Sloan Jambor ‘26, Lyonlife.org Editor-in-Chief
Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Eve may mark holidays that are celebrated by many. Recently, though, these holidays were also remarked as the release dates for the final season of Stranger Things. The long-awaited fifth season left fans with mixed reviews, with some believing the writing was perfect and others thinking that the Duffer Brothers, the producers of the show, butchered the entirety of the series with one final season. WARNING: THE NEXT PARAGRAPHS HAVE SPOILERS
On Thanksgiving, Volume I was released with four episodes, three being above an hour and one being six minutes below. Volume I contained an intense amount of gore with the kidnapping of Holly Wheeler and 11 other elementary school children. Both Mrs. Wheeler and Mr. Wheeler, the parents of Holly, Mike, and Nancy, were attacked by demogorgons—the demons sent to kidnap the children—and both parents were sent into a coma after being slashed open by these demons. Vecna—the villain fueling these kidnappings—was revealed as Mr. Whatsit, an “imaginary” character that appeared before the children in hopes to convince them to come to his house. In reality, the house was just his lair that would cause the children to fuel his mastermind project: the creation of the Mind Flayer. During this, Mike, Will, Eleven, Dustin, Lucas, Robin, Steve, Nancy, Jonathan, Mrs. Byers, and Hopper were all working to save the kids. Whilst Holly was in Vecna’s imaginary house, she snuck out to find Max—a character also trapped in this world—and they attempted to find a way out of Vecna’s mind.
All throughout this, Eleven was being hunted by the military for their master scheme, but despite their efforts, they continuously failed to find her. The first Volume ended with Vecna kidnapping all the children, but his demogorgons were unsuccessful in killing off a few of the main characters as Will developed similar powers to Vecna and ended up killing the demogorgons through his mind.
The Volume I ratings from IMDb were decent as Chapter One: The Crawl got a 7.9/10, Chapter Two: The Vanishing of Holly Wheeler received a 8.4/10, Chapter Three: The Turnbow Trap got a 8.5/10, and Chapter Four: Sorcerer was highly rated with an incredible 9.4/10. The initial release left fans hungry and wanting more because of the cliff hanger of Vecna leaving back to the Upside Down—an alternate dimension of Hawkins—in his new form, and Will receiving his Vecna-like powers. Fans were not too thrilled about the month-long wait, but they also figured it would be worth it in the end.
Though Volume I was electric, fans were not as ecstatic about Volume II, as there was simply not enough action as the previous volume. The Christmas release featured the discovery of Dimension X, the true place Vecna was hiding that was being held by a wormhole, the discovery of Will being able to see through Vecna’s mind, Max’s return to the real world, Will’s official coming out, the reintroduction of Kali, as well as the near-death experiences and breakup of Nancy and Jonathon. Though the three episodes contained a lot of information retaining to where Vecna was hiding and whether or not the kids were safe, there was still a yearning of more action from the fans. There were a few scenes of encounters with Max and Will who were portrayed through Vecna’s body which left the audience on the edge of their seats, and the demodogs hunting down Max in the real world before being destroyed by Mrs. Wheeler’s quick, explosive thinking were some of the most intense scenes within Volume II. Lots of fans were also disappointed with the fact that Nancy and Jonathon lived after almost being enclosed in a goo-like substance in the Upside Down as many believed there were going to be five deaths within the season; however, this did not end up being true.
Overall, Volume II did not hit as hard to both viewers and critics. Chapter Five: Shock Jock received a 7.9/10, Chapter Six: Escape from Camazotz was rated a 8.0/10, and Chapter Seven: The Bridge got a shockingly low 5.6/10. From critiques of the low action and poor quality with their insanely high budget, viewers were hoping the finale would save the poorly executed Volume II.
On New Year’s Eve, the two-hour finale, Chapter Eight: The Rightside Up, dropped, and to say fans had mixed reviews would be an understatement. The last ever episode of Stranger Things contained the final fight between Eleven and Vecna along with the appearance of the Mind Flayer against the rest of the cast. Max, Kali, and Eleven all traveled into Vecna’s mind through Eleven’s powers, and they showed all the brainwashed children that Mr. Whatsit was truly the bad guy, and they helped Holly lead these children to the path that would lead them out of the delusions. Without the children, Vecna was incapable of bringing himself to the real world and finishing his master plan which allowed Eleven to fight him within the Mind Flayer’s body. On the outside, Nancy was shooting at the Mind Flayer in hopes to damage it, and the rest of the characters would throw heat in an attempt to disarm it. At the same time, Vecna was getting injured which allowed Eleven to impale him and end both the Mind Flayer and Vecna.
Mrs. Byers came in to decapitate Vecna while showing traumatic flashbacks that each person had faced within the show because of the Mind Flayer and Vecna. The full circle moment led many to believe the show was over, but when everybody got back to the real world, the military attempted to capture Eleven, but she ended up sacrificing herself and closing any portal to the Upside Down. This later led to the Epilogue of seeing the teenagers graduate, play Dungeons and Dragons (DND) one last time, and seeing the possible futures of all of them. However, though this was sweet, Mike had begun a speculation that Eleven might not truly be gone and Kali would have used her powers to make everybody “see” her while she actually escaped. The ending left viewers to their own interpretation before showing Holly and her friends come down to play DND themselves.
Overall, the mixed reviews left the episode with a rating of 7.8/10, and the fans are still in disbelief that it is over. Senior Lucy Stoll said, “I was really excited for the finale, and I was expecting some crazy deaths. I was a little disappointed with the ending of the second half; the last hour was boring and not eventful.” There are many plot holes that people would like to be revealed, like why there were no demogorgons during the big fight, why there were not five deaths, why colors were changing within the show, why the military just let everybody go after Eleven appeared to die, why the final fight was only six minutes, why the script did not match up with previous seasons, why there was an 18 month gap. Throughout all of the fans’ confusion, the Duffer Brothers did not help with their responses to these plot holes.
The consistent response from these two was a lot of hypothetical theorizing, “I do not know,” and leaving that up to the viewers’ interpretation. For instance, their response to why the military disappeared was, “I suppose there’s not much else to do. There is no Eleven to chase anymore, my guess is they just sort of slowly dismantled operations and left town.” The lack of confirmation on their own show is sending fans into spirals, and there are a plentiful amount of fans that believe there is another episode being released that will clear the air. However, the idea that the Duffer Brothers could hide an entire episode from the scouring on the internet is not likely, and fans are likely just in denial from an ending they did not enjoy.
Many of these fans are yearning for more, but overall Stranger Things ended in a way that was action-packed and enjoyable for most fans who grew up with the show. Though bittersweet, it is amazing to see the growth and completion of the show that seemed to last a lifetime.
Lyon Life 