The Precious Evaluation

In the summer of 2016, the Duffer Brothers (Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer) released Stranger Things on Netflix, however, they didn’t know how much of an impact their show would have on their audience’s lives and their own. Stranger Things has been nominated for over a dozen awards and has won  the AFI Television Programs of the Year, Outstanding Performance by a Youth (Series, Special, Television Movie or Limited Series), and Outstanding Sound Editing for a Comedy or Drama Series (One Hour) )..  The show was inspired by many iconic shows, movies, and even anime, like:  Akira, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Carrie, and Misfits of Science. This show is presented as a regular scifi, horror, and mystery show. Although it is more than that, the show encompasses complex, intricate, and meaningful lessons and conflicts as well. The show became more powerful through plot, emotion, and editing. Stranger Things is one of the best coming of age shows due to the tone, text, and deeper meaning of the stories being told. Most people that watch the show can relate to the characters, understand them, or even feel heard by them. 

  Every episode is overflowing with emotion down to the action, lighting, plot, and music. The bleak and intimidating scenery throughout the show matches the emotion of the characters and plot. To create a show with thisIn auditions Gaten Matarazzo changed the casting director’s perspective on his character. When they first wrote the show they did not know or even imagine how the character would come about, but when Gaten auditioned he was one of the first to, “ create the part outside of how it was written”. This was captivating because the director cared about every detail of the show down to its cast. This shows the dedication to making the show exactly how they want it. Then not only that Gaten is not who they anticipated to give the role to, but he still managed to get it. This is because he was himself and original, some people have true issues being who they are. So knowing this can help others learn how to be comfortable with themselves, because look where it can get them. Stranger Things truly puts effort and finds ways to resonate with their viewers. 

The show even introduces symbols, key terms, other content-specific words, and phrases. This is something younger audiences need to learn about in real life, not Tv, but the Duffer brothers still add this aspect for meaning and understandment. Anyone can listen or watch a movie and know what’s happening, but not all can read between the lines and spot the symbols and hidden messages. As they say Signs and Symbols are for the conscious mind. Stranger Things has many examples of the writers using words a certain way in order to resonate with the audience. Most of their word choices are used to create the mood of the scene through repetition and figure of speech.  One of the episodes El is reading a letter from Hopper. In the beginning of the letter he repeats the word feelings about 3 times telling us how he hasn’t felt his feelings in such a long time, but when he met her they started to come back.  “build an environment where we all feel comfortable, trusted, and open to sharing our feelings. Feelings. Jesus. The truth is, for so long I’d forgotten what those even were.” (David Harbour). When authors repeat a word they are emphasizing it and more than likely it is a key component of the tone. While Hopper was narrating the letter the scene showed the group (Mike, Lucas, Dustin, Will, and more) hugging. When Joanthan and Nancy were shown hugging the line in the back was “I started to feel again, I started to feel happy’, Representing how someone coming into your life and helping can make a big impact just like it did El. (As the scene was going it showed the kids hugging and saying they loved each other just like the love hopper was talking about in his letter). This is a pure example of symbolism in the show, this scene holds specific words and phrases that are more highlighted than others. In the speech he keeps saying the words change, shining a spotlight on those main components of the speech. If that doesn’t convince you, well guess what I have another one. In the speech explaining why Vecna is the villain he says, “You see, humans are a unique type of pest, multiplying and poisoning our world, all while enforcing a structure of their own. A deeply unnatural structure. Where others saw order, I saw a straitjacket. A cruel, oppressive world dictated by made-up rules. Seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades. Each life a faded, lesser copy of the one before. Wake up, eat, work, sleep, reproduce, and die. Everyone is just waiting. Waiting for it all to be over. All while performing in a silly, terrible play, day after day. I could not do that. I could not close off my mind and join in the madness.” This speech could be analyzed because yes he is talking about the origin story he is also talking about problems that happen in our everyday life. For example, “poisoning our world, all while enforcing a structure of their own ” Today humans chose not to recycle, put smoke into the air, and kill earth in many different ways but we still go on with our own routine not thinking how it affects the world. This is not the main component of the speech but we know that they did not add this here for nothing, therefore the writers want us to read between the lines and find the realism in it. This is something I love in movies or shows, to relate or find  realistic characters. It’s somewhat like a comfort to know that you’re not alone, it makes you feel seen. 

