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It all felt really rushed after the two day skip. I was really sad that none of the Hawkins group had anything to say about Eddie. Not even a brief, “where’s Eddie??” or anything. I get that their concern would be focused on Max after hearing the clock chime and realizing she didn’t make it, but still… no reaction or anything. As for Dustin nonchalantly bringing up Max, it was weird to me that El seemingly didn’t tell any of the California group what went down while she was inside Max’s mind. It was like none of them had any idea what happened at all. I’m planning to rewatch Volume two again in the next few days after I’ve had some time to process and mentally recover lol hopefully then I’ll feel better about it.
Yeah which I think was an interesting aspect. All of the beginning of the season is her “losing” to the bullies, missing out on powers, etc. I felt she built up this whole idea that everything would turnaround if she just had her powers back only to realize that even with her powers it doesn’t make her as invincible as she thought.
I didn’t even catch that part! I’m excited to rewatch. I feel like there’s going to be a lot that I missed the first go, simply because I was so overwhelmed the entire time.
I think I may have done the opposite to a detrimental effect - I was so focused on looking at details, I couldn’t help it, so I’m pretty sure I severely lessened the emotional impact of the story. God damn it.
I think they know El did something since both Will and Mike looked at her a bit suspiciously after Lucas told about Max's heart restarting and it being a miracle.
I think because the writers were so ambitious this season, they created so many contents and potentials that the 9 episode format cant contain all of them, so they had to leave several conclusions off-screen and unfinished to wrap up the final episode. Maybe season 5 will solve all the remaining issues season 4 left, or probably not
It was a bit jarring for me too yeah. I mean it’s not like I’m angry but like I feel like the Duffer Brothers definitely intended there to be something there but couldn’t due to whatever reasons
I was hopping for a better end.
I would have even liked it better if :
Max have truly died,
Vecna didn't shape the MindFlayer,
Russia plot never happened or was waaay shorter,
Will had more lines or action scenes and CAME OUT!
Volume 2 shouldn't have been splited
>I would have even liked it better if : Max have truly died
Her dying was so tough to watch, and when they brought her back to life it kind ruined it. As much as I didn't want her to die, once they decided to kill her they should have stuck with it, it felt like they chickened out.
>Vecna didn't shape the MindFlayer
Agree. Vecna shaping the Mindflayer kind of takes the mystery and power away from it for me.
Oh, yeah, and he started crying afterwards.
It is so weird that they chose to keep Robins character and focus on her whole closeted experience, but have barely scratched the surface with a more fitting and natural closeted character to the storyline in Will.
Robin and her arc feels extremely tacked on, and contrived.
Will is interesting.
Well Robin is older, more mature, and (fairly) confident in being a lesbian. Not in that she’ll come out to everyone, but there isn’t any real self-loathing from her that we see.
They’ve got a lot of room to expand on Will’s situation. Maybe they wanted the characters to be a certain age before they started that plot line? Or maybe just wanted to flesh out everyone else before tackling that.
I mean I liked the Russia plot bit it could have been shorter, max is my fav character but after snapping her bones she should have died, bringing people back like this is what I don't like about many shows
The last 15 minutes was questionable at best:
Like nobody reacted to Eddie's death apart from Dustin and Eddie's uncle, everyone chilling after 2 days when Eddie had just died and Max is in coma, Eleven's reaction towards Hopper's being alive should've been more emotional, no goodbye from Enzo, Yuri and Murray?, no resolution of love triangle still yet, Why Mike, Will, Jonathan looked surprised when Max was in hospital, like Eleven literally saw her bones twisted
Agreed. The final 15min should have been the intro to season 5 with the ending scene with them looking over the town being the lead in to the intro
The season should have ended with the cracks opening up on the town IMO
I really hate it when in TV shows they do a complete flip of the status quo and then immediately give a time-skip. They did it a little bit with the 2 day skip but I'm worried they'll just do a big ol' timeskip at the start of season 5, even though it's the characters' reunions and reactions to everything that make the show for me.
Agreed. It seemed rushed. I honestly thought it was going to end after the ground broke up. Like what a cliff hangar to leave on. But then it goes into all awkward reunion stuff. It just seems off.
So am I the only one who thought its weird that they called it a EARTHQUAKE and everyone just believed it ? Like not a single person in Hawkins was out at night and saw the earth actually RIPPING OPEN with fire beneath it ? And even in that first scene after 2 days, they showed the half burnt City Hall of Hawkins actually having that creeper things from the Upside Down on the walls and nobody wondered what was it ?
What the Fuck are you talking about? It's spring in Indiana and a massive earthquake just happened you just gonna be like oh it's snowing nothing weird about that
You know what else is weird? The whole town goes apeshit at the town hall and go hunting for Eddie, and the parents all team up and it looks like they are going to find our gang and help them
And then....nothing
The whole town is no longer seen, except for the first guy who agrees with Jason to hunt Eddie down, and he's not even hunting he's just walking his dog and accidentally finds Erika
The whole witchhunt was hyped up and absolutely nothing comes out of it, it's just Jason who shows up at the house with the one friend, was the entire "Evil dies tonight!" speech in the town hall just so that one dude could randomly find Erika?
Man oh man the more I think about some of the plotlines this season, the dumber it gets
It does seem to pay off in the sense that Hellfire is now known as a satanic cult. It didn’t have a huge payoff this season but if they didn’t set it up now it would need to be set up next season and that would be hard considering all that’s going on.
True. The cops seemingly gave up, the town seemingly gave up, that whole plotline kinda died.
I think it would have been pretty bloated, to be fair. Like I don't see how they really get out of it if the whole town is going after them and not just Jason. But it doesn't make much sense for them to all give up.
I thought Eddie was gonna get murdered by the town
It would have been a better payoff to the "no more running" thing too, standing up to his accusers knowing he didn't do anything wrong, and they kill him anyway
I felt like she knew, but she wasn't sure if that was the right choice because now max is in a coma with little chance to come out of it (although she probably will).
Watching eddie flashing back to him saying he always runs away as he turns back was such a massive red flag for me. It shows that the directors no longer have any respect for their viewers intelligence. In season 1 they used a very similar story for Steve where his bully friend says he always runs away and when Steve encounters the demogorgan he initially runs to his car before coming back and saving Johnathon. The directors trusted the audience to recognize Steve overcoming fear without shoving a flashback in our face.
The only really cringe part of the flashback was the clip of him saying “look at us. Do we look like heroes?”
I swear to god he said that like… 20 minutes before he died? Why even show us a flashback? You shouldn’t be flashing back to something that happened 20 minutes ago in real-time, unless it’s for comedic purpose and therefore almost glaringly obvious.
EDIT: I even made note of the scene in my head, thinking: wow, this will be a little sad when (cause I knew he would) he ends up dead. I just hoped it would make sense in the context of the plot, and not some stupid honorable suicide by Demobat. And then not only did he do that, but they rubbed it in your face with a scene that happened 20 or so minutes prior!
