Stranger Things

:

Season 4.5
  • Network: Netflix
  • Series Premiere Date: Jul 15, 2016
Season #: 5, 4.5, 4, 3, 2, 1
User Score
7.4

Generally favorable reviews- based on 110 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 79 out of 110
  2. Mixed: 18 out of 110
  3. Negative: 13 out of 110

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User Reviews

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  1. thedarkbird
    Jul 2, 2022
    5
    If you like it bigger, louder, bloodier, megalomaniac and as blockbuster as a Jerry Bruckheimer blockbuster, your love for Stranger Things is bound to become boundless. If, however, you liked the charm of the first installment your brain will end up upside down (pun intended) with no chance of recovery.
  2. All_ButTrU4
    Jul 2, 2022
    6
    A disappointing cliffhanger conclusion to an otherwise satisfying season. Despite its abundance of series best performances for some (caleb &gaton) it still failed to move the story organically and forward. Instead we are anchored to the same cliffhanger of a mindflayers arrival or villain inly 11 cand fight. The season has the reoccurring plight of knowing how to start but never how toA disappointing cliffhanger conclusion to an otherwise satisfying season. Despite its abundance of series best performances for some (caleb &gaton) it still failed to move the story organically and forward. Instead we are anchored to the same cliffhanger of a mindflayers arrival or villain inly 11 cand fight. The season has the reoccurring plight of knowing how to start but never how to end and given this appears here ahead of the finale im unsure of the final seasons satisfactory end.… Expand
  3. Donttalk2
    Jul 1, 2022
    6
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. It was great to watch this while millions of people around the world did the same, but in the end, ST4 is just..never ending content. Lots of stuff and then some more to update an IP. This could have been a nice enough "Nightmare on Elm Street" -re-imagining, but all these wasted "Stranger Things" characters had to hop up and down and imitate signature scenes from older movies (without new twists, in contrast to the early seasons). Anyway, some great scenes, but in the end, NOTHING has been resolved, not even the annoying sideplots about relationships. I´m only glad that Schwarzenhopper, the killing machine, finally made it out of russia.… Expand
  4. RTM
    Jul 5, 2022
    6
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Strong performances by the kids, but the material for Season 4 seems uninspired and rehashed. As i watched it i constantly felt like they had no real answer as to how to end it. And so many parts and scenes just felt like i could pick the inspiration of which the material borrowed from. The first couple seasons seemed so original and new with young kids. By 4, it just felt formulaic and an homage of prior works. The whole Vecna storyline felt like what was just done in Star Wars, where the realization was that Palpatine was always behind the dark side. And now Vecna? Unoriginal… The final episode too just felt like they had no resolve to the entire story. So it just sort of ends. Disappointing, but overall, still slightly entertaining.… Expand
  5. pmasterfunk
    Jul 5, 2022
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Season 4 is full of bloat. Every episode has scenes that drag. So many close-ups of Eleven's face. So many slow-motion music montages. So many pointless story threads. There are so many characters that the story just wildly diverges into a bunch of unrelated threads. But these threads are going to come together cohesively, right?

    Right?

    Right??

    SPOILER ALERT

    I'm sure the stans will tell you it works, but don't believe the stans, they're blinded by their love for the media they consume. Unlike me, who is blinded by my hatred of the media I consume.

    The Hopper-Joyce ark had no ties to the Hawkins events until it suddenly did at the last moment.

    The jocks don't amount to anything, the altercation between main jock and Lucas doesn't actually impact the story. Stepping on the Walkman doesn't count, Vecna could have been written to just overpower it and we'd all have been smarter for it.

    Mike and Will and Jonathan going on a wild goose chase was just a massive waste of time, it was essentially an excuse to keep them in the show even though they don't really have anything to offer and their contribution to the story is basically null. Eleven being saved by the power of love is mega-cringe.

    In fact, the whole roadtrip to save Eleven could have been streamlined. It seems important when you watch the show, but none of it couldn't have happened in someone's basement. Eleven's training could just have happened in lab hidden in a dilapidated warehouse by the docks instead of out in the middle of a desert. But you can't blow up a helicopter in an urban setting, so that idea was probably scrapped.

    Jonathan has so little to do that I'd forgotten his name by the end of the season. All he does is drive a van for 90% of his screen time, and serves mostly as an invisible barrier between Steve and Nancy. Then the last episode happens, and he has this heart to heart with Will that lasts all of 3 minutes. Wow.

    The Eleven/Brenner stuff doesn't really work for me, either. The ideological conflict between them was kinda interesting, I mean it's Empire Strikes Back, but hey, I sorta see Brenner's point. But we knew that Eleven was right, she had to go right away lest the world end. Leia and Han were in a bad situation, but their fate wasn't 100% sealed without Luke, and unlike Max, their fate wasn't directly tied to the world's. We know Brenner's position is wrong, so the conflict isn't compelling. It works as far as Eleven gaining independence from papa goes, but when Brenner stabs her with a huge anesthetic-filled syringe (where was he hiding that thing?), the next scene works against all this development by making this whole confrontation moot. The army shows up and shoots up the whole lab, Brenner included. If Eleven had decided to stay and train, this would have worked really well.

