Stranger Things

Netflix was briefly down early Friday after the highly anticipated release of the final two episodes of "Stranger Things 4."

— kaido (@kaidofish)July 1, 2022 — hejo (@heizdu)July 1, 2022 — delgado (@4ng3La_)July 1, 2022 — alyssa (@alyssa64490887)July 1, 2022 The two episodes in Season 4 Volume 2 clock in at nearly four hours of runtime total: Episode 8 is 85 minutes and Episode 9 is 150 minutes. According to global uptime-monitoring site Downdetector.com, user reports of problems with Netflix spiked around 3 a.m. ET — when “Stranger Things 4” Volume 2 went live.

Max (Sadie Sink) is in danger in Stranger Things season 4 with the introduction of Vecna. Does she die in volume 1 or 2? Spoilers here!

By playing Max’s favorite song, a portal in the Upside Down opens up and she’s able to see the real world. She’s still being followed by Vecna and the group comes to the conclusion that she is supposed to be his fourth victim. Meanwhile, Dustin and Lucas run over to Max and try to wake her up. Max discovers Vecna’s home in the Upside Down, and he’s surprised to see her there. Max does not die in Stranger Things season 4 volume 1. Because of this, she writes letters to all the important people in her life, including one to Billy. She goes to his gravesite and starts reading it aloud, while Steve (Joe Keery), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), and Lucas watch nearby.

"Stranger Things 4 — Vol. 2" hits Netflix this weekend, and the kids from Hawkins, Indiana, are back at just the right time for the streaming giant.

"Bingeing worked as a strategy to disrupt the marketplace," Shaikh said. This isn't the first time Netflix has split up a series. The two premieres take place in two different quarters for the company. With new episodes straddling two different quarters around holiday weekends, the company has a better chance of retaining subscribers, which it needs to do to keep Wall Street happy. There's been a lot of debate around whether streamers should release episodes weekly or all at once. "Stranger Things 4 — Vol. 1" is roughly nine hours long.

Midway through the super-supersized Stranger Things fourth-season finale, “The Piggyback,” Nancy (Natalia Dyer), Steve (Joe Keery), and Robin (Maya Hawke) are ...

(It also helps that by this point, “Running Up That Hill” is at full volume on the soundtrack, not just periodically coming out of Max’s headphones, and Kate Bush makes everything better.) That David Harbour looks spectacular running at a monster with a sharp metal weapon in his hand does not retroactively justify the seemingly endless Russia detours, but the sequence does suggest a more satisfying version of Season Four that worked harder at moving faster from beat to beat. There’s a scene where Jonathan all but begs Will to talk about how much it hurts to see Mike and Eleven together, and the strain by the show to not say the thing out loud is palpable, even though it’s so heavily implied that almost no one watching could miss it. * Since the end of Season One, the show has waxed and waned a bit on just how comfortable Eleven is maneuvering through normal society after spending her childhood in a government lab. Max is clinically dead for a minute, completing Vecna’s plan to open a massive gate between the Upside Down and Hawkins, but a more powerful Eleven soon brings her body back to life. Too. Much. The Duffers are trying to service every character properly, and most of those arcs and scenes — like Eleven refusing to forgive Brenner in his dying moments, or Nancy being charmed by reformed ex-boyfriend Steve’s confession that he wishes he was a good person like this when they were together — in isolation from one another. But — to paraphrase this season’s inescapable earworm usage of Kate Bush’s great “Running Up That Hill” — if I only could make a deal with God and get the Duffers to swap their subplots from episode to episode, Stranger Things would still be running up that massive hill the brothers built by seemingly refusing to let go of any single story or character beat. (Did anyone anywhere need a redemption arc for the duplicitous, peanut butter-smuggling Russian pilot?) Perhaps the Duffers still feel too scarred by the audience’s rejection of their last attempt at a relatively self-contained episode, when Eleven ran away to the big city to hang with some fellow superpowered youths in Season Two. But that episode wasn’t hated because it was standalone; it was hated because it was bad, and Eleven’s new friends were annoying in a way that most of the show’s cast additions over the years have not been. It is, first and foremost, a supernatural thriller about a group of kids who have somehow found themselves as the last line of defense between humanity and demonic Armageddon. That kind of storytelling relies on momentum that is just impossible to maintain over such a long episode of television — two long episodes, as this mini half-season also features an 85-minute episode (“Papa”) leading into “The Piggyback” — and that keeps tripping up the things that are working well. The problem is that it feels like a half-hour, if not longer, that the show has forgotten about Nancy, Steve, and Robin while they are on the verge of imminent death. But that is basically all we see of them for close to a half-hour, when Eleven turns the tide against Vecna, resulting in Nancy, Steve, and Robin being set free. (Stand By Me, which has a lot of non-supernatural DNA in this show, is nearly an hour shorter than “The Piggyback.”) That is slightly shorter than the two-and-a-half-hour version that Netflix promised (threatened?) a few weeks ago, but still longer by a comfortable margin than any previous episode of American television.