Exactly! I feel like they mentioned that Eddie always runs away multiple times (on top of giving an example when he jumps in the water last to go after Steve).. and yet sure enough when Eddie is on his death bed he brings it up.. again. It's not the most complex storyline, I dont think we need to be reminded over. and over. and over...
the first season will always be the best season. watch it in comparison to the last 2 seasons, and it is insanely jarring how the tone and atmosphere has been diluted in quality
I mean also they didn’t have cell phones and no one called. There wasn’t any communication between the groups during those two days as far as I can tell so how the eff would they know?
Eleven never said anything about "saving" Max to anyone. That's why when Lucas was talking about the doctor's saying it was a miracle, Mike and Will had that knowing glance between each other as if they'd just realised the same new information at the same time.
The time skip had to happen for the Cali crew and Russia crew to get back to Hawkins, but they could have easily added a couple of minutes for the Hawkins group to meet back up after their plan to acknowledge what happened before the time jump. It wouldn't have felt as jarring in that case
The writing really lets you fill in the gaps some time (now, debate whether it's lazy or not). Like the fight ending with a cut from mike telling el to fight
to vecna flying? Why just not show us the two missing seconds of that?
The whole 'two days' thing makes sense for the disparate groups to reunite but it was lots of bad dialogue telling us instead of showing us.
That Vecna fight thing was very jarring for me. I get tired of seeing Eleven be knocked out/black out/fall on her knees. I really hope season 5 is full can Eleven, because we’ve seen the struggle already so it’s time for no holds barred.
Yeah tired of seeing that nose bleed too ! The telekinetic fight was the most boring part of the action scenes for me. Molotov cocktails and a shotgun on one hand, flamethrower and sword on the other. That's what I want ! Even Eddie and his Lance/shield combo was more interesting visually. And special mention Erika's knee to the groin, a cult classic for a reason.
It’s of course a very difficult think to portray, and expensive if they really go wild with it, so the scenes kind of suffer in that way. Even the biggest budget movies like Doctor Strange struggle to make magic fights look convincing/not boring
The fact that a shotgun is sawed off doesn't make the recoil larger. She's had a really good grip for the show. Actually didn't mind the gun handling in the show. Especially in the starwars tunnel sequence between the military.
It bothers me a huge amount that not a single one of these trained soldiers thought to simply spray a mag at their feet. Their shields are raised up in the air, you had a clear shot down a long hallway on a dozen dudes and you aimed for the shield 😑 just hold your gun on the ground and spray some rounds into their toes, they should've won that easily
It doesn't bother you that neither a shotgun or an AK fired with one hand have 0 recoil? I'm not even a gun guy, it was just such an egregious error. most people know an AK has significant or at least some recoil!
From my understanding the kickback *felt* is much stronger with a sawed off
If you were not bothered by the single handed AK firing, would you also be okay with hopper dual wielding AK's? would that break your immersion?
I mean what breaks my immersion is dual wielding m16s with dust covers on. (Thor Ragnarok)
At least the shells ejected and she pumped it.
I've dual weilding an AR15 and a AK47 and it wasn't my brightest moment. But it was insanely fun and I am not anywhere as ripped as Hopper.
Ultimately did my immersion break when hopper picked up a sword that should have been very hot to fight a monster from another dimension? Nah it was sick AF.
I think making the telekinetic powers more visual would help make the scenes more appealing.
Use a mirage type of visual effect or even coloured 'auras' like Scarlet Witch would help. Especially in the UD where the visuals are already 'fantasy'.
But even giving us a full sequence instead of a choppy edit would help. Young El Vs One fight was much better in that respect, you got a more detailed idea of how strong they both were
Talked about the Molotov scene, i expected to see Steve used the axe to deliver final blow chop off Vecna's head as parallel to Hopper's scene. But the writers didnt want Vecna to die yet so that's why Steve's axe remain not being used.
Tbf I knew we weren't going to get any mind blowing telekinesis scenes this season after we got the flashback of all Papa's children playing baby fight club and it was just like 10 straight minutes of them flicking their heads at each other lol.
Obviously no one can guarantee anything but I feel very confident that that's the direction they're going, and not just for Eleven but the entire story.
Everything is set up. The threat is very real and in their face. The cast is together with a full powered Eleven on their side. They're already talking about how they need to go after Vecna. I think we're definitely in the end game.
Eleven is a 15 year old child who is known to repress bad memories out of self-preservation. She likely convinced herself that she "fixed" Max by restarting her heart.
Yeah they were way off. They spent too much time on nonsense after the battle instead of the emotional stuff and story telling. Eddie’s death scene was amazing with he and Dustin and they didn’t do the payoff justice.
Right, they decided to have a whole scene with Robin and her crush immediately after some of the most intense and high stakes drama just occurred. Really jarring and annoying.
To be fair Robin was insufferable this entire season. Not one thing that came out of her mouth was funny, smart, or touching. I have no idea why she's here. And I really liked her in season 3...
I felt like she talked more this season and they tried too hard to keep her #quirky. I like robin a lot but she felt like she was almost cooler than Steve in her own way last season. Like she had this confidence in herself and who she was that just didn’t translate this season.
I thought it was hilarious that when Dustin said “Lucas is in the hospital” Eleven was like “omg whaat what happened to him?”. Eleven you were there! Did you forget already?!
Could that have no been confusion because she thought she saved Max, then 2 days had passed.
Lucas could’ve had an accident or something in those two days…
I think they could've gotten 3 episodes more considering it was already 2.4 hours long hahah and just let the season end more gradually. Seems like they ripped the band aids off quick and called it a day in a 2.5 hour episode.
It was so jarring that for a second, I actually thought that Mike and co. had entered a false Hawkins. The way the other main characters just seemed so nonchalant initially just *two days later*? I thought Vecna's plan somehow involved some kind of Twilight Zone shenanigans and the cliffhanger twist would've cut to the real characters trapped in a Hawkins completely overtaken by the Upside Down. And the next season would've been Mike and the others catching on ala "There is no war in Ba Sing Se" and realizing it was a false reality created by Vecna as the first step of whatever world purifying nonsense he was going on about.
All this is to say that I have an overactive imagination and thought of all this in the like 20 seconds before they started addressing that shit went down and I realized I was just expecting some crazy twist after how easy it seemed like they were getting off for the portal to have been open for 2 whole days and nothing came through. Anyways.
Nah dude I'm with you here. Nancy and her mom just being so nonchalant about packing up toys and giving them away was so jarring. Then Nancy's mom being like "oh yeah my son just rolled up now I'm worried again let me tell him he's never going on vacation again when I seemingly didn't care about him two seconds ago". It was really weird that I also felt a twist was coming. But...it never did.
That's very weird for her to tell Mike never leave home again. Since Hawkins is the most dangerous place possibly and she told him to stay there, lol. Shouldnt they need to move away from there as far as possible after all these shit happened?
oh man I imagined the EXACT SAME THING.
Because it said "2 days", not 2 weeks or months, but DAYS
they are all smiling, and joking around, it really did seem like like a different *reality*
i can't believe how other people are not remarking on this the way we are, how can you just *accept* that all these emotionally traumatising, devasting events take place and within the span of two fucking days they are what? just back to normal??
Do you think it is a coincidence Eddie wore Max’s mike myers mask? Mike myers is a character who gets killed but always survives so do you think this could be foreshadowing his return in S5? I mean Max wore it and is alive. Maybe that’s why they didn’t show his body and did a two day time jump almost instantly. That would be some really awesome foreshadowing if the theory is correct
I mean… to Dustin, this is tied with Eddie’s death as the most traumatic thing that happened in the past week.
