According to Jack Seale, a journalist who specializes in TV, 'Stranger Things' season four was bigger and better than anything the show had done before.
"It was clearly more expensively produced, with a larger cast and a surer sense of why all the monsters, heroes and hangers-on were there," Seale wrote in The Guardian.
"The double-bill denouement – held back for a month by Netflix to allow hype to build – is more expansive still. It's crazily, luxuriously sprawling, running to nearly four hours, and does everything fans could have expected plus several dollops more."
#4 On The Left: Scene From The First Season Of Stranger Things, Set In 1983. On The Right: Me, Wearing The Exact Same Shirt In 1983
#5 Winona Ryder Provided 1980s Fact Checks On Stranger Things And Even Got Script Changes For Period Accuracy
But if it hasn't quite overstretched itself yet, Seale does wonder where 'Stranger Things' can possibly go from here.
Consider where everything took place. In Hawkins, Indiana, in 1986, waiting for a gang of plucky teens to mount a final assault on Vecna, the demon who roams a dank dimension beneath the town.
Psychic superheroine Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) unlocked memories from a childhood spent in a secure facility for kids with strange powers, revealing that she opened up the interdimensional portal while confronting One, a murderous fellow inmate (thus turning him into the vengeful Vecna).
#8 In The Stranger Things Episode ‘Chapter Three: The Pollywog’ (S2e3), If You Look Closely At Mr. Clarke’s Town Model, You Can See The Betelgeuse Tombstone From Beetlejuice (1988) - A Nice Little Nod To Series Star Winona Ryder, Who Had Her First Breakout Role As Lydia Deetz In That Film
#9 In Stranger Things S04e03 (2022) Dustin's Comment Regarding Missing Collarbones Refers To His Real-Life Condition 'Cleidocranial Dysplasia' - A Rare Genetic Disorder Gaten Matarazzo Suffers From, That Also Affects The Growth Of His Teeth
In the meantime, a group of sympathetic adults got stuck in a grimy Soviet Union prison, battling a creature left over from a previous season.
"A showdown looms – but hey, we’ve got four hours, there’s no rush. And so season four's last two episodes are surprisingly talky, giving almost every character a tender, watershed two-hander with a significant other," Seale explained.
#10 When Victor Creel Is In His Cell And Scratching His Fingernails On A Desk, It Is A Purposeful Nod To Freddy Krueger, Who Robert Englund Notably Portrayed. It Was Meant To Represent Freddy's Razor-Sharp Blades Attached To His Fingers
#11 Max Escaping Vecna Thanks To "Running Up That Hill" By Kate Bush Isn't The First Time Music Has Been Used To Defeat Creatures From The Upside Down. In Season 2, Jonathan Notably Played Will's Favorite Song "Should I Stay Or Should I Go" By The Clash While He Was Possessed By The Mind Flayer
#12 Spoilers: A Small Detail You May Have Missed... Just In Case You Wanted To Cry Again
#13 While Playing Dungeons And Dragons, Dustin Tells Eddie, "Never Tell Me The Odds," Which Is A Reference To Han Solo's Line In Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Which Came Out In 1980
"Lost love is lamented, halting young love gets closer to being properly expressed, and the show’s barely discernible – although fans who pore over every scene have certainly discerned it – hints about Will (Noah Schnapp) being gay become something more overt during his moving speech about learning to live with being 'different.'"
The TV critic thinks the creators of 'Stranger Things, the Duffer brothers, understand what underpins their reference points, and in particular, they get how the neighborhood apocalypse genre works.
#14 When Eleven And Will Go To School With Their Class Projects, You Can See That Will Did His On Alan Turing, A Code-Breaker During World War II. This Is Also A Notable Easter Egg Because Alan Turing Was Notably Prosecuted For Being Gay, And There Have Been Fan Theories Suggesting Will Is Too
#15 In Stranger Things Season 4 Episode 8, The Assault Resembles The Opening Assault On Leia's Transport In Star Wars: A New Hope
#16 In Stranger Things 3 A Quick Wide Shot Of The Machine Shows A Possible Escape Route For A Certain Character
#17 Nancy's Fake Resume Says She Was A "Youth Worker" In The Years She Spent Helping Her Little Brother And His Friends Save The World
"These stories say that it’s OK to be different – to be shy and angry, or a Dungeons and Dragons nerd, or secretly gay, or a heavy metal freak – because your small town might just be the most important place in the world, and maybe you’re not different, but special," Seale wrote.
"The Duffers appreciate that all this is a metaphor for coming of age, so they sprinkle their finale with universal life lessons about slaying your personal monsters and growing up."
#20 S4e2 - Neat Little Detail, Looks Like They Kept El's Scar From When They Tried To Cut Out The Growth During The Battle Of Starcourt. Not Sure If It's Been Mentioned Yet, But I Love Small Continuity Details Like This