"Stranger Things" will come to an end with its fifth season as creators Matt and Ross Duffer have decided to complete the story as they originally intended.

But a lot of it is pretty well mapped out." "It proved too large to tell in four, but—as you'll soon see for yourselves—we are now hurtling toward our finale. 'Stranger Things' Season 5 Expected Release Date: What We Know so Far

Stranger Things season 5 won't be released on Netflix in July 2022 along with Stranger Things season 4 vol. 2. But here's the latest on the final season.

After finishing Stranger Things season 4, The Duffer Brothers completed an outline for season 5 and have the final run fully mapped out ahead of production. The season definitely won’t be released one calendar year from now. Stranger Things season 4 has come to an explosive end with the release of volume 2 on Friday, July 1, 2022.

Meanwhile, kids at the Hawkins devise a plan to kill Henry by returning to the Upside Down. Max volunteers to become bait while Steve, Nancy, and Robin try to ...

It’s exciting that Stranger Things will return with Season 5; however, the showrunners confirmed that it would be the final season of the popular Tv series. The new season will finally reveal who’s the main villain of this story, Vecna or Mind Flayer. Also, there are chances that we’ll see a time jump in Season 5. In the final two episodes, Eleven awakens her powers and decides to save her friends from this new enemy.

Stranger Things season 5 is officially on the way. The new episodes may not have started filming yet, but we still have some idea about what to expect in ...

It's highly unlikely that any of the main cast members are going to split before Stranger Things wraps itself up for good, so it's expected that they're all set to return for season 5. For now, the Stranger Things season 5 plot is firmly under wraps, but the Duffer Brothers have teased that they have the whole series' conclusion pretty firmly mapped out. Joseph Quinn, who was introduced as Eddie Munson in season 4, recently told The Guardian (opens in new tab) that he'd love to see the leader of the Dungeons & Dragons' loving Hellfire Club return in season 5. Considering how Stranger Things season 5 has yet to start filming, it's safe to assume we've got a little bit of a wait before the next chapter arrives. Stranger Things season 5 is officially on the way. In recent weeks, fans have been theorising as to what might happen in the fifth and final chapter. (Fore more, check out our guide to the Stranger Things season 4, Volume 2 ending.) Realistically, though, the new season will probably drop in 2024. Factor in lengthy VFX post-production work and it takes well over a year to complete a season from start to finish. Word of caution: friends don't lie, and they also don't knowingly ruin things, so if you've yet to watch Stranger Things 4, click away and come back at a later date. And while there's no exact Stranger Things season 5 release date just yet, we can use our knowledge of previous seasons to work out when new episodes could arrive. "We really want to stick the landing."

After the big Vecna/Henry/One reveal, the crew puts their various plans into motion. A recap of “Papa,” episode eight of season four of Netflix's 'Stranger ...

She kneels at his side, and in the greatest power move, when he begs her to tell him that she understands he did everything he did because he loved her, she refuses to give him that last win. They escape the prison through sewage pipes and arrive at Yuri’s stash house only to learn that he only has a helicopter to get them home. Their beeping distracts the military guys in the helicopter long enough for Eleven to get her bearings, and I know I’ve already said it, but it deserves to be repeated: She summons all of her strength and she brings that helicopter down in one giant, flaming crash. She realizes that Brenner was pushing her to her breaking point and forcing her to explore that dark void under false pretenses of tracking the Soviets because he was obsessed with finding One in the Upside Down. His anger led to Eleven opening that first gate in 1983. Dampening the power of his best weapon like a real idiot, Brenner is left to carry Eleven out of the bunker to safety. And when Owens and Brenner give her the full rundown of what has been happening — and is about to happen — in Hawkins at the (creepy, long) hands of Vecna, she uses her other power to check in on her friends in that dark void of hers. It’s quite the opposite: If Eleven’s journey this season is all about her finally believing that she is not a monster, then of course it would always come down to her realizing who the actual monster is and confronting him. Dr. Owens reminds his colleague that this isn’t a prison and Eleven is free to come and go as she pleases, but then Brenner turns around and has Owens handcuffed to a pipe and locks Eleven in a room with him. When she wakes up, she finds that she’s been collared in that device Brenner used to torture the other kids in her program. Aside from once again trying to make Eleven believe in his twisted family fantasy, he also knows where to hit her so it hurts — he tells her that she is only acting out because of the guilt she feels for freeing One and for causing all of this death and destruction. Did you use it wisely, or did you spend the whole time listening to Kate Bush and thinking about how you will slowly walk out into the sea if the body count at the end of this season — you know there is going to be a body count — includes Hopper or Steve? And then they realize that if Vecna is looking to make four separate gates, he must make four kills.