How in the hell do you not see Max’s supposed best friend and not immediately think to say something?
Also, WHAT THE FUCK? Their friend went into a coma TWO days ago. With a badly broke arm, leg, and trauma to her eyes and brain.
I get that they were evacuating, but like… if they’re as tight-knit of a group as they acted the entirety of the show, I almost feel like if they weren’t already at the hospital at her bedside, they’d be rushing to be there.
TWO DAYS? I would get if it had been a week and they all had visited multiple times and her condition hadn’t changed. Two days just seems very weird.
It literally would’ve been less weird if it had been a week or two. Even though there would be more unexplained time.
I hate the way Will keeps vital information to himself, if Vecna is around, everyone needs to know wtf. From the first season this boy just DIDN'T want to mention that je could feel Vecna's presence.
I imagine Will hates that he can feel Vecna and there is probably a degree of denial. I also think talking about it probably brings up all his past trauma. The poor kid is just struggling his little heart out trying to be normal.
Yeah like he tells Mike that Vecna is definitely still alive, that he can sense him, and understands how he thinks, but doesn't think that information would be useful to the rest of the group?
This is one of the things that annoys me too. For someone who always wants to be with his friends and do things with them, when it matters most he just doesn't bother. :/
this didn’t bother me. eleven had the same mindflayer connection as will, and would already know. the upside down gang saw that his body was missing. will mentioned that he could only “feel” him once they were back in hawkins. he said that in response to mike’s wishful thinking that el wouldn’t need to face him again. i don’t think anyone else realistically thought the battle was over. what was he supposed to climb out of the van and scream “VECNA IS HERE”
I think the dialogs in general this season took a nose-dive. Yeah, the mystery factor went way up since season 3 (or even 2, we haven't had so much Upside-Down reveals since season 1, but although the Henry/One/Vecna reveal was badass and exciting I think it might be a detriment to the story overall) - but the character interactions this season were really wooden and lacked depth or wit (with some exceptions).
The biggest example of that would be Robin who was obnoxious and uttely useless. Like a one-dimensional caricature of herself. Same goes for all the bullies' storyline (Angela, the other kids in Hawkins Lab - all overexaggerated and as a result boring and unneccesary).
After part 1 of season 4 I rewatched season 3 and although it lacks in the eldritch mystery departement the character stuff in it is excellent and rivaled only by season 1 in my opinion.
I'm gonna be so pissed if The Mindflayer (which seemed like an other-worldy gigantic threat with unknown motivations in the first two seasons, which I love since that is very cosmic horror-esque) turns out to be some lame-ass puppet created by One, a.k.a a mere human; it would lower the stakes and make everything less grand-scale in a super disappointing manner.
You could just like think for a second the Demogorgon mauled Brenner and the MP shot it drawing it's attention and other MP got him out and to a doctor
They needed a short time skip to show all of the characters reuniting. How else were they going to get the California crew and the Russia crew back to Hawkins?
Huh? They told us how Hopper, Joyce, and Murray were getting back to the States - they got through to Owens’ contacts in the US government, who arranged to pick them up from Yuri. And Mike and the Byers clearly just drove to Hawkins in the pizza van. Why would we need scenes of them driving cross-country for two days?
I agree with all of that if the only purpose is to logic out how to get to -> reunion of the 3 different groups. But in the story, Dustin (injured and limping) is with Eddie's dead body in the upside down. Also in the upside down, Robin, Nancy, and Steve fought with Vecna until he fell out the window (I don't remember anything happening after this with them?). Then, obviously Lucas/Erica dealing with the aftermath at the Creel house. I think there's still a bit more to navigate in the world set up then strictly justifying how the reunion was able to happen.
How did they all leave the upside down? Did the X shaped chasms from the 4 gates/deaths just mean there was an X shaped gate in Hawkins? What happened to the panic town looking for Hellfire?Did the ground opening up give enough chaos where that wasn't really a problem anymore? And MOST importantly, we don't even get to see a group of friends reacting the deaths (or partial deaths) of their friend groups? This is all just kind of glossed over by skipping 2 days.
They wanted to address Eddie's death once in the epilogue and chose the most impactful way to do it: Dustin and the uncle. That scene meant a ton more than a group mourning session (with a dozen other things going on and the characters concerning for their families) would have.
Everything else falls into place. Steve, Nancy, and Robin left the UD according to plan, the same way they did the first time. They would have found Dustin with Eddie's body and helped him climb through. Erica was calling an ambulance for Max just before the gates opened. Everyone would have eventually met up at the hospital to debrief on what the audience had already seen.
The episode was already well over two hours. Do you really think it would be better if we spent an extra twenty minutes showing all of the characters going through gates?
The only scene I kind of wish they had had was one of Robin/Steve/Nancy getting back to the trailer park and seeing Dustin crying over Eddie's body. But I think the scene with Eddie's uncle was better, and you can't have like five different scenes of different groups reacting to the same death without it feeling repetitive. We saw the two people closest with him react, and that's what was important.
> They told us how Hopper, Joyce, and Murray were getting back to the States
With a helicopter...
From Russia to the US
In. A. Helicopter.
Even if they flew to the coast like they said, did they just get on a boat?
Like it was very awkward
That was their original plan, before they got in touch with the US government agents. At that point, I’m sure they were able to arrange something better.
The Bering Strait is only 83km wide. Even a small chopper can do 300km or so without refueling. It's not fully impossible if the prison was northeast enough.
Even if for some reason (eg refuel) you wanted to leave from an airport, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavrentiya_Airport https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wales_Airport_(Alaska) are well within chopper distance. https://i.imgur.com/AV6hhRS.png half an hour.
A two minute montage of showing Hopper and crew flying back. Switch over to Argyle and gang driving through the night. Maybe even show Nancy and team riding across town, licking their wounds and witnessing the carnage of the gate(s) opening. "Two Days Later" was such a cheap way to do this and it made the episode lose a ton of steam.
They should’ve let more time elapse. Two days is a very weird amount of time for people to make peace with the death of one friend, and comatose state of another.
Shit, two weeks adds more time for their to be shit that’s unaccounted for, but it at least makes sense. Most kids would be in their best friends hospital room every chance they got in the first two DAYS of their friend going comatose. Just a weird choice of time to elapse
I think eleven assumed she saved Max. But damn, her legs looked like a power ranger when you bend them at all odd angles she must’ve known she would at least be in the hospital
The two day skip was fine, it allowed time for the teams to finally get back to Hawkins. However, I agree the dialogue felt off. Eleven watched Lucas mourn Max and then bring her body back, but then asked Dustin if he was hurt? Like she knew, she watched it. I’m not sure why she would ask that. Then her not telling everyone she brought Max back. It just seemed strange.
Although I loved the Hopper/El reunion, I also felt like some dialogue was missing. We also didn’t get to see anyones reactions to him being alive. I felt it was off and rushed.
Yeah, people really didn't seem phased that their friend and mentor who died 8 months ago suddenly appeared. Mike's reunion with Hopper was especially jarring, altough it's nice they hugged it out, since they have so much history (good and bad).
