After 10 years in the making, beloved Netflix series “Stranger Things” came to an end with its fifth and final season. The newest season of “Stranger Things” came out in three parts: Volume 1 released Nov. 26, Volume 2 released Dec. 25, and the finale released Dec. 31. While Volume 1 received immense praise, with “Chapter Four: Sorcerer” being the third highest-rated episode of the whole series, Volume 2 and the finale have been criticized for several reasons.
Throughout the first four seasons, viewers see a series of events in fictional town Hawkins, Indiana, sparked by middle schooler Will Byers’ (Noah Schnapp) disappearance. Characters such as his mother Joyce (Winona Ryder), his brother Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), and his best friends Mike Wheeler (Finn Wolfhard), Lucas Sinclair (Caleb McLaughlin), and Dustin Henderson (Gaten Matarazzo) search for him throughout the first season and encounter a young girl who has superpowers named Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown), “El” for short, and a monster called the Demogorgon. The season ends when Joyce and police chief Jim Hopper (David Harbour) rescue Will from an alternate dimension known as the Upside Down. Throughout the next three seasons, characters from the first season such as Mike’s older sister Nancy (Natalia Dyer) and her ex-boyfriend Steve Harrington (Joe Keery) also begin to play larger roles in the series, along with new characters such as Max Mayfield (Sadie Sink) and Robin Buckley (Maya Hawke). Viewers are also introduced to new monsters: Demodogs in the second season, the Mind Flayer in the third season, and the main villain Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) in the fourth season.
The fifth season of “Stranger Things” had a promising start but a disappointing finish. Taking place a little more than 19 months after the end of Season 4, when Vecna opened four gates to the Upside Down across Hawkins. The military has placed the town under quarantine and set up a base around one of the gates to the Upside Down. El, who had lost her powers in Season 3 and regained them in Season 4, trains intensively to prepare to defeat Vecna while the military searches for her.
Volume 1 of Season 5 emphasizes various relationships between characters: the romantic relationship between Jonathan and Nancy, the father-daughter dynamic between El and Hopper, and the tense friendship between Dustin and Steve, to name only a few. Lucas also continues to take care of Max after Vecna’s attack leaves her in a coma, and Robin starts a romantic relationship with her former classmate Vickie Dunne (Amybeth McNulty). Additionally, Will’s connection to Vecna begins to grow stronger and serves as a major plot point for this season.
Different sequences in this first part of Season 5 were especially impressive. One example takes place in “Chapter 3: The Turnbow Trap,” the main characters set an elaborate trap for a Demogorgon in hopes to track it to Vecna’s hiding place in the Upside Down after struggling to find him. The sequence shows the formation of their plan, the characters setting up the trap, and the process of luring the Demogorgon into the trap. The creativity and the suspenseful but exciting mood of the sequence immerses viewers.
The fourth episode of this season was very strong and well-received, earning a 9.5-star rating on IMDb. In order to save kids from being targeted and kidnapped by Vecna, the main characters devise another elaborate plan. Seeing the plan come together with its many different moving parts made the scene more immersive. Another part of the episode included Hopper and El’s infiltration of a military base in the Upside Down, where their relationship is tested and they discover something that has the potential to be a game-changer for their mission to kill Vecna.
The overall quality of the season drops drastically in Volume 2. Its last episode, “Chapter Seven: The Bridge,” took the spot of the lowest-rated episode in the whole series with a 5.7-star rating on IMDb. The lack of action played a large factor in these episodes’ poor reception. The plot seemed to move very slowly, and many of the events in this part of the season felt redundant or unsatisfying. Interactions between characters seemed out of character and scenes that were meant to be meaningful came off as corny. One sequence that was arguably well done took place in the hospital, where Robin, Lucas, and Vickie scramble to protect Max as Vecna sends Demodogs after her. This scene was very tense and suspenseful, immersing viewers in a way that wasn’t accomplished otherwise in this set of episodes. Still, by the end of Volume 2, the series failed to raise the stakes and excite viewers for the finale.
The final episode of “Stranger Things” came out both in theaters and on streaming Dec. 31, with a runtime of more than two hours. However, in such a long episode, little good seemed to come out of it. The final battle between El and Vecna fell short in many ways, from the underwhelming action sequence to its confusing nature stemming from several continuity errors. By this point in the series, viewers became much less invested in the characters and found the ending to be predictable.
The best thing to come out of the “Stranger Things” finale might have to be the song choices. As it takes place in the 1980s, many popular songs from that time period have been used throughout the series. Notable songs from past seasons include “Should I Stay or Should I Go” by The Clash in Season 1, “Every Breath You Take” by The Police in Season 2, “Material Girl” by Madonna in Season 3, and “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God)” by Kate Bush in Season 4. Some of the most important scenes of the finale played Prince’s “When Doves Cry” into “Purple Rain,” along with Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide” in the epilogue.
In summary, the fifth and final season of “Stranger Things” came to be a disappointment. Because of the high expectations for the ending, fans have even taken to social media to share theories insisting that it was a fake ending and the real finale will be released later. Still, there were several sequences, scenes, and moments where viewers could find themselves immersed and entertained. Despite the collective negativity toward Season 5, the cast undeniably gave it their all to wrap up 10 years of this series.