And there's really probably only one video you need to watch, the brief recap made by Netflix summing up the first string of episodes, which ran for about nine ...

They’ve discovered that music can help pull people out of the trance, which is how Max, despite being “marked” by Vecna, manages to escape. And there’s really probably only one video you need to watch, the brief recap made by Netflix summing up the first string of episodes, which ran for about nine hours in total. Even though it has only been a month instead of a few years like the gap between seasons 3 and 4, you still may want a refresher on what exactly happened in those first seven episodes.

With 'Stranger Things 4' Volume 2 now streaming, it's time to look ahead at how the series will end with Season 5.

The Duffer Brothers called Season 4 their “ Game of Thrones season.” On the eve of the finale, fans emotionally prepared themselves to say goodbye to some of their favorites. Stranger Things is a fantasy series, after all, and in this magical world, anything could happen. "Normally it's like, 'Oh, we get to revisit the characters in their normal lives and how they're doing and what are their relationships like?' And 5 is just going to be pedal to the metal from the opening scene. "We do have an outline for Season 5 and we pitched it to Netflix and they really responded well to it," said Matt Duffer. "I mean, it was hard. Netflix has not revealed exactly when Stranger Things Season 5 will premiere, and considering the scope and ambition of Season 4, it seems like the show’s creators, The Duffer Brothers, need ample time for production. According to Ross Duffer, the original plan was to shoot Season 4 and 5 back-to-back, but that wasn’t feasible. As for the release schedule, Peter Friedlander, Netflix’s head of scripted series for the U.S. and Canada, told Variety that Season 5 will be released all at once. Spoilers ahead for Stranger Things Season 4. Hawkins, itself, is in disarray, with the small town now merging with the Upside Down, and Sadie Sink’s Max is left in a coma after Eleven may or may not have saved her from dying. At least that's what I remember from the outline," Ross Duffer explained. “The ending is the hard thing,” he added. Here is everything we know about Stranger Things’ final season so far.

While the early deaths of the season were reserved for newer characters, many OGs found themselves in precarious spots as the season progressed including Nancy.

While they hit a few bumps in the road — RIP [Redacted] — their plan ultimately works as they’re able to stop Vecna, at least for the time being. Instead, Nancy falls into darkness and eventually ends up in a very familiar empty swimming pool which is when Vecna’s voice calls out to her. Using the light in their home, the group is able to send an SOS in Morse Code which Dustin, Lucas, and Erica answer after Dustin pieces together that they went through the water gate.

SPOILER ALERT: This story contains details of Season 4, Volume 2 of Netflix's Stranger Things. The penultimate season of Netflix's addictive Duffer joint ...

We’ll have more coverage of the final two episodes of Stranger Things in the coming days, including an exclusive interview with Matt and Ross Duffer. Until then, sound off below. Let’s face it: Eleven may have the strength to crash-land a helicopter in the desert, but bringing back someone from the dead is a whole different bailiwick. It’s far from over (and lucky for us).

The series holds the record for Netflix's most-watched English language series of all time.

Viewers also documented the crash on social media, with some sharing videos of the “Problem Connecting” error message or an endless red loading symbol. The mass convergence around Stranger Things’ midnight (PST) drop actually doesn’t come as much of a surprise, given the cultural command the series wields. Even after splitting up this season of Stranger Things into a two-part binge, Netflix still found itself with quite the hangover.

The penultimate episode of season 4 resolves some plot points introduced in part one, while laying out the stakes for the finale. Vecna torments Nancy, ...

