![]() ![]() With each episode, Ryder's Joyce gradually slips towards desperation and her sanity is strained. For my money, it's Winona Ryder, Millie Bobbie Brown, and David Harbour who make this show great. While Finn Wolfhard, Caleb McLaughlin, and Gaten Matarazzo are great and they play perfect best friends, they're not the real standouts of the show. To that end, I have to shout out the great cast and their work on this show. You get to know more about the shadowy agency, Eleven, the demon monster from the Upside down world, and you also get to know more about the cast of characters and what makes them tick. Episode by episode, another piece of the puzzle falls into place. If this dynamic doesn't toss you back into thinking about The Goonies or its numerous clones I don't know what will. With their best friend missing, it's up to a group of kids and their new gal pal with psychic powers to rescue him. The world feels more natural to the point that when you see an army of school kids hauling Trapper Keepers you don't really question it.Īdd to that you have an engaging story with plenty of mystery surrounding it. Perhaps because of the extended runtime with 8 episodes to work with, this show doesn't make it a point to constantly remind people of the era it takes place in. Stranger Things seems to handle things more naturally. While I do love Super 8, even I would admit that it goes too hard to ape the Spielberg "Wonder Gaze" and cast the film unrealistically in the late 70s early 80s. There are a number of similarities between these two works with a cast of young child actors in the leads to shadowy government agencies to a creature that likes to keep to the dark. Abrams' ode to Steven Spielberg 80s movies, Super 8. If there is an easy comparison to make, one could draw a pretty solid line right to J.J. If the Duffer Brothers had slipped up in the slightest, if all of the cultural references hadn't worked, the show would have been just a flimsy piece of nostalgic kitsch that would have been quickly forgotten. There is a lot packed into this show from numerous movie references like The Thing and The Evil Dead to bits and pieces carved from Stephen King books, there is a lot of 80s nostalgia at work here. Brenner (Matthew Modine) arrives on the scene.Īs I'm a person who is reluctant to provide any spoiler material lest someone reading hasn't seen it, I'm actually having a tough time talking about Stranger Things. As Eleven may prove to hold the clue to Will's disappearance, a shadowy government agency lead by Dr. ![]() When Mike, Lucas, and Dustin discover a mysterious girl named Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) in the rain only wearing a t-shirt, the mystery only thickens. Even the town's chief of police Hopper (David Harbour) is at a loss, as the clues they do have fail to add up. His mother Joyce (Winona Ryder) and his older brother Jonathan (Charlie Heaton) can't find him. After playing a long round of D&D with his pals Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin), and Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) goes missing. In the sleepy Indiana town of Hawkins, life is normal. It isn't perfect, but it's damn entertaining and thankfully holds up to repeat viewings. From the get-go, the Duffer Brother's Stranger Things won me over. ![]() Interestingly enough, outside of how great it was or comparisons to various movies I heard nothing! That got me interested. When people started chattering about Netflix's ode to 80s horror movies, Stranger Things, I put my guard up preparing to wait months to start in on it. From Breaking Bad to Game of Thrones, I've purposely kept my distance so I can enjoy things on my own terms. Part of it has to do with not wanting my opinions of a work colored by outsiders, but it's also to do with the incessant water cooler chit-chat that inevitably leads to massive spoilers. When everyone is talking about a show or a movie, my gut response is to run in the opposite direction. A Cultural phenomenon is a tough sell for me. ![]()
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