“Stranger Things 2” review
If you haven’t binged watched “Stranger Things 2,” get out your laptop and press play because this season brings greater threats, new characters and love triangles that will bring out your inner teen girl.
Hawkins, Indiana has become a spot for “strange” things to happen. In the first season, we experienced a young girl with telekinetic abilities and a Demogorgan that attacked when it smelled blood. Talk about an interesting week for this town.
The new characters we get are Max and Billy, stepsiblings who hate each other, Bob Newby, Joyce’s boyfriend, and Dr. Owens. Max is the super cool, video game girl that just moved from California. She beats Dustin’s high score on the video game, which was cool because it broke traditional stereotypes of girls not being into that kind of stuff. Hats off to the producers for that.
Dr. Owens was a nice change from Dr. Brenner. He’s a bit skeptical in the beginning, but as the season progresses, so does his compassion for people and let’s face it, Brenner was anything but compassionate. An interesting cast role was Sean Astin, who played Bob Newby, because of his role in The Goonies. He brought comedic relief and unfortunately gave Will some pretty horrific advice.
This season, a new and even more dangerous threat looms over Hawkins like a giant, evil shadow. Coined as the “Mind Flayer” by Dustin, he explained that it wants to conquer the human race. Well, who cares what it wants, Dustin, that thing needs to get gone! Now the demo-dogs (Baby Demogorgans) cause some issues, too, and in episode 6, you’re going to need some tissues. These things are ferocious canine-like creatures. When Steve uses his infamous bat of nails to hit one in the face, applause is suggested.
In addition to the “Mind Flayer,” the directors wanted a human villain to cause issues for the characters since Steve wasn’t the enemy anymore and the new guy Billy perfectly fit that hole because he’s even more of a jerk than Season 1 Steve ever was. However, Dacre Mongomery, who plays Billy, is actually a really nice guy.
Honestly, Billy should have been eaten by one of those demo-dogs. Another interesting story arc of threats was the fact that Eleven wasn’t really around to help save the day until the end. She had to face her own threats this time, and it was cool to see her character development.
The two love triangles added some depth to the overall story plot. Nancy’s guilt over Barb pushed her between Jonathan and Steve again, and this time she made a good decision by choosing the one who actually understand the weight she was carrying.
The more fun love triangle was between Max, Dustin and Lucas. Max was the new girl, and the boys wanted to make her feel welcome. Who she chooses in the end makes sense because he was the only one who constantly communicated with her.
There were some awesome new friendships in this season as well. Hopper and Eleven develop a father-daughter relationship after the Demogorgan fight where he takes her in and protects her from Hawkins Lab. He teaches her, disciplines her and shows her the kind of love she’s never felt before. We get more character development from Eleven as she learns how to be a person in this society, such as her learning she needs to eat vegetables before dessert.
Steve and Dustin’s new friendship is probably one of the best friendships that we didn’t know we needed, until it happened. The way Steve helps Dustin in all kinds of problems, including helping him fight a demo-dog and giving him girl advice, was big brother advice we can all learn from.
“Stranger Things” Season 3 will most likely be airing in late October or early November of next year. There’s no telling what this next season will bring, but it’s sure to be even “stranger.”