It’s about damn time! The world has been waiting with baited breath since July of 2019 for new episodes of Stranger Things, and now it’s finally here. I will say, totally worth the wait. Now, there are SPOILERS ahead, so you’ve been warned.
We pick up nine months after the events at the Starcourt Mall took place, and everyone is spread out all over the place. We see Joyce, Jonathan, Will, and Eleven in California, where El is being relentlessly bullied and dealing with the loss of her powers. Back in Hawkins you’ve got most of the rest of the gang. We also learn that Hopper is indeed alive and being held at a top secret Russian prison. Overall, things seem to be pretty tame with life until you get a little closer to everyone.
As I said, El is being bullied a lot but she’s looking forward to Mike’s visit during spring break. Jonathan and Nancy might be on the rocks because neither go to visit one another, and Jonathan is hiding that he plans on going to college close to home to look out for Joyce and Will. He’s made a hilarious friend in Argyle, a frequently stoned pizza delivery guy. Steve and Robin are working at Hawkins’ local Family Video (respect and RIP), while Dustin, Mike, and Lucas have all joined the high school’s D&D club, Hellfire. Eddie, a “super senior” is the enigmatic leader of this club and hands down my favorite character of the season. Anyways, Nancy is bringing her type-A personality to the school paper, and Sadie is being mentally tormented by Billy’s death.
You know, just when they all thought they were done with the Upside Down, a nasty creature named Vecna starts picking off Hawkins High students with an alarming and gruesome frequency, and eventually we learn he is targeting students who have went through some extreme trauma. Cue Sadie almost dying. That was an emotionally and physically intense episode this season, and I imagine it’ll wrack up some nominations this coming awards season. Only problem with this new evil entity is that El doesn’t have her powers, but is taken by Sam Owens to some underground lab where she’s unfortunately reunited with “papa,” aka Dr. Brenner. They think she can get her powers back in time to help save Hawkins and her friends.
Finding El is really the only mission for the California group, so their journey, while entertaining at times, was probably the most uneventful. I was also not really finding Joyce and Murray’s mission to get Hopper out of Russia all that entertaining. Good news is, he’s out. So I imagine everyone will be coming back together in the last two episodes of the season airing in July. Hawkins is where most of the main cast is, and obviously, the action. Hawkins hasn’t been called a portal to hell for nothing. Dustin is still endlessly entertaining, and while the storyline keeps teasing at a Steve and Nancy reunion, I think they are setting up for Steve’s demise. It would make sense as that would be a huge main character loss. Also maybe some foreshadowing when Steve was wearing Eddie’s jacket in the Upside Down? Maybe that’s him “passing the torch” of looking after these kids when he’s gone. If there were more than one season left of this show I’d be pissed about this potential development, even if it is a good one.
Overall, the season was fantastic and even after finishing it almost a week ago, I’m still thinking about it. I can’t wait for July 1st! Then I’m just hoping we don’t have to wait another three years for the final season. Look, this wasn’t a completely spoiler-filled review, as there’s still a ton to unpack with Vecna and Eleven’s time in the underground lab, but I didn’t want to ruin all the fun. If you haven’t watched this latest season yet, then what the heck are you waiting for?!