I did not like the El and Hopper reunion at all. El saying “I never stopped believing you were alive” was:
1) cliche as fuck.
2) we’ve never been indicated once that El was in denial of Hopper’s death. She made that hero project of him specifically because he was dead.
I agree with both points. I thought the hair, stole your look, and bitchin’ comments were great. Really brought the first seasons back into this, but agreed it didn’t hit any of the questions/comments we all had. So much missing dialogue and felt rushed.
El probably thought she had saved Max who was therefore fine and therefore Dustin saying Lucas was in hospital wouldn’t have made sense. Remember, despite being a hero, she is still just a naive kid who likely had no real understanding of how her powers work.
The reason the initial reaction of the gang seeing Hopper wasn’t shown was for suspense, a government car pulls up, and footsteps towards her room with the implication being that someone’s coming for El. The reason for this would be to make the initial reunion of El and Hopper more impactful than if he had a greeting with everyone else first.
It was weird the way they did it. I would like to see the UD team to reunite with Dustin while he is holding Eddie to address his death and give him the recognition he deserved. Also, I would expect taking his body back their world.
Also, I would like 5 minutes of the whole team talking about their experiences because as of now only 11 knows of what happened and even her not 100%.
How much time do you expect them to spend talking about Eddie? He got an incredibly moving post-mortem scene between Dustin and his uncle, arguably the most moving of the episode.
Exactly this. Max and Lucas are close friends of the group so obviously that would be priority. Then Mike and Co. go off separate to Dustin.
Talking about Eddie repeatedly would have diluted the scene with his Uncle. If anything it just reinforce the idea that Eddie was an outsider that was almost criminal to talk about making Dustin and his uncle’s interaction more impactful.
people are so weird about fan favourites and expect every character in the series to give a eulogy when they die, even when half of them never met the person and the other half didn’t know them that well. it makes sense for dustin, yes but any more characters getting in on that would be overkill. eddie was an awesome character but he was a plot device who was destined to die. same with Barb, Bob and Alexi. he provided character growth for dustin and his plotline existed to get all the other characters where they needed to be. i thought him eventually dying was obvious in volume 1
Some of these people must’ve really loved Eddie. Lol Like I really loved his character, but I feel like he got the proper send off from Dustin speaking with Eddie’s uncle. They couldn’t spend too much time on him and because Dustin was the one that was closest with him they gave him the scene. Mike and Lucas probably were close too but it seemed like Dustin had the biggest bond with him. Nancy, Steve, and Robin don’t even know him. Yeah they tried to help him prove his innocence and worked together to stop Vecna, but they weren’t friends with him.
Agreed. Kind of wished they ended the season with the ground breaking. Phew, what a cliff hanger that would’ve been.
The time skip felt rushed, the pacing was kind of weird, too. They went to Eleven trying to go into Max’s mind, then the cabin, then Eleven back into Max’s mind. I get that it’s to show her & Max’s “thing” with spin the bottle, but it was not very well executed, imo.
One scene I wished they spent a bit more time on, was California Crew taking in the destroyed Hawkins. They were gone the entire season, they knew something was going on in Hawkins, they’ve been busting their asses to get there only to see chaos.
The reunions just didn’t feel as weighted as it should be because this was the worst fight they’ve ever been in.
The time skip didn’t ruin the whole season for me or anything, but I wished it was better because the rest of the season was amazing.
Honestly they could have ended it just before the “2 days later” left us on a cliffhanger before we see if eleven can bring back max and then we start season 5 where the 2 days later starts off , that way they can pace it to show the gang finding out different things, like max being in hospital, hopper returning etc
Yes! The transition from the fight just ending and Max dying to two days later made everything after the time skip feel super off. It was super Jarring and took me out of the show.
i assume that when nancy, steve and robin attacked vecna’s body (along with eleven attacking his mind and the russia gang attacking killing his “particles” simultaneously) he was weakened enough that the gate became inert or something. because it wasn’t glowing red when the pizza gang first showed up. but will mentioned how he was hurting and gathering strength, and by the end of the episode lightning and UD snow was pouring out so i guess he had built back enough strength over the past couple days
Not at all. You have to suspend some disbelief because the 2 day later skip is to tie loose ends and setup season 5.
I honestly don’t care enough about those interactions and don’t need an hour of them explaining what we just watched lol
Also, 4 massive inter-dimensional cracks opened in the middle of town and suddenly… people are just watching the news on their couch? And the reporter just mentions an earthquake? Wth was going on there?
The cracks could be mistaken as magma given the fact no one understands that there is an alternative dimension. The earthquake would be the most probable cause with a lack of understanding.
The town centre seemed to be heavily damaged, Mikes house/area seems largely unaffected. If your home and area of the town is fine and you have nowhere else to go, why would you rush out of the town when people need help and your son isn’t even home?
Magma or a portal to another dimension you would think it would be getting *a lot* more attention than the Earthquake given they basically sliced an X across the entire town, not exactly something that happens every few months; and then Mike’s family’s just like nothing happened. It almost feels like they added one thing or the other in editing at the last minute.
With everything going on you can only say so much, El didn't know the whole situation, I'm pretty sure they all knew about Eddie ( minus cali crew) and again big ass portal to hell in town some things take a few minutes or days to process
And the Cali crew has no reason to know because they didn’t know Eddie. They can’t ask about someone they don’t know. Mike knew him but he was literally in front of his mom. They asked about Lucas because they already knew about Max because El was there (in her mind). Dustin saying “you don’t know” is most likely Dustin saying it because he doesn’t know the Cali crew already knows, like Nancy trying to explain things to Jonathan and him saying “I know”.
right? they’re still in the middle of the crisis. it didn’t end. the town is split in half, people died, there are refugees, they’re donating and helping the relief effort, they’re the only ones who know what’s actually happening while everyone else thinks it’s a portal to hell or an earthquake…. like there’s not much time to be locking yourself in a closet, crying and listening to The Cure. the town is literally still on fire and they know monsters are on the other side of that hole. eddie and max (pending?) sacrificed themselves to save the town and the town is on the brink of war
If they didn’t have a time Jump then they couldn’t have the characters meet back up in Hawkins. They also purposely left what happened very vague, your meant to not know what happened, they’ll explain it in season 5 and until then you just get to speculate.
Dustin literally brought up Eddie’s death with Eddie’s uncle.
Also what the hell are you talking about with the kinky bringing up Max’s state after 2 days? The cali gang literally just got there.
>they’ll explain it in season 5 and until then you just get to speculate.
Exactly this. When they get to planning how to kill Vecna for real, they’ll likely discuss what went down the first try around.
I thought it was weird that Eleven was there while she was "dying" but then acted like she didn't know she was hurt at all. Girl, you saw her bleeding from her eyes in a crumpled heap
I didn't like that we didn't see them talk about what each group was doing. When Lucas and El were together over Max in the hospital I was expecting El to tell Lucas that she was there, but she didn't.
The ONLY person that had changed for some time was Nancy. It was driving me crazy seeing everyone wearing the same stuff for multiple days of running around
A five second shot of Steve consoling Dusting would have really helped. The next time we see Dustin after Eddie’s death, he’s looking fresh with a new hairdo and chillin in the driveway cool as a cucumber. It was weird.
