Just finished season three. Really good stuff!

7/5/2019 11:20:31 PM

It was good. The aruging between Hopper and Joyce was a bit too sitcom-y. Also the 'performance' Dustin had to put on for his girlfriend during a tense moment was kinda cringe.

7/6/2019 12:28:27 AM

Thought it was great, even if I do back up the two critiques about Hop and Joyce and Dustin's serenade.

7/8/2019 9:14:41 AM

thought it was great. Did not mind the Neverending Story duet.

7/8/2019 9:54:23 AM

I'm only three episodes in to season 3 but why is Dustin still missing his front teeth? They've been missing for like 2 yrs now.

7/8/2019 12:28:23 PM

He has a medical condition. He explained it in season 1.

Thought it was excellent in all of its exquisite 80s detail. Loved the Waldenbooks at the mall. I'm a sucker for nostalgia and I'm eating it up. I could almost smell my hometown mall from the 80's.

I'm not through the whole season yet so I can't comment on the story, but I've enjoyed it so far.

7/8/2019 12:41:36 PM

Got through episode 4 last night. Really interested in where this going.

[Edited on July 8, 2019 at 1:50 PM. Reason : s]

7/8/2019 1:46:11 PM

I binge watched it all on Saturday. Good stuff.

Glad there wasn't a throwaway episode like S2E7 where El hunts down her sister.

7/8/2019 2:11:37 PM

The strobing warning was legit. Husband had to narrate a few scenes for me. And I was all for the never-ending story scene. I loved it in all of its cheesy, cringy glory.

7/9/2019 12:41:27 AM

Really glad they took a minute in the final episode to point out how absurd all the crazy shit that happened in Hawkins, even if it was just poking fun with the little tv show clips of the investigation.

I was really having a good time watching this season and then the last episode had to try to attack my feels.

*** SPOILER ****



You've been warned.

The song("Heroes"), Hopper, the letter, the leave the door open 3 inches, ugh, that was so well done.

We probably have until Christmas 2020 to debate who the "American" actually is. They definitely want the audience to think it's Hopper but I think it makes more sense for him to be trapped in the Upside Down than stuck in a Russian cell.



**** END SPOILER ****

7/9/2019 9:05:21 AM

Dr. Brenner is the American, Hopper escaped to the upside-down through the 3-inch crack in the door... (maybe)

I loved all the old logos/signs/wrappers/product-placement. Really enjoyed the show. I thought they went a little over-board on the cheesiness of Hopper and Joyce's bickering... they seemed to make Hopper a lot goofier than he was in the earlier seasons (was that because of the old movie trope that all parents are goofy, and Hopper has only recently become a parent again?)

7/9/2019 10:43:41 AM

The thing that bothered me about Hopper's character wasn't the silly bickering, it was that dude put on weight and seemed out of shape early in the season, and then be turns into a complete/total badass.

Dude was fighting hand-to-hand with The Russian Terminator and he was going up against "the best Russian soldiers" that were there to guard the mall/bunker. I understood him shooting some up, but he was doing pretty damn well with a lot of hand-to-hand combat for a town sheriff.

I also think the kids survived a LOT of huge blows. Fairly certain Eleven, Mike, Max, Nancy, Jonathan, and Steve would all have some fairly serious damage ranging from broken bones to serious concussions.

7/9/2019 10:52:37 AM

This show seems to have done the 80's better than some of the movies that came out in the 80's. I mean the mall in season 3 looked more like my hometown mall when I was 7 than the mall in "Chopping Mall." (If you haven't seen that cinematic classic you totally should).

And Hopper's letter was great.

My only beef with the premise of season 3 is that after what took place in Hawkins, I can't believe the government didn't have that city under the tightest surveillance possible in the 80's. I don't see how they would have let someone moving tons and tons of earth for an underground complex go under the radar. Maybe if it was just an ordinary town in middle America, but when you open an interdimensional portal - that kinda thing usually makes a government want to keep tabs on said portal's location.

7/9/2019 12:38:21 PM

Quote :

"it was that dude put on weight and seemed out of shape early in the season"

He might of had a belly, but most of that weight was in his chest and soldiers. I've learned not to fuck with guys like that.

7/9/2019 12:42:36 PM

I enjoyed this season. The Russian element just didn't do it for me. That's my only real complaint. All for the Neverending story part. I laughed quite a bit.

