Yeah, I don’t get this review finding any kind of redemption arc for Brenner. It was the complete opposite. Brenner is shown to be even more of a monster than we thought he was in the flashbacks. El gets her powers back from, in no small part, remembering how abusive and manipulative Brenner was towards all his…

Yeah, that struck me too as a weird read. The show never presented Brenner as anything but an abusive asshole right to the end.

I always felt that was a lazy criticism by people who needed to find an excuse to denigrate it because it was a widely popular show that made no attempt to be anything more than be an entertaining show. If anything, it deserves a lot of credit for how seamlessly it integrated all of the 80’s stuff. 

I think the most striking thing about Stranger Things now is that the comment section isn’t full of people arguing that it’s just lazy nostalgia fare anymore.

I don’t think it would have been absurd, and I’m quite doubtful of Max being brain dead. Eleven doesn’t really have powers in a traditional sense. People talk a lot about having plot armor, but Eleven actually has a plot weapon, and it does what she needs to most of the time (see also, Iron Man). A lot of the time,…

Vecna didn’t make a replica of Hawkins, or at least I can’t see a good reason for that to be the primary theory of what happened. The reverse Hawkins is a flash photograph of how it existed when Eleven opened the gate, which is why Nancy’s diary entries end on that date. It would be more likely that Eleven…

I thought the whole ‘heart of the group’ bit was a stretch as well, but I decided it made sense Will would see Mike in an outsized capacity because he’s madly in love with him.

yeah, if Mike’s the heart of the group he’s been a pretty bad heart for a couple seasons now. it would be interesting if s5 addressed some of this - say, what an outright dick he has always been to Max - and used it to give him some growth before the end of the show

Master of Puppets was a perfect track for that (and for Vecna, really.) 

I also think this focus on takes of “if characters can’t die there are no stakes and this is a bad show” shows that Game of Thrones just whacked out some people’s meters on what entertainment “must” do. Stranger Things has never been a show where the core cast is ever in mortal danger—they didn’t even try to pretend…

I’m hopeful Mike gets a time to shine in S5, because I understand the complaints from people that he’s insufferable, yet I find him one of the most realistic characters in the ensemble and an interesting inversion of the usual “superhero’s girlfriend” tropes. He himself in this volume highlights how frustrating and…

I think “redemption arc” for Brenner is a misread of what happens. El and Brenner have their fighting words, and she clearly rejects him and his counsel because it means abandoning her friends. His dying wish is that she just say she understands his point of view, and she refuses. He’s not a monster, but he’s deeply…

When Steve plays Vecna’s ribs like a xylophone, he strikes the same rib twice in succession, yet he produces two clearly different tones

Eddie with the one-man rock concert in the Upside Down was a top 5 moment for the entire series for me. That. Shit. HIT!!!

“And Will’s striking speech to Mike (Finn Wolfhard) in the car lets Schnapp finally showcase his range”

Steve is two days away from retirement and ready to sail on the SS Live Forever with his six nugget family. I’m sure he’ll be fine

Guy gets a little bit of a rush every time he tells people he doesn’t watch a popular tv show

I am usually blind to details, but the book Lucas was reading to Max was The Talisman, where the main character flips between worlds on a journey across country.

Isn’t it the weighted bathingsuit she wore so she’d sink in the sensory deprivation tank? From Season 1?