While it may seem kind of petty given all the death and the potential Upside Down-ification of the world, season 4 also shook up the love lives of many of the characters. (One of the crevasses bisects and kills Jason, the only upside to the disaster). Eddie also dies, and although he was only introduced this season, he’s a natural addition to the crew and it’s sad to see him go—especially since all of Hawkins thinks he’s a satanic murderer instead of a hero who just liked playing Dungeons & Dragons with his fellow weirdos. The screen goes to black, and cuts to “two days later.” The rest of the gang will go to the Upside Down. Eddie and Dustin will cause a distraction to lure Vecna’s creepy bats away from his body while Nancy, Steve, and Robin will go to the house and kill him. Hopper and Joyce have the least to do, but they make a risky phone call to the States and learn what’s going down. The encouragement gives Eleven what she needs and she bursts free of Vecna’s restraints, giving Nancy and Steve, and Robin an opening to assault his physical body. The fight against Vecna comes to a head in the season finale. Back in the U.S.S.R., Hopper and Joyce get a better look at the prison/Upside Down research lab, and learn that the Soviets also have a bunch of Demodogs and a swirling mass of Mind Flayer-like particles. Every time Vecna kills, he opens a gate to the Upside Down, and when he opens four he’ll be able to wreak havoc on Hawkins (and the world). Max realizes that she is still Vecna’s fourth and final target, so they come up with a plan to fight back by using her as bait. Eleven engages in a psychic duel with him, casting him into a gateway to the Upside Down where he becomes the creature we know of as Vecna. Nancy and the Hawkins crew, meanwhile, had ventured into the Upside Down to rescue Steve but Vecna psychically kidnaps Nancy’s consciousness right before she’s about to escape and reveals that he is Pennhurst Asylum patient Victor Creel’s son, and that he was responsible for the infamous killings before Doctor Brenner took him in and dubbed him “001.” The season ends with Hopper and Joyce reunited but still in Siberia, Eleven re-powered but still in an uneasy alliance with Brenner, and Nancy in danger. At just this time, though, the other faction of the government raids the facility, and Brenner is shot several times while trying to escape with Eleven. Despite the collar, Eleven takes down an army helicopter before she too can be killed, and Mike and his cohort arrive just in time to get her to safety.

'Chapter Nine' makes everyone feel connected in taking on Vecna, even with no conceivable way of getting everyone physically in Hawkins for the final ...

Listen, if a frantic makeout during a time of crisis when neither of you have showered in days is good enough for Hopper and Joyce, it is good enough for these two!! Everyone heads over to Hopper’s cabin to clean it up so that El can use it to hide out since on top of everything, you know Sullivan and the military are still on the hunt for her. Steve, Robin, and Nancy are able to get to Vecna’s physical body and they light that piece of shit up with some molotov cocktails before Nancy takes out her sawed-off shotgun and blasts that guy so hard, he falls out of the window. But then the tide turns all at once: Joyce, refusing to let another man she loves be eaten in front of her, saves Hopper. They’re able to get all the demogorgons back in the pit and Murray burns their asses to the ground with a flamethrower. They saw those demogorgons and that Upside Down dust back at the prison and they know that those monsters are all part of one organism. Steve, Robin, and Nancy are running out of time (and air!). In the Soviet Union, Hopper is trapped by a demodog. Everyone is well aware that Yuri is dicking them around with his claim that the helicopter isn’t working, but even if he were able to get them out of the Soviet Union right then and there, they still would never make it back to Hawkins in time. It takes a little work, but eventually Max’s plan of hiding in her happiest memory works and we find her back at the Snow Ball, where she had her first kiss with Lucas. This season has been chock full of callbacks to Stranger Things moments big and small, so it feels right that we’d revisit such a memorable one for the big climax. I guess it’s hard to fault him too much since this time the yammering he does reveals information that completely rewrites everything we thought we knew about the Upside Down and … all of Stranger Things, really. Through one of Owens’s agents, Hopper and Joyce learn that Eleven and the Byers boys are en route to Hawkins to fight some sort of evil and no one has been able to make contact with them. And yet still, Stranger Things has found a way to make everyone feel connected in taking on this season’s villain, even if there was no conceivable way of getting everyone physically in Hawkins for the final showdown (this show isn’t really concerned with the physics of space and time, but I’m glad they didn’t push things too hard), and the way they do it is through hive mind. Traditionally, Stranger Things likes to scatter its cast around Hawkins and then eventually bring the whole crew together by the end of the season to fight whichever Upside Down monster is plaguing them at the moment.

