I was really into the first season of Strangers Things, I think a lot of people were, but I also think that hype kills things. Sadly, Stranger Things 2 was so built up that it lacks the same iconic and almost unique imagery that encapsulated most of the first season.
However, that’s not to say that the second season wasn’t good. It was great, just not as great as the first season.
This season the budget’s clearly bigger, the kids have been given more emotional storylines, and it’s not as simple as it used to be: free Will, that was it.
What Stranger Things 2 is good at is drawing in a varying age of audiences. You can grab some of the older demographic with the nostalgia of the 80’s and you can keep the younger audiences with the lovable characters and sci-fi worlds that dominate much of the media industry. Everybody loves a good superhero and Stranger Things 2 feeds off that.
The focus of the story in Stranger Things 2 shifts from the supernatural to the natural.
Characters are more concerned with each other and writers are more concerned with relationships and how they play out in the real world.
It’s shifted from sci-fi to teen drama with a more recognizable human aspect to the story.
The other problem I have with it is that it started to fall into your typical Netflix, slow-burn plot line which only gets frustrating over time.
Then there’s the required romantic plot line that El apparently needed…
Personally, I don’t find Stranger Things 2 to be a huge disappointment but it might catch you off guard with its shift in focus. Regardless, it’s still at its core one of the best Netflix shows going.