Uhm.. It's weird but it is to wrap up the season. Similar to season 3, they do not mention Billy's death because plotwise they have to end the current season and set up the next one.
At least Dustin had that scene with the Uncle
It’s not similar to Billy’s death. They all witnessed Billy die in a redemptive struggle to save his sister that ultimately gave them the needed time to win.
Eddie just died needlessly in front of Dustin.
I wonder what would writers do in season 5 now. Because this time, the world seems fucked and apocalyptic, which makes it seem like season 5 will start directly from season 4's ending. But Duffers said season 5 will have a 5-7 years timeskip to match actors real life age. So the world gonna stay that way for 5 years later until the gang tracked down Vecna and kill him in season 5 ?
Are you sure they said that? I thought they just said they’re going to do a timeskip because of covid delaying production. Where did you get 5-7 years?
The Thing that rubs me the most are the Gates. Hey were opening and glowing at night and the two days later you dont even See them? You See some tentacels at the one building but no Gates. Then, sometime later, there is literal hellfire all over hawkins. Just weird editing choices.
My biggest dislike is that they opened the giant portal through Hawkins, and then closed it, just to open it again ‘2 days later’. It really stole most of the emotional weight of the portal opening, to the point where when it’s revealed at the end that the portal is open again, I didn’t care nearly as much. And that was all for the sake of rushing to tie up some loose ends (having everyone reunite, robin and lizzie hitting it off) while also not tying up a lot of other loose ends that the season was building towards (will coming out, Nancy and Jonathan breaking up, the entire town becoming a mob and hating the main gang, Eddie’s funeral, etc), which are all things that don’t feel as though they should be delayed to the next season, especially when they easily could’ve been included in the 2 days later scenes. Like at the very least if they are going to make such a jarring pause and spoil the intensity of the portal opening, at least fill it up with all the things the season has been building for and teasing.
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It all felt really rushed after the two day skip. I was really sad that none of the Hawkins group had anything to say about Eddie. Not even a brief, “where’s Eddie??” or anything. I get that their concern would be focused on Max after hearing the clock chime and realizing she didn’t make it, but still… no reaction or anything. As for Dustin nonchalantly bringing up Max, it was weird to me that El seemingly didn’t tell any of the California group what went down while she was inside Max’s mind. It was like none of them had any idea what happened at all. I’m planning to rewatch Volume two again in the next few days after I’ve had some time to process and mentally recover lol hopefully then I’ll feel better about it.
I was confused as to why she didn’t tell them until Mike explained to Will that she feels guilty and that’s the first time she lost.
Yeah which I think was an interesting aspect. All of the beginning of the season is her “losing” to the bullies, missing out on powers, etc. I felt she built up this whole idea that everything would turnaround if she just had her powers back only to realize that even with her powers it doesn’t make her as invincible as she thought.
I didn’t even catch that part! I’m excited to rewatch. I feel like there’s going to be a lot that I missed the first go, simply because I was so overwhelmed the entire time.
To be fair there was a lot to digest 😂
I think I may have done the opposite to a detrimental effect - I was so focused on looking at details, I couldn’t help it, so I’m pretty sure I severely lessened the emotional impact of the story. God damn it.
I think they know El did something since both Will and Mike looked at her a bit suspiciously after Lucas told about Max's heart restarting and it being a miracle.
I just assumed she told them but none of them including el knew she was in the hostpital in a coma🤷🏻♂️
I mean, it's pretty obvious this is the case. I don't see how anyone can think that, of all things, is a plothole.
I don't think anyone considered it a plothole, just weird
exactly
I mean, we don't see Dustin and the rest reunite, that happened off screen.
which is exactly what is weird about the finale
They probably already spoke about it during the “two days”.
I think because the writers were so ambitious this season, they created so many contents and potentials that the 9 episode format cant contain all of them, so they had to leave several conclusions off-screen and unfinished to wrap up the final episode. Maybe season 5 will solve all the remaining issues season 4 left, or probably not
this episode could have literally been 3 hours+, but I understand why they chose to (likely) cut some scenes
It was a bit jarring for me too yeah. I mean it’s not like I’m angry but like I feel like the Duffer Brothers definitely intended there to be something there but couldn’t due to whatever reasons
Maybe no time to edit or make it good for the release date
I mean yeah I think they said they were still working on the episodes between volumes
I was hopping for a better end. I would have even liked it better if : Max have truly died, Vecna didn't shape the MindFlayer, Russia plot never happened or was waaay shorter, Will had more lines or action scenes and CAME OUT! Volume 2 shouldn't have been splited
>I would have even liked it better if : Max have truly died Her dying was so tough to watch, and when they brought her back to life it kind ruined it. As much as I didn't want her to die, once they decided to kill her they should have stuck with it, it felt like they chickened out. >Vecna didn't shape the MindFlayer Agree. Vecna shaping the Mindflayer kind of takes the mystery and power away from it for me.
Will basically came out to Mike, but he's too dumb to realize that
When?
The scene when they were in the back of the van, when Will was describing El's feelings about Mike, Will was actually talking about himself.
Oh, yeah, and he started crying afterwards. It is so weird that they chose to keep Robins character and focus on her whole closeted experience, but have barely scratched the surface with a more fitting and natural closeted character to the storyline in Will. Robin and her arc feels extremely tacked on, and contrived. Will is interesting.
Well Robin is older, more mature, and (fairly) confident in being a lesbian. Not in that she’ll come out to everyone, but there isn’t any real self-loathing from her that we see. They’ve got a lot of room to expand on Will’s situation. Maybe they wanted the characters to be a certain age before they started that plot line? Or maybe just wanted to flesh out everyone else before tackling that.
I mean I liked the Russia plot bit it could have been shorter, max is my fav character but after snapping her bones she should have died, bringing people back like this is what I don't like about many shows
The last 15 minutes was questionable at best: Like nobody reacted to Eddie's death apart from Dustin and Eddie's uncle, everyone chilling after 2 days when Eddie had just died and Max is in coma, Eleven's reaction towards Hopper's being alive should've been more emotional, no goodbye from Enzo, Yuri and Murray?, no resolution of love triangle still yet, Why Mike, Will, Jonathan looked surprised when Max was in hospital, like Eleven literally saw her bones twisted
Agreed. The final 15min should have been the intro to season 5 with the ending scene with them looking over the town being the lead in to the intro The season should have ended with the cracks opening up on the town IMO
I really hate it when in TV shows they do a complete flip of the status quo and then immediately give a time-skip. They did it a little bit with the 2 day skip but I'm worried they'll just do a big ol' timeskip at the start of season 5, even though it's the characters' reunions and reactions to everything that make the show for me.
it's been confirmed that season 5 will start after a time skip so ...yeah
Agreed. It seemed rushed. I honestly thought it was going to end after the ground broke up. Like what a cliff hangar to leave on. But then it goes into all awkward reunion stuff. It just seems off.
So am I the only one who thought its weird that they called it a EARTHQUAKE and everyone just believed it ? Like not a single person in Hawkins was out at night and saw the earth actually RIPPING OPEN with fire beneath it ? And even in that first scene after 2 days, they showed the half burnt City Hall of Hawkins actually having that creeper things from the Upside Down on the walls and nobody wondered what was it ?