In the final two episodes of 'Stranger Things 4,' characters come full circle back to Hawkins.

The Duffers expected audiences to stay on the hook for a season in which the core characters — and thus key “Stranger Things” dynamics — were fractured; they set up a slow-burn reveal of Vecna’s true identity that paid off nicely, and ended the season with the most dynamic character clinging to life. And yet there’s an insecurity at the root of the more recursive decisions “Stranger Things” makes: For all the show does that works, there seems an unwillingness to accept that allowing character beats to have appropriate weight and gravity means leaving something out. Often, though, this seemed to extend to the show’s form as well as its content: Like a teenage diarist uncertain of which part of the story is most important, “Stranger Things” can’t help but underline, emphasize, doubly describe, and circle back. Will, whose growing isolation from his ever-coupling straight friends has reminded many queer viewers of their own teenage lives, shows the painting to Mike amid Mike’s nervous venting about trying to maintain a relationship with someone as special as Eleven. We see in Schnapp’s performance that Will is on the outside of this pairing in more ways than one. (This brings an end to a storyline, and a performance, that never quite transcended the literal.) Perhaps it’s Eleven’s new freedom that helped provide Mike (Finn Wolfhard) an opening to confess his love to her as she battled season villain Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower). Will (Noah Schnapp) has made gestures toward talking about whatever it is that’s on his mind with his brother Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), and unfortunate Max (Sadie Sink), the linchpin character of the season, lies in a coma watched over by Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin), after having proven her mettle, and her goodness, in a battle against darkness. This is likely not an episode that many franchise fans this side of standom will watch in one go, thus diluting the season’s cumulative power and impact in the name of creating a monument to just how much Netflix will allow.

"Stranger Things" has taken the idea of playing the long game to heart a bit too literally, capping its super-sized fourth season with two sprawling ...

Where does that leave the show? The third-season cliffhanger that sent Hopper (David Harbour) behind the Iron Curtain also dragged on too long, even if revisiting the Cold War proved unexpectedly timely. "She's special.

Will there be a 5th season of “Stranger Things?” Here's what co-creators the Duffer Brothers have said about the last season of the Netflix show — with a ...

“We do have an outline for Season 5 and we pitched it to Netflix and they really responded well to it,” Ross Duffer said. Season 4 will be the penultimate season; season 5 will be the last.” But don’t expect to wait as long as the break in between Season 3 and 4. “There are still many more exciting stories to tell within the world of ‘Stranger Things,’” the creators continued. And the Duffer Brothers recognize that. Sadie Sink, for example, is a 20-year-old actress portraying Max Mayfield, who was 15 years old in Season 4.

Stranger Things season 5 will happen, but when can fans expect to tune into it on Netflix? Will there be any more new episodes this summer?

What did you think of Stranger Things season 4, part 2? Unfortunately, Stranger Things season 5 won’t be hitting Netflix this summer. Season 4 will no doubt be on the minds of fans for a long time to come, but that doesn’t mean they can’t set their sights on season 5 too.

Jump to category: Final Season; Potential Release Date; Plot; Spin-Off. Quinci LeGardye. By Quinci ...

"During the six-month pandemic hiatus, we outlined season 5 and pitched it to Netflix," they said. "I’m sure we will do a time jump," Ross Duffer told the outlet. Season 4 will be the penultimate season; season 5 will be the last." In fact, the Duffers told Variety last month that they already have a plot mapped out for season 5. "We really want to stick the landing. The Netflix paranormal hit's horrifying fourth season has come to a close, and the Duffer Brothers have confirmed that we just have one season left with the Hawkins gang.

We had 11 questions for 'Stranger Things 4: Volume 2.' Here are the answers. · 1. Is Nancy OK? · 2. Is Vecna Eleven's father? · 4. Do Joyce, Hopper, and Murray ...

