“Stanger Things” is a fun and suspenseful adventure thriller that immerses itself in the nerd culture of the ‘80s.
A young boy named Will goes missing due to mysterious circumstances one night on his way home. From this incident starts a huge chain of events. With his family and friends distraught, they all begin their own searches. His friends find an escaped psychic child, Eleven, who claims to know where he is. Will’s mother begins seeing him in the lights of their house and tries to contact him. The police chief finds more and more mysteries through old-fashioned detective work. Another disappearance causes a pair of high schoolers to start their own search for a monster.
The show is eight hours of easy binging, with each episode ending on a cliffhanger that leaves many questions, and the following episode promises answers. There’s not much in this series that doesn’t move its convoluted plot forward. And what a plot it is, dealing with everything from parallel worlds, missing children and MK Ultra to high school drama, albeit that’s only a small part.
The acting in the show is amazing, and made impressive is the fact that majority of the story relies on children, and therefore child actors and they all hit it out of the park. Millie Bobby Brown, age 12, plays Eleven, a psychic child raised in a government compound her whole life. This is a role that has very few actual lines, involving mostly body language and expressions and she nails it. The other children are all very realistic and believable as well. The whole cast is clearly giving it their all and sell this strange situation to the audience.
The series does a good job with its exposition. There’s a lot that needs to be explained and it manages to explain only what needs to be explained and doesn’t bog itself down with more then what’s necessary. The effects are well done and mostly practical, which is refreshing to see, and the CGI monster that eventually appears is supposed to be other worldly, so it makes a bit of sense for it to looks a bit off, or less real.
It’s not without its flaws though. While all in all, the story is pretty tight there are a few plot holes, like Will’s father, who is brought up early on, shows up in two episodes and is then gone. The final episode can’t escape the routine of the rest of the show, introducing several cliffhangers in the last 10 minutes, although a season two has been confirmed.
