"Stranger Things" is yet another example of a Netflix Original dominating modern media. The cinematography, plot and dialogue combine simply to form a masterpiece. In fact, if you didn’t watch all eight 50-minute episodes in one long binge session, I’m impressed with your self control.
In the calm town of Hawkins, Ind., in 1983, people don’t even have to lock their doors. When a young boy named Will mysteriously disappears in the night, his band of neighborhood friends and fellow nerds make it their mission to combat the mysterious and supernatural forces they believed to have caused his disappearance. They team up with Will’s fiercely dedicated mom, a sleazy turned heroic cop named Hopper and rebellious and misunderstood teenagers Nancy and Jonathon, who put aside their breakfast club-esque anxieties of “not becoming like their parents” to help find the missing boy.
The show is set in the '80s and gives a deliberate nod to '80s' classic sci-fi and horror, making viewers feel nostalgic for a time that many weren’t even around for. Spielberg’s "E.T." is possibly the most noticeable reference, with mysterious mute character, Eleven - nearly a re-embodiment of "E.T." himself.
Scenes of flashlights shining through eerie woods, static talking through walkie-talkies, riding bikes freely throughout the neighborhood, mysterious telekinetic powers, faceless men wearing big white space suits, evil scientists and Winona Ryder herself are so completely '80s sci-fi and horror that it truly looks like an re-mastered film that Steven Spielberg, John Carpenter and Stephen King all sat down together to create.
Catching it’s many 80s references from "Alien" (1979) to "Poltergeist" (1982) to "The Goonies" (1985) make watching the series particularly fun. But even if you aren’t interested in a blast from the past, the show's addicting and adventurous plot and characters prove it to be binge-worthy.