In the aftermath of the battle, Hawkins citizens believe that Eddie (Joseph Quinn) and the Hellfire Club caused both the murders and the earthquake. The only thing we know for sure is that Stranger Things 5 will be the show's final outing. The basketball team's Satanic Panic-inspired hunt of the Hellfire Club throws a major wrench into our heroes' plan to defeat Vecna. Jason (Mason Dye) and his squad confront Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) and Erica (Priah Ferguson) at Creel House, resulting in a full-on fistfight. The answer to the first question is pretty simple: She's a school counselor, and it's her job to listen to troubled teens. Think about the painting he made for Mike (which he falsely claims Eleven commissioned for him). Think about his assertion that Mike is the "heart" of the party. The clock references like her necklace or the ticking may not be plot-relevant, but they're still tools that help build tension around Vecna. For example, the ticking clock when Max talks to Ms. Kelly after being cursed is a perfect reminder of her time running out — and of the fact that she could see the Creel clock at any moment. Perhaps he was just trying to conserve his energy in those early seasons, and it was only when he realized just how powerful Eleven was that he decided to bring out the big guns: teenage murder. Having Demogorgons and Demodogs around does allow Hopper and Joyce to fight at least one part of the Upside Down hive mind, proving to be a much-needed help to everyone fighting Vecna head-on. But all of that is just scratching the tip of the iceberg, because now Eleven seems to have the power to bring people back from the dead. Along the way, Hopper (David Harbour) and Joyce (Winona Ryder) finally act on their feelings for each other, and Murray (Brett Gelman) gets to barbecue a whole bunch of Demogorgons. Her freedom comes with a price: He gives her a vision of his plans for Hawkins and tells her to pass that message on to Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown). There were tentacles, there were guitar solos, and at the end of the day, there was a body count.

Spoiler Alert. Courtesy of Netflix. [Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Stranger Things Season 4 Episodes 8 “Papa” and 9 “The Piggyback.

And so, again, heading into this, we knew that some characters wouldn’t be making it out and with the series heading into its final season, it is the perfect time to take a risk with at least one major death. As for Vecna, Nancy, Steve, and Robin’s combined efforts and weapons (Molotov cocktails and a shotgun) sent him flying out the attic window, but his body was nowhere to be found when they stepped outside the Creel house. Then the group in Hawkins took the fight to Vecna in the Upside Down. Max ( Sadie Sink), with Lucas ( Caleb McLaughlin) and Erica ( Priah Ferguson), tried to distract Vecna by being bait, while Steve ( Joe Keery), Nancy ( Natalia Dyer), Robin ( Maya Hawke), Dustin ( Gaten Matarazzo), and Eddie ( Joseph Quinn) ventured into the Upside Down to kill him. When they swarmed the trailer, Dustin pulled himself through back to their world, but Eddie instead did what he thought he wouldn’t and was the hero, buying more time and drawing them away. Last he was seen, Eleven had left him, bleeding to death, with a “goodbye, papa,” and drove off with Mike ( Finn Wolfhard), Will ( Noah Schnapp), Jonathan ( Charlie Heaton), and Argyle (Eduardo Franco). It certainly seemed like he was, if not dead, going to be very soon, especially given there wasn’t exactly any help nearby. And with the threat of Vecna ( Jamie Campbell Bower), demogorgons, and whatever else the Upside Down could cook up, it seemed like anyone could be on the chopping block.

Was that most metal concert put on by Eddie Munson guitar performance really played by actor Jospeh Quinn in Stranger Things season 4 volume 2?

The lyrics and the tone it set really worked for the scene. Those of us who have seen the episode know that it’s in an important scene, and part three of the four phases the friend group came up with in their attempt to take Vecna down. In movies and shows, it’s hard to tell when an actor is actually doing something, or whether the magic of television makes it look like they are.

The characters' relationships develop and they face an array of surprises and complications in the bustling storyline that closes the fourth season.

Even with two inflated episodes, the Duffer brothers have a lot of narrative ground to cover in these last installments. Then they proceed to move onto the emergency at hand without actually talking about the emotional issue that prompted the confessional in the first place. In one case, the confessional monologue is between two characters — I won't name names — who vow to be more open with each other. Stranger Things flirts with that idea in these final episodes, in a way that raises the stakes without violating the show's central conceits. The deepening relationship between Hopper and Joyce. Steve Harrington's efforts to transcend his womanizing. This is something that happens often in the final episodes. But I will note they are answered in the episodes just released, which also continue the series' unerring knack for wrapping up one world-threatening crisis while unveiling the seeds of the next one, due to unfold in the show's upcoming fifth and final season. There is a lot of mayhem in this season. As the eighth episode opens, Eleven has left California for a secret facility with the doctor who originally raised her and helped develop her abilities, Matthew Modine's ruthless researcher Martin Brenner. The show has always turned on an improbable premise: A nerdy gang of young kids keeping horrible creatures from an alternate universe from consuming our world — with help from a few bumbling adults. Eventually, they realize they must work from multiple locations, including from within the Upside Down itself, to try to defeat him. Questions abound: Does an important character die (with lots of fans putting money on Joe Keery's underachieving, magnificently coiffed dreamboat Steve Harrington)? Does a certain kid with a bowl-cut hairstyle reveal feelings beyond friendship for his boyhood buddy?

