Nine Thoughts About Stranger Things 3! With Spoilers!

I thought Stranger Things 3 was pretty close to perfect, and by perfect I mean finding a balance between outright fan service and solid writing which offered both closure and some good prospects for a fourth season.  Some thoughts:

1)  This felt a lot more action-oriented than the previous seasons, and that was OK.  They were juggling a ton of characters and while the first few episodes were slow, the fast pace of everything else felt justified and not at all rushed.

2)  There were plenty of emotional moments, but one that stood out for me was Will tearing down Fort Byers, "putting aside childish things" so to speak as his friends discover girls.  I had many a feel with this scene.

3)  Something I didn't like: while using music well is a powerful technique, they really overdid it here.  Every damn scene doesn't need a cutesie 80s gratuitous musical cue.  A few would have been awesome, but it became tedious and predictable.  (Jackie Wilson's "Higher and Higher" is from 67, natch.)

4)  I really want Steve to find a nice girl and settle down.  He's earned it.

5)  Robin was great.  Erica was great.  Max felt a little underdeveloped, even though she got plenty of screen-time this season.  She grieves after Billy sacrifices himself but it felt kind of rote.

6)  As good as this season was, part of me kind of wants it to end here -- Hopper dead, the kids growing up and moving on, everyone fully experiencing "the hurt" of the final letter.

7)  I get that part of the show's charm comes in the form of 80's pop-culture references, but Grigori the Russian hit-man was a little too on-the-nose in referencing The Terminator.

8)  Nancy is bad-ass, as always.  The actual NRA is a terrorist organization, but if she started her own gun club I'd join in a heartbeat.

9)  As a life-long nerd myself who used to play a lot of Dungeons and Dragons, you'd think I'd relate to one of the "core" kids the most (Will, Mike, Lucas, Dustin).  But Steve -- saying stupid things, the faded glory, multiple romantic failures, but very occasionally rising to greatness when needed?

Yeah, I'm definitely a Steve.

14 Thoughts About Stranger Things, Season Two! (With Lots of Spoilers!)

1)  We get it -- people smoked a lot in the 80's.  But people did not smoke that much.

2)  "I am on a curiosity voyage, and these are my paddles!"  Dustin was great in season one.  He was pretty damn near sublime in season two.  His "cool" haircut was -- wow.

3)  Speaking of hairstyles, Eleven / Elle's boy haircut was really confusing.  Sometimes I honestly thought she was one of the boy characters.

4)  As great as the Winter Ball scene was at the end and how it tied so much together, I think one of my favorite things about this show are the less obvious moments of chemistry, and how even characters who don't really share an arc are still guaranteed to have a really human moment or two.

5)  The Nancy love-triangle is still fantastic.  They frame Jonathan as the moody, Clash-listening poet dude, and Steve as the rich dumb jock from the beginning.  But by the end of Season Two I was kind of rooting for Steve to get back together with Nancy, or at least find somebody new.  He's genuinely a protector of the kids, even when he's still the dumb jock who doesn't know what Morse Code or the history of National Socialism are.  (Arguably my favorite laugh lines of the season.)

6)  The theme of this season, and probably the show, is that "friends never lie."  But of course, they end up lying to each other constantly.  They couldn't protect each other, otherwise.  They couldn't survive, otherwise.  (I'd argue tying up your son / brother and jamming him with sleep medication when needed in order to save the world is somewhat deceitful, at best.)

7)  I liked Max.  Was she necessary though, beyond just "filling in" for Eleven and establishing a bit of romantic tension?  Eleven and Mike certainly don't seem to think so.

8)  I didn't know what to make of Max's brother.  It seems like he was supposed to do more, probably something awful, but beating up Steve was pretty inconsequential.  I will give no fucks if he isn't back for season three.

9)  Speaking of fucks, kids should curse more in movies and TV.  And they should do it in these off-hand, spontaneous ways, just like how kids (and adults) curse in real life.

10)  The only major letdown for me was episode seven, where Eleven goes to Chicago to find her sister.  I think fleshing out her backstory is fine, but everything with Kali and her gang just doesn't work.  Kali's buddies were very Destroy All Movies!!! (in a bad way), and loosening up the action of the last two episodes into three might have worked well.

11)  Goddammit Bob, as with most characters on this show, they set you up as boring and flawed and then manage to develop you in genuinely funny and sympathetic ways.  I wanted Bob to live.  I had many a feel when he died.  R.I.P. Samwise.  I mean Bob.

12)  Barb shall have her revenge on Hawkins, Indiana.  (She really did!  At least on the governmnent scientists who managed to get her killed, thanks to Nancy and Jonathan and the crazy conspiracy dude!)

13)  My Stranger Things season three betting pool:  What insanely neurotic behavior will Mrs. Byers engage in next season (decorating the house with Christmas lights, Will's crayon drawings) before being proven absolutely correct about everything she thinks is going on?

14)  I hated the fact they used The Police's "Every Breath You Take" for Eleven and Mike's first kiss (an admitted stalker anthem) but then, right on the line "I'll be watching you," we get the big old reversal into the Upside Down which ends the season.  For a show about inter-dimensional space demons, this show really has the lightest of touches at times.  That's not easy to pull off, and I think that's why I love it so much.

Barb, We Hardly Knew Ya

"The Synth Sounds of Stranger Things"

Here's a very cool video guide as to how classic 80's synths were used to make the soundtrack to Stranger Things.  Here's a more in-depth guide to the retro tech that was involved.

As mentioned, as much as I liked the series I think it started much stronger than it ended.  I wouldn't say I was disappointed exactly, but for a show going in so many weird directions the last episode felt pretty conventional in comparison to the rest of the series.  (The bit with the sheriff leaving some Eggos in the woods was great though.)

Then again, it was nice to have a tidy eight-show run that actually did manage to answer and resolve some of its own "big" questions with just enough left to the imagination for a second season.