[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers through the series finale of Stranger Things, Season 5 Episode 8, “The Rightside Up.”]
Stranger Things needed to end, arguably well before Season 5. There was only so much new mythology this show could explore, so many new characters it could introduce. Its most effective qualities, such as the appeal of its young cast and the nostalgic elements of its setting, had been in serious decline for a while. So the series finale, “The Rightside Up,” was exciting because it at least came with a guarantee that (most of) this adventure would be wrapped up by the time the closing credits rolled. Yes, it’d take over two hours, but knowing that an end was at hand was honestly a relief.
While featuring many of the show’s stronger qualities, the series finale also managed to encompass so many of the Netflix show’s biggest flaws at once. Awkward acting. Even more awkward CGI. Multiple fake-outs, manipulating us into daring to believe that a character might actually die. Terrible wigs. And a conclusion that had a good message and positive vibes, but took far, far too long to arrive.
Season 5 got off to a promising start, largely thanks to a few set pieces with a lot of powerful momentum: Watching the Hawkins gang work together to search the Upside Down and break into a military installation highlighted the cast’s strengths, while reminding the audience just how much fun these characters can be together.
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Those first four episodes, though, were followed by a Volume 2 which technically moved the plot along, but only in the slowest ways possible, with multiple narratives dragged out across multiple episodes. These three episodes did make time for some big character moments, like Nancy (Natalia Dyer) and Jonathan (Charlie Heaton) calling an end to their relationship — though the scene was so confusing in its execution that the Duffer Brothers literally had to give a statement to People confirming that those two crazy kids had broken up. Effective storytellers don’t usually need to clarify plot points to People.
Volume 2 essentially boiled down to a lot of set-up, capped off by an extended coming-out scene for Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) — all setting the stage for the first hour and 20 minutes of “The Rightside Up.” Aside from a change in records to trigger the climatic bomb, the plan largely went as expected. Okay, there was one twist of a literally giant nature: The involvement of the Mind Flayer in a kaiju-esque giant crab form, essentially serving as a sweet ride for Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) and the children he’d abducted, at least until a multi-pronged attack from our plucky world-saving teens brought an end to that supernatural threat.
Stranger Things (Netflix)
Stranger Things has always felt a little spiritually indebted to the Alien franchise, leading us to the freewheelin’ axe-swingin’ Joyce (Winona Ryder) getting her “Get away from her you bitch!” moment with “You fucked with the wrong family.” Did we honestly need the many, many flashbacks to all the trauma these characters have endured thanks to the soon-to-be-headless Vecna? Perhaps not. But it did help sell the idea that at last, after all this time, the Big Bad is truly gone.
And, soon after Vecna’s killed, the gang manages to trigger the wormhole collapse, leading to the disappearance of the Upside Down and two of the finale’s biggest needle drops: Armed with the power that comes with having made Kate Bush a chart-topping success, the show was able to secure two iconic Prince tracks.
However, while “I think there’s nothing really more epic than Prince,” Ross Duffer told Tudum, the use of “When Doves Cry” felt out of sync with that narrative moment, and as the backdrop for Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) and Mike (Finn Wolfhard)’s teary farewell, “Purple Rain” ended up being more distracting than significant to their story.
The music choice isn’t the only reason why this seemingly seismic climax fell completely flat in the moment, as Stranger Things is literally the show that cried wolf when it comes to putting its characters in grave danger. Consider the montage in Season 5, Episode 4 which teases the possibility of Hopper (David Harbour) blowing himself up with C-4, or the scene early in the finale when Steve (Joe Keery) slips and seems to fall to his death — a cut-to-black adding some artificial adrenaline to the action before he’s immediately rescued by Jonathan.
There have been so many scenes like this over the course of the show’s history, and so very few of them have actually had real consequences. So El’s disappearance, beyond recycling the Season 1 finale in a very real way, failed to register an emotional reaction — especially because there were still over 40 minutes of the finale left. Plenty of time for another twist.
Eleven’s fate remaining ambiguous ended up being the show’s last big twist: After the Upside Down disappears, the episode flashes forward 18 months to the high school graduation of the Party (yes, the audience is still being asked to believe they are teenagers). And somehow, miraculously, nothing supernatural ruins the festivities.
Robin (Maya Hawke), Steve, Nancy, and Jonathan, visiting town for the occasion, all resolve to stay closer. Hopper and Joyce get engaged. Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo) rebels at the graduation ceremony with a speech about how “When you get to know people different than you, you get to learn more about yourself,” a thesis statement this show could have shown more than the occasional glimmer of interest in exploring. And the kids wrap it all up with one last game of Dungeons and Dragons in the Wheeler basement.
The Duffers can’t resist one more montage, this one setting up the futures of the show’s core characters: Max (Sadie Sink) and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) getting a happily ever after, Dustin continuing to study and hang out with Steve, Will discovering the New York City gay scene, and Mike… becoming a writer. If Mike telling stories inspired by the past five seasons seems at all familiar to you, it might be because you’ve seen the series finales of The Dick Van Dyke Show, 30 Rock, Game of Thrones, the original Roseanne, Gilmore Girls…
Mike’s final story of the series is the happy ending he’s crafted for Eleven: A daring escape with some help from the dying Kali (Linnea Berthelsen), and a life in a small town where she can be free and safe from anyone seeking to use her for nefarious ends. It’s a nice tale, and as believable as anything else that’s happened on this show.
The emotional heft of watching the original Party members (plus Max) put their D&D binders on the shelf is real, because it’s easy to get sentimental about characters you’ve been watching over the course of nine years. Yes, that’s only over the course of five seasons and 42 episodes, but viewers have very literally watched these kids grow up on screen over the years. Now they’ve left the basement and a new generation has taken their place.
Whatever comes next for the Stranger Things universe, it’ll never have the same impact as that first season did, back in 2016; an unexpected summer hit that gave young teens characters they could relate to and older folks a potent hit of nostalgia. The show’s evolution into pop culture phenomenon was an awkward one, but it proved that even in the shattered streaming landscape, monoculture moments were still possible. Stories could still unite us. Even at its most plodding and dense, Stranger Things held a real power over its audience. Long after we forget what happened to Vecna, we’ll remember that.
Stranger Things is streaming now on Netflix.