Despite an overstuffed plot, the Netflix series hits a high note to set up its final season.

Thanks to a powerhouse ensemble, Stranger Things overcomes its hurdles to punch out season four with an electrifying, tear-jerking finale. But for a show vastly interested in putting everyone’s lives on the line, the stakes are fairly low in volume two, which also slightly dulls the impact. The only two episodes in this volume, “Papa” and “The Piggyback,” are brimming with emotional gut punches, sci-fi twists, and an intense mind fight to rival any other showdown that’s taken place over the course of the show. However, akin to volume one, the second half of the season falters because of overcomplicated writing. Even in “The Piggyback,” the real momentum doesn’t pick up until almost an hour into the 140-minute runtime. Soon enough, surprise particles alert everyone else that something is viciously wrong (you know, besides the “earthquake” that just ruined their town). With the two worlds openly colliding, the show sets up its fifth, final, and potentially epic season.

Netflix's Stranger Things 4 still struggles to imagine a world in which Eleven is just as important to Max as Kate Bush and "Running Up That Hill.

It’s certainly a strength of Stranger Things that the relationship could still seem meaningful, even after a season without seeing or really mentioning each other. Max and Eleven are a wonderful example of that. They have the kind of loving, meaningful bond that forms between two girls and can’t really be understood by the boys in their life. But Eleven — and the power of love — brings her back. The flashbacks are a reminder that Eleven and Max shared a deep friendship. Once reminded of the love in her life, Eleven is finally able to pin Vecna down, saving the lives of multiple people in the process.

We don't actually see Dr. Owens in the Stranger Things season 4 finale, so what happened to the scientist who worked on the Nina Project with Brenner?

Will we continue to see the military trying to track El down in season 5? We saw what they did with the agent guarding the Byers home in season 4 volume 1. After she gets the upper hand for a moment, he knocks her out with a syringe and then has the audacity to put the electric collar around her neck! They almost shoot our favorite teen, but in an epic moment she uses her powers to control the plane, then crashes it into the ground and escapes. We actually don’t see Owens at all in the season finale. So what happened to the doctor?

The characters' relationships develop and they face an array of surprises and complications in the bustling storyline that closes the fourth season.

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The start to Season 4 of Netflix's "Stranger Things" set a record for U.S. streaming in a week, Nielsen said, with 7.2 billion minutes.

Ozark (Netflix) – 44 eps., 644M minutes NCIS (Netflix) – 354 eps., 692M minutes Apart from a one-off report on Wonder Woman 1984 in December 2020, this week marked the kickoff to Warner Bros Discovery’s HBO Max being officially tracked by Nielsen. The Boys on Prime Video finished within a whisker of Obi-Wan, with 949 million minutes of viewing. All 32 episodes of the show racked up 7.2 billion minutes of streaming from May 30 to June 5. Age-wise, it was fairly evenly split across the 18-34, 35-49 and 50-64-year-old groups.

Hawkins, Indiana, is a deadly place to live, and 'Stranger Things' season 4 racked up character deaths. None of the original company members died, ...