    But it doesn't. What it actually does is steer the action to this big set piece where Eleven crashes a helicopter onto a bunch of Humvees. It looks cool, it looks like it was done with practical effects. It's impressive looking, for sure, but as a conclusion to the Brenner/Eleven relationship it doesn't really do anything.

    And that's when I realized this whole thread wasn't written to resolve relationships, or to advance the plot, or have the viewer question their methods - the story was written to arrive to this hype action scene. That the story had to arrive to this specific moment that probably looked really good in a storyboard. And that's what the last episode is, arbitrary noodling to get from one set piece to another. From that point on, I couldn't unsee it.

    Eddie finds a mint condition BC Rich Warlock, a functional cable, a working Peavy Amp, all in the Upside Down where there's electricity apparently, and everything works flawlessly. Eddie and Dustin's plan to distract the baddies was pretty thin if it had to involve finding random functional and loud objects in the Upside Down.

    Back in Russia, Hopper goes full Barbarian and chops off a demogorgon's head with the actual Conan movie prop sword. Murray could have just prevented his friend from engaging a dangerous monster that has massacred a prison-full of soldiers with AK-47s by continuing to use the flamethrower he had in his hands. But that wouldn't look as cool.

    I can't help imagining Dave from accounting drawing these cartoons on the whiteboard in the office cafeteria for **** and giggles, and the Duffer bros walking in and going "f*ck yeah, we're doin' it, we're doin' aaaaaaaaall of it".

    Finally the bad guy supremo gets mentally whacked by Eleven, molotoved by Robin and Steve, shot multiple times by Nancy with a shotgun, then falls out a window, and what do our heroes do? Not check the body, that's what they do. He's incapacitated, weakened, suffering, and yall just gon walk away? Chump mistake. Then the world sorta ends.

    What was all this fire and fury for? What was the point?

    Setting up season 5, my dudes, setting up season 5.    … Expand
  6. jzathajenius
    Jul 11, 2022
    5
    OK, firstly the length of each episode is ridiculous. What is worse is that they easily could have cut a lot of filler from each ep. There are soooo many long boring scenes of two characters just sitting there and talking. I have no idea why they were trying to desperately to pad each episode with unnecessary filler but it dragged every episode down and became a slow grind to get through.OK, firstly the length of each episode is ridiculous. What is worse is that they easily could have cut a lot of filler from each ep. There are soooo many long boring scenes of two characters just sitting there and talking. I have no idea why they were trying to desperately to pad each episode with unnecessary filler but it dragged every episode down and became a slow grind to get through.

    Secondly, I just don't really care about most of these characters. The new ones like Yuri, angry jock guy, and the stoner pizza dude, were just awful stereotypes that added nothing to the show. And existing characters like Lucas and his sister, Mike, Will and his brother were just boring. The interesting storylines, like Eleven and her memories, and Vecna and Max were pretty much the only thing that kept me watching. And Steve is still the man.

    So Season 4 is my least fave. Not looking forward to season 5 I gotta say.    … Expand
  7. leaveit
    Jul 8, 2022
    6
    Attempts to pull the show out of the rut it got itself in in seasons 2 and 3 by blatantly retconning several plot points, only to end the season in perhaps the most predictable way you can imagine. If you saw the other season finales, you've seen this one.
  8. UncleWillard
    Jul 4, 2022
    4
    First two seasons were great and then it fell.off a cliff for me, except for Steve. Steve has been the o e constant in this show. I get a kick out of his character and his arc. Everyone else sucks. I struggled paying attention to these last two episodes and nothing g seems to have been resolved. I thought this was the end of the show, but looks like there's more. Sigh.
  9. jacoblees
    Jul 11, 2022
    6
    Even its best moments can't resonate as they ought, and often don't feel very earned, due to the show's bloated, unwieldy plots and excessive reliance on zany cartoon humor and eye-roll one-liners. But I'll show up for the next season. Which will be 25 hours this time?

Awards & Rankings

97
#97 Best TV Season of 2022
20
#20 Most Discussed TV Season of 2022

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
74

Generally favorable reviews - based on 18 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 15 out of 18
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 18
  3. Negative: 0 out of 18
  1. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Darren Franich
    Jul 5, 2022
    75
    Plotlines individually were good, meh, or bleh. ... But the finale's crosscutting was symphonic, bangs and crashes and screams across realities. ... I mean it as a massive compliment when I say Stranger Things' weird kids are growing into weird adults.
    Read full review
  2. The Daily Beast
    Reviewed by: Kevin Fallon
    Jul 5, 2022
    70
    A person shouldn’t think a TV show is good but also spend the entire time watching it hoping for it to end soon, and being annoyed when it doesn’t.
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  3. New York Magazine (Vulture)
    Reviewed by: Jen Chaney
    Jul 5, 2022
    40
    Too many times, you watch and go, “Seen this before. Yep, seen that too.” Even the dialogue nods to this redundancy. ... By the end of season four, though, the show is replaying its own greatest hits way too often.
    Read full review
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