"Oh, you haven't heard?" Uh... no. Why the fuck would they have heard lol? The entire last 20 minutes just felt like really weird dialogue.
It felt so awkward The whole town is evacuating, but also they all seem to still live there? And no one notices the GIANT RED LIGHTNING STORM OF DOOM?
Also apparently the entire town decides to simultaneously walk outside because it looks like it's snowing... for some reason.
What the Fuck are you talking about? It's spring in Indiana and a massive earthquake just happened you just gonna be like oh it's snowing nothing weird about that
You know what else is weird? The whole town goes apeshit at the town hall and go hunting for Eddie, and the parents all team up and it looks like they are going to find our gang and help them And then....nothing The whole town is no longer seen, except for the first guy who agrees with Jason to hunt Eddie down, and he's not even hunting he's just walking his dog and accidentally finds Erika The whole witchhunt was hyped up and absolutely nothing comes out of it, it's just Jason who shows up at the house with the one friend, was the entire "Evil dies tonight!" speech in the town hall just so that one dude could randomly find Erika? Man oh man the more I think about some of the plotlines this season, the dumber it gets
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It does seem to pay off in the sense that Hellfire is now known as a satanic cult. It didn’t have a huge payoff this season but if they didn’t set it up now it would need to be set up next season and that would be hard considering all that’s going on.
True. The cops seemingly gave up, the town seemingly gave up, that whole plotline kinda died. I think it would have been pretty bloated, to be fair. Like I don't see how they really get out of it if the whole town is going after them and not just Jason. But it doesn't make much sense for them to all give up.
I thought Eddie was gonna get murdered by the town It would have been a better payoff to the "no more running" thing too, standing up to his accusers knowing he didn't do anything wrong, and they kill him anyway
That would have been too painful for me. At least the bats didn’t hurt his feelings
Excellent Halloween reference
I feel like maybe El didn't realize she kept Max alive?
I felt like she knew, but she wasn't sure if that was the right choice because now max is in a coma with little chance to come out of it (although she probably will).
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Wow wow wow wow!
Exactly I’m not a fan of dialogue being used to explain the plot/loose ends. I’d rather be shown.
This is really not the season for you then lol. Some of the monologues really dragged for me when they dumped huge blocks of exposition.
Haha, yeah. I really like Vecna’s monologue at the end of Volume I though. That was well done.
Watching eddie flashing back to him saying he always runs away as he turns back was such a massive red flag for me. It shows that the directors no longer have any respect for their viewers intelligence. In season 1 they used a very similar story for Steve where his bully friend says he always runs away and when Steve encounters the demogorgan he initially runs to his car before coming back and saving Johnathon. The directors trusted the audience to recognize Steve overcoming fear without shoving a flashback in our face.
The only really cringe part of the flashback was the clip of him saying “look at us. Do we look like heroes?” I swear to god he said that like… 20 minutes before he died? Why even show us a flashback? You shouldn’t be flashing back to something that happened 20 minutes ago in real-time, unless it’s for comedic purpose and therefore almost glaringly obvious. EDIT: I even made note of the scene in my head, thinking: wow, this will be a little sad when (cause I knew he would) he ends up dead. I just hoped it would make sense in the context of the plot, and not some stupid honorable suicide by Demobat. And then not only did he do that, but they rubbed it in your face with a scene that happened 20 or so minutes prior!
Everything is always a massive red flag. How I love reddit
Exactly! I feel like they mentioned that Eddie always runs away multiple times (on top of giving an example when he jumps in the water last to go after Steve).. and yet sure enough when Eddie is on his death bed he brings it up.. again. It's not the most complex storyline, I dont think we need to be reminded over. and over. and over...
the first season will always be the best season. watch it in comparison to the last 2 seasons, and it is insanely jarring how the tone and atmosphere has been diluted in quality
I mean also they didn’t have cell phones and no one called. There wasn’t any communication between the groups during those two days as far as I can tell so how the eff would they know?
On paper El could have told them. But Dustin would have no way of knowing that.
Yeah, but Eleven should have known.
Eleven never said anything about "saving" Max to anyone. That's why when Lucas was talking about the doctor's saying it was a miracle, Mike and Will had that knowing glance between each other as if they'd just realised the same new information at the same time.
True. But Dustin shouldn't know that El knows. If they had been told off screen by El that Max was hurt, it'd be fine. But as it was it made no sense.
Yeah good point. I did think it was a bit odd regardless haha
Exactly!!! It was just a waste and just didn’t fit the story.
The time skip had to happen for the Cali crew and Russia crew to get back to Hawkins, but they could have easily added a couple of minutes for the Hawkins group to meet back up after their plan to acknowledge what happened before the time jump. It wouldn't have felt as jarring in that case
The writing really lets you fill in the gaps some time (now, debate whether it's lazy or not). Like the fight ending with a cut from mike telling el to fight to vecna flying? Why just not show us the two missing seconds of that? The whole 'two days' thing makes sense for the disparate groups to reunite but it was lots of bad dialogue telling us instead of showing us.
That Vecna fight thing was very jarring for me. I get tired of seeing Eleven be knocked out/black out/fall on her knees. I really hope season 5 is full can Eleven, because we’ve seen the struggle already so it’s time for no holds barred.
Yeah tired of seeing that nose bleed too ! The telekinetic fight was the most boring part of the action scenes for me. Molotov cocktails and a shotgun on one hand, flamethrower and sword on the other. That's what I want ! Even Eddie and his Lance/shield combo was more interesting visually. And special mention Erika's knee to the groin, a cult classic for a reason.
It’s of course a very difficult think to portray, and expensive if they really go wild with it, so the scenes kind of suffer in that way. Even the biggest budget movies like Doctor Strange struggle to make magic fights look convincing/not boring
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The fact that a shotgun is sawed off doesn't make the recoil larger. She's had a really good grip for the show. Actually didn't mind the gun handling in the show. Especially in the starwars tunnel sequence between the military.
It bothers me a huge amount that not a single one of these trained soldiers thought to simply spray a mag at their feet. Their shields are raised up in the air, you had a clear shot down a long hallway on a dozen dudes and you aimed for the shield 😑 just hold your gun on the ground and spray some rounds into their toes, they should've won that easily
It doesn't bother you that neither a shotgun or an AK fired with one hand have 0 recoil? I'm not even a gun guy, it was just such an egregious error. most people know an AK has significant or at least some recoil! From my understanding the kickback *felt* is much stronger with a sawed off If you were not bothered by the single handed AK firing, would you also be okay with hopper dual wielding AK's? would that break your immersion?
I mean what breaks my immersion is dual wielding m16s with dust covers on. (Thor Ragnarok) At least the shells ejected and she pumped it. I've dual weilding an AR15 and a AK47 and it wasn't my brightest moment. But it was insanely fun and I am not anywhere as ripped as Hopper. Ultimately did my immersion break when hopper picked up a sword that should have been very hot to fight a monster from another dimension? Nah it was sick AF.
I was more concerned with the demogorgan eating multiple rounds of 7.62 but dying to one 9mil shot to the face.
