Winged Post Managing Editor Emma Li (12) and Features Editor Leah Krupnik (11) break down the thrills and disappointments of the final season of Stranger Things.

View the full transcript here:

Emma: Hi everyone. I’m Emma.

Leah: And I’m Leah. We both watched Season 5 of Stranger Things, and here are some of our thoughts. 

I really liked this season. I thought it had some really good character building, but I did think that, overall, the writers tried to cram a lot into this final season, so some of the storylines ended up feeling a little incomplete by the last episode. 

Emma: It was definitely one of the weaker seasons if not the weakest season. I actually really enjoyed seasons 1 through 3. In season 5, the cast was a bit bloated in my opinion. I feel like some characters could have been better utilized instead of adding all these new characters.

Leah: I did really like the way that the ending was framed and how the storyline really wasn’t black and white. I thought that was one thing the show did fairly well — it really emphasized a lot of the nuance. But I think with so many different nuances in the different character relationships, it definitely struggled to keep a lot of things straight. 

Emma: A lot of viewers felt unsatisfied with this ending, especially since it’s pretty ambiguous. I saw a lot of internet discourse about it. People were wondering if Mike’s story at the end was just him making things up versus the actual reality of the situation. 

Leah: I felt like the very end of the last episode was honestly a pretty good way to tie a lot of the show together, even though some storylines were still missing. But when it came to the central characters, I liked how we got to hear a little bit from all of them. 

Emma: I saw this clip circulating where Robin’s actress Maya Hawke, in the middle of a scene, actually had to pull the Duffer Brothers aside and make a statement because she thought that Robin’s behavior in the scene wasn’t lining up with her characterization. That definitely fueled 

the flames to people’s dissatisfaction with the season overall.

The Upside Down lost some of its scary quality of earlier seasons. It was a little strange to me that it changed in such a way, and I feel like it kind of did lose its identity a little bit. I did think the storyline was interesting overall.

Leah: Yeah, I think that the role that the Upside Down plays in the series really changes throughout. I think one thing that I liked this season is how it continued some of the themes from Season 1, and I think a lot of things started to make more sense at the end of this season. Obviously the show begins when Will is taken to the Upside Down, and in the beginning of the 

show, we really don’t know what any of this means or what the Upside really even is. We see the characters figure it out by the end of this season. But besides the actual reality of figuring out that the Upside Down is a wormhole, I think it’s really interesting how that theme of kids being used by the Upside Down and by Vecna continues throughout the show. There were definitely a lot of parallels between Holly in this season and Will in Season 1, and I really enjoyed watching Holly’s character learn to navigate [the Upside Down] in kind of similar ways to what we saw with Will earlier on. And then the main cast of characters was, at this point, older, so they’re not really kids anymore, and they’re able to serve in more of a mentorship role and see the situation from more of an outside perspective. I thought that was a really interesting dynamic to watch.

Emma: Yeah, I definitely thought Holly was a good parallel, as well. And then I also like what they did with Will’s character, especially the scene where he comes out and then he’s able to awaken his powers and fight back. I thought that was a really nice scene, especially since in Season 1 he was the one who was used and trapped in the Upside Down and suffering. But now he finally is able to reclaim his agency and fight back against these forces. 

Leah: Yeah, and I think that there’s a lot of grey area that we saw. It’s really interesting how we get to see that Will and El have a lot of these same powers [as Vecna], and they have to grapple with their identities throughout, as well, of how they use these powers. 

Emma: I think the entire horror atmosphere is gone from the Upside Down, especially when it went from being blue and cold to just yellow, for some reason, and I remember Season 1 had such an 80s horror movie atmosphere that I really enjoy. That’s pretty much what got me into the show in the first place. I just feel like the show got a little bit scared to kill off main characters which also made the stakes not feel quite real. 

Leah: Building off of that point, I think the military takes a lot of the blow. We see scenes where it looks like hundreds of soldiers are being killed by a couple monsters. I think in a way that makes the stakes feel real because it definitely gives you a sense of perspective — if they fail at this mission that could end up being all of Hawkins — but at the same time, there’s just way too many coincidences to be realistic at a certain point. Somehow always in those scenes all the main 

characters are spared. In fact, a lot of the time they’re actually spared by the military actively trying to protect them which makes the military fit into a really confusing place in this dynamic, because they’re sacrificing so many soldiers on behalf of this desire to close the Upside Down. On the other hand, we see Hopp go around and kill a bunch of soldiers. In all of those fight scenes, I agree with Emma that the stakes don’t feel as real because we consistently see all the main characters being spared. 

Overall, I did really enjoy Season 5,  especially more of the emphasis on character building and when the characters finally understand what the Upside Down is. I thought that in some ways the conclusion was really satisfying, giving us information about where all the characters end up. At the same time, this last season had the very ambitious job of closing out everything that went before it. I did feel like the last episode and a half were extremely rushed. There was a lot that happened all at once, and when it was over there were still a lot of questions left to be answered. Overall, I thought this was a good season, but it strayed from some of the earlier vibes of the show, which I know some viewers were pretty unhappy about and still left a lot unresolved.

Emma: I think the show wrote itself into a corner, and it had the really difficult job of tying all these storylines together, especially with this extremely large cast now. That ultimately resulted in a season that felt not consistent with the rest of the show. I feel like it was straying from what the show used to be. [It] definitely lost a lot of the original atmosphere that drew me to the show. 

Leah: I think my overall rating for Season 5 of Stranger Things is a 4.2 out of 5 stars. 

Emma: My final rating would be a 3 out of 5, just cause I feel like it’s definitely one of the weaker seasons and doesn’t stay true to the show’s identity. 

Leah: Thanks for watching.

Emma: Bye!