Stranger Things does not only tell the story through text it also has an impact with music. Each season has one song that represents the character’s emotion and tells their story without their lines. In season 1 the song, “Should i stay or should i go” was presented many times. In its first appearance it was shown how Will and his brother Jonathan used it to push through their life even though they were struggling with money, family, and mentality. In the scene when the song is on him and his brother is talking about his dad never being there for him and if he is it is not anything they will both find interest in.  In this scene the lyrics playing behind him are, “ You’re happy when I’m on my knees, One day is fine and next is black, So if you want me off your back, Well come on and’ let me know, Should I stay or should I go? In this part of the song it is an act for Will’s feelings toward his dad, showing how one day his father is there at least trying and the next selling dreams leaving him in the “black”.  The next time the song appeared Will was in his “Safe place” hiding right before the monster captured him.In this part of the song he was gently singing, it was moments before being captured so at the time he was thinking this would be his last moments. Knowing that it shows deeper insight on the song. Will was not the most respected in his everyday life, on a day to day basis he was bullied, insecure, and he felt lonely. At that point he felt that he didn’t matter, so in that moment when he was about to be taken by the monster he thought to himself should i stay or should i go.  (This was the show saying he was not sure if he wanted to stay in the real world anyway because there was nothing or nobody here for him anyway.) Yet,​​ this is not the only song that can be used as an example, in season 4 one of songs that made it was Running up that Hill. In the show it did tell a story but it also became deeper than the others. In life  “It’s been shown to provide positive results in reducing pain, anxiety, stress, and even the need for restraints in agitated patients. In the hospital setting, music therapy can be an effective adjunct to conventional medicine that the nurse offers to patients supporting their healing.” (Johns Hopkin) In this season there was a monster called Vecna that fed off of traumatic experiences. (For example Max watched her brother die, when they never had a relationship, but afterwards regretted it. Then Nancy assistant had been a part of a hit and run, and never told anyone.) He would give his victims hallucinations that twisted their experience and make it seem like they were the cause of it. In spite of that it was only one thing that could get them out of that trance, which was music. Referring to music healing certain parts of our body, Max is literally at the edge of death, but her favorite song is playing, while all the memories of her and her friends are flashing before her eyes. In this moment she remembers all the transformative flashbacks and breaks out of his curse. (for the moment). This symbolizes how even though a traumatic experience has happened to you does not mean it has to take over. In life there are as many transformative experiences as horrible and as a person you need to learn how to see that because if you fail, life can go downhill. Therefore the show even tells a story through music. 

This show has many ways of telling a story such as text, music, and even action. While most shows do this it is yet not as clear as stranger things. The show’s time period is based on the 80’s meaning the characters have to make actions as if they are from that time. For example, every dad in the show’s flaws are exposed constantly. Lonnie is an abusive father. He homophobically bullied Will (his son) his entire childhood, and Jonathan and Joyce reference this several times throughout the show. In one of the episodes Jonathan says to Will, “ He is trying to force you to like normal things, and you shouldn’t like things because people tell you you’re supposed to. Especially not him.”Then Mike and Nancy’s dad (Ted) is pretty uninvolved,  he does not seem concerned with what’s going on with his kids. Throughout season One Ted has shown many traits of being uninvolved such as sleeping through Christmas with his family and  he barely acknowledges Karen and Mike at dinner.These flaws are not pointed out by accident, they are presented so clearly to highlight the actions of a person living in this time frame. Another gesture to explain the story in season 3 was Billy’s character. Not only was he a stereotypical douchebag with a basic haircut that verbally abused or over sexualized women, he also had racist actions. For example in the show he did not want Max (his sister ) to hang out with Lucas St Clair (the only black boy out of the group). He never stated why but when he would talk about him he would get a raging attitude or threaten Max with hurting her and him. In one of the episodes he even gets as close to beating Lucas because he caught Max hanging out with him and his friend group. This matters because even though the writers never made him say he didn’t like Lucas because he was black they showed it by targeting lucas and billy actions speaking about lucas. This is something fundamental to teens and people watching it helps Analyze the author’s purpose in providing an explanation, describing a procedure, or discussing an experiment in a text, identifying important issues that remain unresolved. 

Stranger Things is a show I would watch till I EXPIRE! If Stranger Things is not in your top 5, you are an idiot. Unless you don’t have netflix, but even then you can log into a friend. Stranger Things is and always will be my prized show for many reasons. Although there was a time when I wasn’t a fan, not long after I became one. yet not for the stereotypical reasons that you hear like, “oh my god did you see el fight that demogorgon”, or “did you see hopper break out of the russian prison”. Even though those scenes are amazing, that’s not what developed my love for the show. It’s the structure they used, everything is astonishing down to  emotional impact, intriguing camera work, beautiful soundtrack, and more. In all, Stranger Things has every ingredient to a breathtakingly pleasing show. That being the case I would have to rank Stranger Things as a 4. Even Though I love Stranger Things for other reasons it still deserves a 4,  as I examined my rubric it matches the standards. It would have received a 5 but it missed following the rules of thirds and i don’t own it on dvd YET! For that reason Stranger Things deserves a 4. Thank you for reading!!!! Bye bye movie critics.