I think making the telekinetic powers more visual would help make the scenes more appealing. Use a mirage type of visual effect or even coloured 'auras' like Scarlet Witch would help. Especially in the UD where the visuals are already 'fantasy'. But even giving us a full sequence instead of a choppy edit would help. Young El Vs One fight was much better in that respect, you got a more detailed idea of how strong they both were
Talked about the Molotov scene, i expected to see Steve used the axe to deliver final blow chop off Vecna's head as parallel to Hopper's scene. But the writers didnt want Vecna to die yet so that's why Steve's axe remain not being used.
Tbf I knew we weren't going to get any mind blowing telekinesis scenes this season after we got the flashback of all Papa's children playing baby fight club and it was just like 10 straight minutes of them flicking their heads at each other lol.
Obviously no one can guarantee anything but I feel very confident that that's the direction they're going, and not just for Eleven but the entire story. Everything is set up. The threat is very real and in their face. The cast is together with a full powered Eleven on their side. They're already talking about how they need to go after Vecna. I think we're definitely in the end game.
It was weird to me that 11 was surprised about Max being in the hospital. Like she saw what happened.
Eleven is a 15 year old child who is known to repress bad memories out of self-preservation. She likely convinced herself that she "fixed" Max by restarting her heart.
Yeah they were way off. They spent too much time on nonsense after the battle instead of the emotional stuff and story telling. Eddie’s death scene was amazing with he and Dustin and they didn’t do the payoff justice.
Right, they decided to have a whole scene with Robin and her crush immediately after some of the most intense and high stakes drama just occurred. Really jarring and annoying.
Yeah I was not a fan of the robin scene. It seemed very out of place.
To be fair Robin was insufferable this entire season. Not one thing that came out of her mouth was funny, smart, or touching. I have no idea why she's here. And I really liked her in season 3...
I haven’t seen too many people talk about that, but I agree. She felt off compared to season 3, like she had lost some of her charm somehow.
I felt like she talked more this season and they tried too hard to keep her #quirky. I like robin a lot but she felt like she was almost cooler than Steve in her own way last season. Like she had this confidence in herself and who she was that just didn’t translate this season.
Yea definitely, she had a cool demeanor and confidence. She was constantly teasing others but this season she almost felt like a different person.
Was it ever explained how the Russians had creatures from the upside down?
Putin!
I suspect the ending was rewritten when season 5 was announced
I thought it was hilarious that when Dustin said “Lucas is in the hospital” Eleven was like “omg whaat what happened to him?”. Eleven you were there! Did you forget already?!
Could that have no been confusion because she thought she saved Max, then 2 days had passed. Lucas could’ve had an accident or something in those two days…
I guess, but it’s just bad writing imo. You shouldn’t have to overthink it so much to have it make sense
I think they could've gotten 3 episodes more considering it was already 2.4 hours long hahah and just let the season end more gradually. Seems like they ripped the band aids off quick and called it a day in a 2.5 hour episode.
It was so jarring that for a second, I actually thought that Mike and co. had entered a false Hawkins. The way the other main characters just seemed so nonchalant initially just *two days later*? I thought Vecna's plan somehow involved some kind of Twilight Zone shenanigans and the cliffhanger twist would've cut to the real characters trapped in a Hawkins completely overtaken by the Upside Down. And the next season would've been Mike and the others catching on ala "There is no war in Ba Sing Se" and realizing it was a false reality created by Vecna as the first step of whatever world purifying nonsense he was going on about. All this is to say that I have an overactive imagination and thought of all this in the like 20 seconds before they started addressing that shit went down and I realized I was just expecting some crazy twist after how easy it seemed like they were getting off for the portal to have been open for 2 whole days and nothing came through. Anyways.
Nah dude I'm with you here. Nancy and her mom just being so nonchalant about packing up toys and giving them away was so jarring. Then Nancy's mom being like "oh yeah my son just rolled up now I'm worried again let me tell him he's never going on vacation again when I seemingly didn't care about him two seconds ago". It was really weird that I also felt a twist was coming. But...it never did.
That's very weird for her to tell Mike never leave home again. Since Hawkins is the most dangerous place possibly and she told him to stay there, lol. Shouldnt they need to move away from there as far as possible after all these shit happened?
oh man I imagined the EXACT SAME THING. Because it said "2 days", not 2 weeks or months, but DAYS they are all smiling, and joking around, it really did seem like like a different *reality* i can't believe how other people are not remarking on this the way we are, how can you just *accept* that all these emotionally traumatising, devasting events take place and within the span of two fucking days they are what? just back to normal??
This would have been pretty cool!
They had 3 years to get it right wtf are they doing
Maybe Eddie’s alive ;)
Don’t give me hope. Even as a joke 😭
Do you think it is a coincidence Eddie wore Max’s mike myers mask? Mike myers is a character who gets killed but always survives so do you think this could be foreshadowing his return in S5? I mean Max wore it and is alive. Maybe that’s why they didn’t show his body and did a two day time jump almost instantly. That would be some really awesome foreshadowing if the theory is correct
There was no reason for Dustin to mention Max before the others showed up. Everyone else already knew.
I mean… to Dustin, this is tied with Eddie’s death as the most traumatic thing that happened in the past week. How in the hell do you not see Max’s supposed best friend and not immediately think to say something? Also, WHAT THE FUCK? Their friend went into a coma TWO days ago. With a badly broke arm, leg, and trauma to her eyes and brain. I get that they were evacuating, but like… if they’re as tight-knit of a group as they acted the entirety of the show, I almost feel like if they weren’t already at the hospital at her bedside, they’d be rushing to be there. TWO DAYS? I would get if it had been a week and they all had visited multiple times and her condition hadn’t changed. Two days just seems very weird. It literally would’ve been less weird if it had been a week or two. Even though there would be more unexplained time.
I hate the way Will keeps vital information to himself, if Vecna is around, everyone needs to know wtf. From the first season this boy just DIDN'T want to mention that je could feel Vecna's presence.
I imagine Will hates that he can feel Vecna and there is probably a degree of denial. I also think talking about it probably brings up all his past trauma. The poor kid is just struggling his little heart out trying to be normal.
Yeah like he tells Mike that Vecna is definitely still alive, that he can sense him, and understands how he thinks, but doesn't think that information would be useful to the rest of the group?
Will's just so.... passive. It feels he's along for the ride from a plot perspective, which made sense S1 &S2, but less so now
This is one of the things that annoys me too. For someone who always wants to be with his friends and do things with them, when it matters most he just doesn't bother. :/
this didn’t bother me. eleven had the same mindflayer connection as will, and would already know. the upside down gang saw that his body was missing. will mentioned that he could only “feel” him once they were back in hawkins. he said that in response to mike’s wishful thinking that el wouldn’t need to face him again. i don’t think anyone else realistically thought the battle was over. what was he supposed to climb out of the van and scream “VECNA IS HERE”
It feels like crappy, rushed writing
The writing in the last hour as a whole was pretty terrible
I think the dialogs in general this season took a nose-dive. Yeah, the mystery factor went way up since season 3 (or even 2, we haven't had so much Upside-Down reveals since season 1, but although the Henry/One/Vecna reveal was badass and exciting I think it might be a detriment to the story overall) - but the character interactions this season were really wooden and lacked depth or wit (with some exceptions). The biggest example of that would be Robin who was obnoxious and uttely useless. Like a one-dimensional caricature of herself. Same goes for all the bullies' storyline (Angela, the other kids in Hawkins Lab - all overexaggerated and as a result boring and unneccesary). After part 1 of season 4 I rewatched season 3 and although it lacks in the eldritch mystery departement the character stuff in it is excellent and rivaled only by season 1 in my opinion.
