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Television Stranger Things 4 (New Trailer)
- Thread starter MescalineDreams
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Can't really be avoided. Finding under 18 actors is harder and they are more limited in how much time they can work.
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Agree but the kids looking old as shit now isn't entirely on the producers, because the cast was age appropriate in S1 which dropped way back in July 2016. So the kids were cast 10+ years ago when El was actually 11 and the rest of the kids were 11 to 13. Part of the charm of S1 and S2 was watching actual kids... playing kids.
While they've milked this series past expiration, they couldn't have foreseen COVID lockdowns AND writers' strike dragging everything out even more. IMO they're doing a good job managing around Lucas growing up to be Francis Ngannou and El looking like crack whore Wendy from Breaking Bad despite only being 21 now.
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Episode 7 was awful. Shockingly bad. Hope the last one isn't along those lines.
Edit: when I embed a picture my post won't post and I get this error message: Oops! We ran into some problems. Please try again later. More error details may be in the browser console.
So I can't embed the picture of the episode ratings.
Edit: when I embed a picture my post won't post and I get this error message: Oops! We ran into some problems. Please try again later. More error details may be in the browser console.
So I can't embed the picture of the episode ratings.
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People don 't like gay stuff these days. I am guessing you don't like gay stuff. The end of episode 6 was the worst part of the new season with the wayyyy too long dialogue between the two girls.
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I honestly skipped through most of the epilogue, way too fucking long. I just felt disappointed after that final fight. Vecna ended up being a can. No major deaths except for Kali who they introduced back basically to kill off lol. I was on team Vecna. I liked his design, his voice, and the actor portraying him. It's crazy that they had three years to make this season and the finale still ended up feeling so incredibly rushed. Where were the demorgogons and dogs? Vecno just lives in the middle of a desert with zero protection. The Mind Flayer was a mindless 200 foot tall kaiju that got its ass kicked by normal bullets and flame throwers. Mind Flayer should have been some eldritch horror instead that got into the minds of everyone and made them turn on each other. Overall, the biggest flaw of this season is the creators just not willing to kill off anyone. Even watching this I knew nobody would get harmed. There's zero stakes and as a result zero tension. This wasn't game of thrones bad but I'm still pretty disappointed. Season 4 got me hyped again, but this brought me down.
Oh well. Show is over, I'm sure many people will feel the same way I do. I don't think I'm alone.
Final ranking of seasons
1
4
2
3
5
5 was ranked about season 3 for me until the last couple of episodes.
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They really nerfed Vecna/Mindflayer. What was that final battle like 10 minutes long?
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I think overall S5 had the most missteps, but there were also some solid gold highlights. The last episode imo was much better than the rest of the season. They had a job to do, and it got done.
Joyce cutting off Vecna's head with the axe she's been swinging since S1, and then going off to marry Hopper, was something we badly needed. Thank god they gave that lady a win.
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I was really not nervous for any of the characters to die this season, except the girl from S2 and my intuition proved correct
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Good finale and definitely the best episode of S5.
Vecna/Mind Flayer resolution was canned and trite. Henry storyline was promising but yet again we got Eleven via overpowered deus ex machina armbar. Honorable mention to Nancy with her M16 that somehow shoots 50 cal rounds on full auto and Joyce with her hatchet. Bonus for the unintentional comedy of her taking what seemed like thousands of whacks to severe Vecna's head, highlighting her incredibly poor aim and suburban mom hatchet skills.
But the 1-hour epilogue was perfect. Like spot on. The closure this series needed and Mike's final D&D campaign and character endings were amazing. Dustin with the GOAT valedictory speech. El being gone but possibly not was also perfect. She's always been the imaginary friend with magical powers and like Frosty the Snowman or Hobbes from Calvin and Hobbes, she has to go away for the protagonist to grow up.
But the 1-hour epilogue was perfect. Like spot on. The closure this series needed and Mike's final D&D campaign and character endings were amazing. Dustin with the GOAT valedictory speech. El being gone but possibly not was also perfect. She's always been the imaginary friend with magical powers and like Frosty the Snowman or Hobbes from Calvin and Hobbes, she has to go away for the protagonist to grow up.
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Well they nailed it, I had my doubts. Overall this show was pretty freaking good. The characters, atmosphere, and acting were top notice. It will be one of those shows new people will binge for a long time.
I came into it way way late with a summer binge over a year ago. I think I appreciate it more now after it’s over. Seeing flashbacks to when these people were so young was pretty cool. I guess they are going to do spin offs but how they going to top something like that?
I came into it way way late with a summer binge over a year ago. I think I appreciate it more now after it’s over. Seeing flashbacks to when these people were so young was pretty cool. I guess they are going to do spin offs but how they going to top something like that?
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Sort of tough to formulate an overall assessment of that final episode. I’ll probably have to do a rewatch. On the one hand, I think there were some aspects that felt rushed and might not hold up to scrutiny. On the other hand, I think the performances, character dynamics and overall tone were solid enough for me to recommend it.
This is not some slam dunk of a finale but it was effective and entertaining.
I thought a lot of the acting was quite good. Brown didn’t have as much to do as usual in some of the earlier episodes of the season but she definitely delivered in this one. Wolfhard, Sink, McLaughlin, Matarazzo, and Schnapp all sold the emotion of the final sequence well.
This is not some slam dunk of a finale but it was effective and entertaining.
