I got caught up in the hype when Stranger Things dropped its first season in the summer of 2016, I’m not ashamed to admit it. It was in the zeitgeist in a way I hadn’t experienced since… I don’t know. What else has captured everyone’s attention and brought upon us a wealth of new Halloween costumes like the first season of Stranger Things? Fuckin’ Squid Game. Unlikely.

Anyway, I love this show. I’m looking forward to rewatching it.

The Premise

We start our fanciful horror story in the small town of Hawkins, Indiana. On November 6, 1983, little 12-year-old Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) gets abducted from his home following an extensive Dungeons & Dragons campaign with his geeky friends Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin). The nearby Hawkins National Laboratory has opened a rift to an alternate dimension and a monstrous creature called the Demogorgon is responsible for fucking shit up. Will’s mother Joyce (Winona Ryder) senses that her son is still alive out there and spends the season being unhinged. Will’s brother Jonathan (Charlie Heaton) has a weaselly face. The Hawkings lab is run by a man named Martin Brenner (Matthew Modine), who experiments on a girl with incredible telekinetic powers named Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown). Eleven helps Will’s friends find Will, or at least assist the adults [and maybe Mike’s sister Nancy (Natalie Dyer)] in finding Will.

Also Steve Harrington (Joe Keery).

Steve “The Hair” Harrington!

My Half-Baked Thoughts

Stranger Things makes me nostalgic for the ’80s and I barely even lived in the ’80s! Obviously there’s some ’80s-like overflow into the early ’90s, but by then I was playing Bubble Bobble on my sister’s NES and these little nerds had nothing but tabletop Dungeons & Dragons. Sad!

Anyway, the show impeccably captures the mood of a Midwestern small town with limited technology. I loved every minute of the vibe. From the haircuts to the clothes to the music, I could have been watching something that was seriously made in 1983 and I wouldn’t have known the difference (except, you know, Winona Ryder is 45 years old here). My first time through the season I was captivated by the aesthetic, which I think trumps the story, characters, and acting as its strength. That’s saying a lot, too, because the story, characters, and acting are fucking fantastic.

We have to save the world and go through puberty?? What a ripoff!

At the time of shooting the kids’ ages ranged from 11 – 15 years old, with Millie Bobby Brown being the youngest. All were exceptional. Brown showed the most range as Eleven with scenes of believable fear, screaming and crying. Both Finn Wolfhard and Caleb McLaughlin played excellent often-frustrated kids, with Gaten Matarazzo as the goofy foil. Usually kids suck in TV shows and movies, but these kids carried the fucking show. Obviously. Eleven is the best character for so many reasons that I won’t list them here. You should know them already.

While the young kids followed a supernatural mystery story, the others forged different paths. The older teenagers combined high school relationship drama with supernatural horror. Joyce experienced supernatural and psychological horror. Chief Hopper was doing a full-out fuckin’ Jason Statham action thriller. I didn’t find Hopper’s side of the story particularly interesting, but Joyce losing her mind over the course of eight episodes was fun to watch while Jonathan Byers attempted to be the weasel-faced man of the house. Steve Harrington wasn’t NEARLY as big of a dick in Season 1 as I remember. He and Nancy pressured Barb (RIP RIP RIP) to drink during their party, and he (sort of justifiably) broke Jonathan’s camera after believing that he was being a gross voyeur. Which he was, honestly. Are we really going to let Jonathan slide on that one? I wouldn’t. He’s a good older brother for sure, but keep him away from the ladies please. Other than that, though, Steve spends most of his time trying to redeem himself instead.

Obviously, the most compelling part of Season 1 is Eleven’s story. It’s hard for me to remember exactly how I felt watching her backstory unfold the first time, getting bits and pieces of her life as a science experiment down in the Hawkins Laboratory, and how she interacts with the three boys. It’s weird, though. At first you think she can barely understand English, but then it becomes apparent that she’s just socially stunted (and obviously totally traumatized). It’s not clear how much of her life has been spent as a lab guinea pig, but I’m guessing… uh, all of it? She doesn’t even know what a waffle is. Talk about sheltered; Eggos are the bomb, yo. I thought the downplayed romantic connection between Mike and El was adorable AND A HINT AT THINGS TO COME. Also, El is a complete psychokinetic badass and she rocks the buzzcut like nobody’s business.

Is Pepsi okay?

I’m not sure how Will survived for so long in the Upside-Down. The whole season takes place over the course of, what, maybe two weeks? Three? You’re telling me that Barb died within 15 minutes, but Will was able to camp out in his shitty, unprotected fort for days upon days without access to heat, food, water, comic books, or drugs? With a Demogorgon prowling around two feet away at all times? Able to flicker lights in his house with, what, his dick? I wanna see the season through Will’s point of view. I want to know exactly how much dirt he ate and how much the little tweeker miserably jerked it while stranded in some alternate dimension. Season 1.5, bring it on Duffer Brothers.

I think I can end it on that note.

Worth the Watch?

Yes. If you haven’t seen it yet, treat yourself. It lives up to all the hype that it got in 2016, and its charming ’80s aesthetic will ensure that Stranger Things will hold up for decades to come! Centuries! If humanity still exists in the year 2116, they’ll unearth DVDs of the show from some sort of bomb shelter and LOL all over again at Steve Harrington’s antics.

Mom, we have to watch Stranger Things right this second!