7/9/2019 1:23:46 PM

Quote :

"My only beef with the premise of season 3 is that after what took place in Hawkins, I can't believe the government didn't have that city under the tightest surveillance possible in the 80's."

I'm with you there.

How much time passed between the hospital incident and the 4th of July celebration? It's like nobody in the town (especially the Mayor) noticed that the hospital became the scene of a bunch of destruction or grisly murders?

7/10/2019 12:43:32 PM

Really enjoyed this season, as well as the first two. Normally for a show with a large cast and multiple storylines like this I'll find myself disliking parts of it, but I really like every character and story. Such a good show.

David Harbour has been teasing something on his Instagram page where he changes his profile picture to a different number everyday. The number goes to Murray's fictional voicemail and has a message that says "If this is Joyce, Joyce, thank you for calling, I have been trying to reach ya. I have an update. It's about, well, it's probably best if we speak in person. It's not good or bad, but it's something . . . "

[Edited on July 11, 2019 at 9:11 AM. Reason : Sfhj]

7/11/2019 9:09:27 AM

Hated. This. Season.

Pacing, tone, story (which comes from and goes nowhere), acting (on the part of the leads, not their fault, terrible writing) you name it. Saw the whole thing through out of a sense of obligation and a hope that we might actually learn something new, but nope.

7/11/2019 10:29:47 AM

You appear to be in the minority.

7/11/2019 11:16:02 AM

Yup.

7/11/2019 11:18:23 AM

This is amazing!

https://youtu.be/9ILTNsXi_7k

7/14/2019 8:41:45 AM

man that is great!

7/15/2019 12:21:43 PM

yea that is pretty rad

7/15/2019 4:51:26 PM

The Russians having an incredibly built out base in the middle of America seemed more than far fetched. Yeah yeah yeah I know it's a sci-fi show but come on, got to be limits somewhere.

The 80s nostalgia seemed to be laid on way too thick this time around, felt way too in your face. Possibly my least favorite of the 3 seasons, but still pretty good.

7/16/2019 9:25:34 AM

agreed on the Russians

disagree on the 80s nostalgia, I'll take all I can get

7/16/2019 10:49:31 AM

I also found the 80s nostalgia distracting. As someone who remembers the 80s pretty well, it just kept pulling me out of the story.

At one point I actually yelled at the TV to STOP WINKING AT ME, I GET IT, IT'S ANOTHER POP CULTURE REFERENCE.

7/16/2019 12:04:32 PM

That's kinda been the show's M.O. since the very beginning.

7/16/2019 12:10:05 PM

agreed

7/16/2019 12:12:27 PM

Finished this morning...thought it was better than last season, though not as good as the first.

I enjoyed the Neverending Story, though that particular song really just hit the exact right nostalgic note with me, so I can envision that had they chosen a different song, or that song didn't hit you in the same way that whole scene becomes annoying.

The bickering was both funny and annoying at times, though weighted more towards annoying. Mostly I just thought Hopper's side of it with his over the top reactions were a little contrived and added heavily to the annoying aspects of it

Obviously the Russians installing this whole facility unnoticed is ridiculous, but that's the story they wrote, not sure how else to really explain it if that's the direction they thought was best.

I didn't think the 80's stuff was too much at all, never have with this show. In fact I think this show does a much better job of being less over the top with it than plenty other 80's/90's period pieces. That said, I didn't really like the El/Max shopping scene.

I found myself more emotional from Hopper "dying" til the end more than almost any other TV show I can remember

Oh the one thing that really did irk me was how much Hopper had to be convinced that bad shit was going on. He's being presented with scientific evidence that something odd is happening and his response is basically, "You have emotional problems and are acting crazy" when I would expect the reaction to be, "A whole lot of really weird shit has happened here recently, let's check this out"

[Edited on July 18, 2019 at 11:37 AM. Reason : asdf]

7/18/2019 11:34:50 AM

Just finished. It was entertaining, but my least favorite of the three seasons. My issues have mostly already been expressed on here.

7/20/2019 9:30:50 PM

Finished it this weekend. Loved it. Cried pretty much the whole way through Hopper's letter. That sequence was excellent.

7/22/2019 8:40:01 AM

Just finished the season, thought it was pretty good, I think I liked it more than 2, less than 1. It did seem the best paced of the 3 though, not much filler.

