorgon shown from the eyes of the four boys, makes the same ugly looking monster that rued Eleven’s life — something that the viewers could connect with to understand the angst and pain that she went through, even though it is not something that people experience on a physical level.

Mike’s instant acceptance of Eleven with all her absurdities and her queer ways of life, his nicknaming of her, his understanding and caring for her, his fierce and forceful initiation of her into their coveted group and his blind belief in her is intriguing and innocent to a level that hits the soft spot of the viewers, the loyalty and friendship among the four boys taking us back to the innocent stages of our lives while also yearning for the lost times.

The Stranger kids work on a parallel dimension of the existentialist as well, as a satire on society and its modern-day presuppositions, its loss of innocence and a commentary on the internal struggles of life mutating and expanding in various forms that cannot be explained, leaving man isolated and alone in more ways that can be conceived and understood.

This is especially seen in Season 2 when Eleven/Jane transports herself to the parallel dimension of the Upside Down; constantly with us, travelling with us and unseen to us, the dimension of complete isolation and revelation is with us to show the true nature of man’s messed-up and conflicting premonitions, constantly haunting us as revealed through the visible forms of the Demogorgon and Dart.

While these aliens are the most absurd creatures on the show, what continues to be more absurd and intriguing are not these mutated forms of the ET but man and his presumptions in terms of his thoughts, his mind, and his life. Stranger Things has been able to portray this through the absurdities of the Upside Down and through the embodiment of El through her mental capabilities bordering superpowers.

Man continues to intrigue.