Maybe this should not be the thing that sticks out the most to me but the problem I have with the time jump in the last forty minutes or so is that we lose any sort of fallout from the soldier storyline. I mean, Hamilton and co were portrayed as sort of irredeemable heels yet we are expected to believe that the moment the Upside Down gets destroyed, they pack up shop and all is forgiven and forgotten? None of those characters struck a me as the “we’ll give you a pass since you saved the world,” type people.
I think there were a lot of solid moments interspersed throughout. One of my favorites was after Vecna deceived Hopper into pulling El from the tank. I thought they did a really good job for that moment where Harbour reveals that he knows about El’s and Kali’s plan. It’s well done because even though Hopper should be well aware at that point that Vecna is unreliable and can show him things that aren’t legit, he doesn’t doubt, for a moment, that that portion of it was the truth. I thought that was effective, particularly with Eleven lying for him to try to keep him on board and Hopper persisting and insisting that she look him in the eye and tell him that wasn’t their plan.
Vecna and Mindflayer getting got rather unceremoniously was not too bad to me. The team work aspect was (as usual) cool, even if it’s a little tough to buy that the Mindflayer would be that vulnerable. I liked Will making the save, preventing Vecna from getting to El at that crucial moment. Also, nice touch that they teased that Henry would try to fight off the control and reassert his humanity but he was like, nah, I made my choice. Would have been trite if they went with that villain trying to redeem himself trope.
So El gets the Dark knight Rises ending, except Mike doesn’t get to go vacationing with her and Hopper doesn’t get to see her and give her the head nod of acknowledgment like Michael Caine.
Ultimately, ambiguity and all, I felt that was a nice sendoff for her character.
I think there were a lot of solid moments interspersed throughout. One of my favorites was after Vecna deceived Hopper into pulling El from the tank. I thought they did a really good job for that moment where Harbour reveals that he knows about El’s and Kali’s plan. It’s well done because even though Hopper should be well aware at that point that Vecna is unreliable and can show him things that aren’t legit, he doesn’t doubt, for a moment, that that portion of it was the truth. I thought that was effective, particularly with Eleven lying for him to try to keep him on board and Hopper persisting and insisting that she look him in the eye and tell him that wasn’t their plan.
Vecna and Mindflayer getting got rather unceremoniously was not too bad to me. The team work aspect was (as usual) cool, even if it’s a little tough to buy that the Mindflayer would be that vulnerable. I liked Will making the save, preventing Vecna from getting to El at that crucial moment. Also, nice touch that they teased that Henry would try to fight off the control and reassert his humanity but he was like, nah, I made my choice. Would have been trite if they went with that villain trying to redeem himself trope.
So El gets the Dark knight Rises ending, except Mike doesn’t get to go vacationing with her and Hopper doesn’t get to see her and give her the head nod of acknowledgment like Michael Caine.
Ultimately, ambiguity and all, I felt that was a nice sendoff for her character.
I thought a lot of the acting was quite good. Brown didn’t have as much to do as usual in some of the earlier episodes of the season but she definitely delivered in this one. Wolfhard, Sink, McLaughlin, Matarazzo, and Schnapp all sold the emotion of the final sequence well.
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Ultimately it wasnt perfect, but I thought they nailed what counts. The characters and their stories are the most important thing and I think thats where the strongest resolution was. The big showdown wasnt really any sort of surprise but it got the job done. Ultimately, they went the Stephen King route where if you care about the characters, you'll go along with the ride and I think it mostly worked. There were several monologues in the final stages that were either unnecessary or too long. Classic example was Mike needing to tell Will he was sorry after the Will coming out episode. It was just unnecessary. Everything that needed to be said was already said in that scene, and this extra beat should have been on the cutting room floor.
So mostly it was stuff like that. They probably just wanted to make sure there were no loose ends, but a leaner episode probably would have worked better.
But still, the character resolutions were near perfect, imo. Especially the whole ending with Eleven. Theres just enough ambiguity that you can ponder, even though we all know what probably happened.
So mostly it was stuff like that. They probably just wanted to make sure there were no loose ends, but a leaner episode probably would have worked better.
But still, the character resolutions were near perfect, imo. Especially the whole ending with Eleven. Theres just enough ambiguity that you can ponder, even though we all know what probably happened.
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Yeah, I remember all the predictions of who lives and dies and I always kinda felt like it was talking about the wrong show. Its Goonies, not Game of Thrones. I thought maybe Will might have to die because of the connection with Vecna, but I wasnt expecting more than 1 or maybe 2 deaths max. Kinda obvious Kali would die simply because wtf else can she do? No one cares about her and her story arc is pretty meaningless. Her episode way back in season 2 was god awful and her line delivery doesnt help.
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I'm not sorry to see Kali go, but it is nice that she wasn't a villain
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From my understanding each season was supposed to be structured like American Horror Story. Each with a different cast and story. Season ones success led them continuing with the same story and cast.
Replacing the actors wasnt a option after season twos success. Especially since the financial growth of Netflix coincided with Stranger Things popularity.
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LMAO yeah Kali was a throwaway character if ever there was one. In S2 she was the leader of an alternate universe Scooby Doo Mystery Inc. gaggle of meddling kids cruising around in their evil Mystery Machine committing crimes. Even more laughable was Hopper, Murray and El pretending to be sad when she died. Shit even Kali couldn't stand her own terrible writing and was like my character arc sucks ass but yours doesn't have to El, oh well time to bounce, kthxbai.
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