Matthew Modine remained wonderfully creepy and morally murky until the end, but hopefully the definite removal of Dr. Brenner as a threat for Eleven allows her character to move forward. Chrissy was Vecna’s first victim this season, and though her arc is contained in premiere episode “The Hellfire Club,” it’s still pretty compelling and sets the tone for the “youth cut down in their prime” atmosphere of this fourth season. I’m glad he got the Metallica homage moment with that “Master of Puppets” performance, and kudos to Joseph Quinn for the palpable regret he brought to his line delivery of “I just ran, and I left her there.” R.I.P., buddy. Taking her collar off was nice, but you put it on in the first place? The moment in “The Piggyback” when he decides to atone for his (understandable) cowardice earlier in the season by sacrificing himself to save Dustin and their other friends is lovely and heartbreaking. But with everyone connected to the lab dead, and with Lieutenant Colonel Jack Sullivan leaving Owens handcuffed at the bottom of that underground facility, I’m going to assume some kind of awful Ex Machina future awaits our guy. That’s too bad since Paul Reiser is a legend and his Dr. Owens was a great counterpoint to Papa: He genuinely cared about Eleven and felt anguish and guilt over separating her from her friends and forcing her to take part in the Nina experiments. Max’s realization that she did want to live — did want to keep running up that hill, if you will — was up there with Eddie’s sacrifice, and though her coma is worrying, it feels like a sign Max will eventually wake up. If he dies, it’s because he was trying to give Eleven back her freedom and free will, and that’s meaningful and admirable. But probably midway through Vol. 1, it became clear that Eddie was essentially a good version of the forever-irritating Billy — harder-edged than Steve but really just a metalhead misfit trying to hang out with his Hellfire friends instead of being hunted down as a devil worshipper and murderer. But in a very spread-apart season, Vecna’s destruction isn’t limited to just Hawkins — he’s putting bodies on the floor all over America. Millie Bobby Brown and Noah Schnapp joked about the series needing “to kill people off” in May, before season four premiered, so fans have been ready for some loss. In a season that felt like the Duffer brothers amping up their ’80s mimicry to untenable levels, Eddie seemed to be little more than a mishmash of character clichés from that time.

The final two episodes of the fourth season were released Friday at 3 a.m. ET.

Viewers watched 1.65 billion hours of the show in its first 28 days on the site. The fourth season of Stranger Things was delayed by the pandemic, and the show hadn’t aired new episodes since 2019. The seven episodes of the horror sci-fi series’ most recent season was released on May 27.

The final two episodes of 'Stranger Things' Season 4 featured a full-on war with Vecna.

As the particles shift the green grass and colorful flowers of Hawkins into black-and-white death and decay in front of El and her friends, black smoke billows from the cracks leading to the Upside Down and red lightening crashes in the sky. While everyone is reuniting with Hopper and Joyce, Will reaches for the back of his neck, a move he made many times when he was controlled by the Mind Flayer, as he turns to see the sky darken. Inside Max’s mind, Eleven reaches out to her friend and tells her she can’t go yet, and Eleven manages to somehow use her powers to bring Max back from the dead. With Max’s death, though Vecna is nowhere to be seen, his plan is carried out and the fourth gate opens in Hawkins. Four giant fault lines crack through the earth beginning at the gates — one flaming right through Jason’s body, killing him — and come together in the center of the town to create a huge rift into the Upside Down. Eleven and Vecna finally face off in Max’s mind via the “piggyback” method and Vecna gets the upper hand, restraining Eleven long enough that he can begin his gradual-bone-cracking-eye-bleeding-death ritual on Max through her mind. Once Vecna does get Max under his spell again, she tries to hide from him in the memory of her first kiss with Lucas at the Snow Ball, but Vecna finds her. He blames Eleven for all the damage that happened, not taking responsibility for the fact that him pushing her to explore her darkness as a young girl is what led to Eleven opening that gate in 1983. While it works, eventually the bats find a way into the trailer and the pair prepare to escape through the gate into their own dimension. In his final breaths, Brenner frees her and asks her to tell him she understands that he did everything because he loved her — she holds his hand but refuses to give him that satisfaction. When Mike (Finn Wolfhard) tells Will he’s worried Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) will no longer need him, Will explains that she always will and reminds Mike he’s “the heart” of the group by showing him his painting. The Hawkins gang hatches a four-phase plan to take out Vecna without Eleven, which involves Max ( Sadie Sink) setting herself up as the bait. The fourth and penultimate season of “Stranger Things” is filled with multiple worlds, numerous deaths and a pineapple pizza.

After being written off, Brett Gelman built an impressive career as a character actor. Now, in Netflix's sci-fi blockbuster, he's giving a star turn.

“Joyce and Murray complain about each other and doubt what the other is saying,” said Gelman. “They essentially became a comedic action duo.” Gelman’s unconventional comic gifts bring much-needed levity to the series as the perils facing its teen characters become increasingly terrifying. And though he’s been part of the ensemble since Season 2, the fourth season of Netflix’s sci-fi/fantasy blockbuster — which premieres its final, feature-length episodes Friday — moves Murray, and Gelman, from colorful side character to main player.

"Stranger Things" has demonstrated its ability to influence the Spotify charts; now the companies are doubling down on consumer interest to drive ...

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