8/4/2019 9:39:58 PM

I did enjoy it overall, and I do think the mall setting was able to introduce several other elements of 80's nostalgia that hadn't been introduced before. Season 2 really fell short in that regard, minus a few Halloween costumes.

Even though I liked the season, I'd prefer if they ended the series here. i feel like they can only reintroduce the same story so many ways. S1: The monster is here and dies. S2: The government is conspiring to bring back the monster. S3: Now the Russian government is bringing it back. That pretty much covers the span of what's 'novel'.

Plus the kids are starting to get rather grown. It'll be weird to watch them riding bikes and using slingshots when they are clearly shaving and speaking with deep voices.

8/15/2019 7:48:10 AM

Technically Netflix hasn't confirmed Season 4, but the producer has said its happening.

Although I think they are running into the issue of using younger child actors that have yet to fully hit puberty with the timeline not being that far out.

The time line:
Season 1 was November of 1983 (Mike, Lucas, Dustin, Will, and Eleven are all 12)
Season 2 was Halloween 1984 (Mike, Lucas, Dustin, Will, Eleven and Max are all 13)
Season 3 was Summer 1985. (Mike, Lucas, Dustin, Will, Eleven and Max are all 13 or 14)

Season 1 was filmed in 2015 and all the main actors were close to if not the age they were portraying so it was realistic, but now they are playing characters that are 3-4 years younger than what they actually are and it doesn't feel as authentic.

I actually would think if you fast forward to like 1988 for the next season it may work better.

8/15/2019 9:06:06 AM

^Yeah that's what I was thinking, fast forward to when they are in high school. Maybe Nancy, Will, and Steve are back in town from college or something. Hop has been "dead" for a few years and Joyce is still dealing with the guilt of it all. Cold War is starting to slow down so whatever has been happening with the Russians is changing.

Maybe they could make it winter 1989 and the series comes to its conclusion as it rolls into 1990, ending the 80s and being a symbolic ending of the show.

8/15/2019 9:15:35 AM

Quote :

"I'm only three episodes in to season 3 but why is Dustin still missing his front teeth? They've been missing for like 2 yrs now."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaten_Matarazzo#Personal_life

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleidocranial_dysostosis

8/18/2019 2:29:26 PM

Quote :

"I found myself more emotional from Hopper "dying" til the end more than almost any other TV show I can remember"

Yup.

8/19/2019 9:24:19 AM

LULZ at the people complaining about the fact that the Russians built a base in the middle of Hawkins while going unnoticed on a show about monsters building themselves out of liquidfied rats...

8/19/2019 9:53:42 AM

LULZ at people that use that argument about anything that happens in a fictional piece of work.

The universe of Stranger Things has already established that monsters from another dimension exist. By the rules of the show, it isn't ridiculous for liquefied rats to sprout monsters. It IS ridiculous however for the Soviet Union to build a giant sprawling underground base during the Cold War without the US government knowing about it.

8/19/2019 10:23:23 AM

Directly underneath a secret lab that the government already knew about and should have been monitoring.

8/19/2019 10:28:25 AM

Next thing you know they'll try to pass off a show where Russia installs a puppet as the US president.

8/19/2019 2:15:09 PM

I'm in two episodes and am enjoying it.

Disturbing intro, they decided to put a warning on because of the most recent school shooting.

Kind of a funny coincidence that a lot of this show is USSR vs. USA, given the current state of affairs.

6/2/2022 2:22:04 PM

I think I’m 4 in, enjoying the season quite a bit.

6/2/2022 2:23:21 PM

I am 4 Episodes in, its been pretty good

Although in Episode 4 the scene in the house with Mike, Will, and Jonathan made me roll my eyes. But cameo in Episode 4 was well worth it.

The visual effects have definitely gotten better.

6/3/2022 10:13:28 AM

It's pretty wild that STs is giving such a huge boost to Kate Bush.

6/6/2022 2:29:45 PM

So good, sucks we have to wait for season five.

7/3/2022 9:51:40 PM

Steve Perry, FTW!

7/4/2022 9:08:04 AM

Really enjoyed the Master of the Puppets scene. Ah, nostalgia

7/5/2022 2:03:04 PM

Kinda thrown off by them all carrying bug zappers around with no extension cords or ways to plug them up. I don't remember them being battery operated.

7/5/2022 2:21:10 PM

It's like they are powered through induction.

7/5/2022 2:38:55 PM