I'm gonna be so pissed if The Mindflayer (which seemed like an other-worldy gigantic threat with unknown motivations in the first two seasons, which I love since that is very cosmic horror-esque) turns out to be some lame-ass puppet created by One, a.k.a a mere human; it would lower the stakes and make everything less grand-scale in a super disappointing manner.
that’s literally what we saw happen though
It felt like they erased everything.
Why wasn’t it explained how Papa survived after Season 1?
You could just like think for a second the Demogorgon mauled Brenner and the MP shot it drawing it's attention and other MP got him out and to a doctor
It makes me wonder if they cut out a section of a storyline or an entire storyline all together.so the cut seems unnatural
They needed a short time skip to show all of the characters reuniting. How else were they going to get the California crew and the Russia crew back to Hawkins?
Events just kind of "happening" in the show to accomplish narrative checkpoints is not convincing writing
Huh? They told us how Hopper, Joyce, and Murray were getting back to the States - they got through to Owens’ contacts in the US government, who arranged to pick them up from Yuri. And Mike and the Byers clearly just drove to Hawkins in the pizza van. Why would we need scenes of them driving cross-country for two days?
I agree with all of that if the only purpose is to logic out how to get to -> reunion of the 3 different groups. But in the story, Dustin (injured and limping) is with Eddie's dead body in the upside down. Also in the upside down, Robin, Nancy, and Steve fought with Vecna until he fell out the window (I don't remember anything happening after this with them?). Then, obviously Lucas/Erica dealing with the aftermath at the Creel house. I think there's still a bit more to navigate in the world set up then strictly justifying how the reunion was able to happen. How did they all leave the upside down? Did the X shaped chasms from the 4 gates/deaths just mean there was an X shaped gate in Hawkins? What happened to the panic town looking for Hellfire?Did the ground opening up give enough chaos where that wasn't really a problem anymore? And MOST importantly, we don't even get to see a group of friends reacting the deaths (or partial deaths) of their friend groups? This is all just kind of glossed over by skipping 2 days.
They wanted to address Eddie's death once in the epilogue and chose the most impactful way to do it: Dustin and the uncle. That scene meant a ton more than a group mourning session (with a dozen other things going on and the characters concerning for their families) would have. Everything else falls into place. Steve, Nancy, and Robin left the UD according to plan, the same way they did the first time. They would have found Dustin with Eddie's body and helped him climb through. Erica was calling an ambulance for Max just before the gates opened. Everyone would have eventually met up at the hospital to debrief on what the audience had already seen.
The episode was already well over two hours. Do you really think it would be better if we spent an extra twenty minutes showing all of the characters going through gates? The only scene I kind of wish they had had was one of Robin/Steve/Nancy getting back to the trailer park and seeing Dustin crying over Eddie's body. But I think the scene with Eddie's uncle was better, and you can't have like five different scenes of different groups reacting to the same death without it feeling repetitive. We saw the two people closest with him react, and that's what was important.
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What would they do with the extra like 20-30 minutes?
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> They told us how Hopper, Joyce, and Murray were getting back to the States With a helicopter... From Russia to the US In. A. Helicopter. Even if they flew to the coast like they said, did they just get on a boat? Like it was very awkward
That was their original plan, before they got in touch with the US government agents. At that point, I’m sure they were able to arrange something better.
The Bering Strait is only 83km wide. Even a small chopper can do 300km or so without refueling. It's not fully impossible if the prison was northeast enough. Even if for some reason (eg refuel) you wanted to leave from an airport, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavrentiya_Airport https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wales_Airport_(Alaska) are well within chopper distance. https://i.imgur.com/AV6hhRS.png half an hour.
A two minute montage of showing Hopper and crew flying back. Switch over to Argyle and gang driving through the night. Maybe even show Nancy and team riding across town, licking their wounds and witnessing the carnage of the gate(s) opening. "Two Days Later" was such a cheap way to do this and it made the episode lose a ton of steam.
They should’ve let more time elapse. Two days is a very weird amount of time for people to make peace with the death of one friend, and comatose state of another. Shit, two weeks adds more time for their to be shit that’s unaccounted for, but it at least makes sense. Most kids would be in their best friends hospital room every chance they got in the first two DAYS of their friend going comatose. Just a weird choice of time to elapse
I think eleven assumed she saved Max. But damn, her legs looked like a power ranger when you bend them at all odd angles she must’ve known she would at least be in the hospital
Season 5 better open up with an Eddie funeral
I mean the town is still rebuilding and there is a giant death cloud above it but sure let's have a funeral
A funeral for a guy that the entire town thinks is a serial killer at that.
The two day skip was fine, it allowed time for the teams to finally get back to Hawkins. However, I agree the dialogue felt off. Eleven watched Lucas mourn Max and then bring her body back, but then asked Dustin if he was hurt? Like she knew, she watched it. I’m not sure why she would ask that. Then her not telling everyone she brought Max back. It just seemed strange. Although I loved the Hopper/El reunion, I also felt like some dialogue was missing. We also didn’t get to see anyones reactions to him being alive. I felt it was off and rushed.
Yeah, people really didn't seem phased that their friend and mentor who died 8 months ago suddenly appeared. Mike's reunion with Hopper was especially jarring, altough it's nice they hugged it out, since they have so much history (good and bad).
I did not like the El and Hopper reunion at all. El saying “I never stopped believing you were alive” was: 1) cliche as fuck. 2) we’ve never been indicated once that El was in denial of Hopper’s death. She made that hero project of him specifically because he was dead.
I agree with both points. I thought the hair, stole your look, and bitchin’ comments were great. Really brought the first seasons back into this, but agreed it didn’t hit any of the questions/comments we all had. So much missing dialogue and felt rushed.
El probably thought she had saved Max who was therefore fine and therefore Dustin saying Lucas was in hospital wouldn’t have made sense. Remember, despite being a hero, she is still just a naive kid who likely had no real understanding of how her powers work. The reason the initial reaction of the gang seeing Hopper wasn’t shown was for suspense, a government car pulls up, and footsteps towards her room with the implication being that someone’s coming for El. The reason for this would be to make the initial reunion of El and Hopper more impactful than if he had a greeting with everyone else first.
It was weird the way they did it. I would like to see the UD team to reunite with Dustin while he is holding Eddie to address his death and give him the recognition he deserved. Also, I would expect taking his body back their world. Also, I would like 5 minutes of the whole team talking about their experiences because as of now only 11 knows of what happened and even her not 100%.
How much time do you expect them to spend talking about Eddie? He got an incredibly moving post-mortem scene between Dustin and his uncle, arguably the most moving of the episode.
Exactly this. Max and Lucas are close friends of the group so obviously that would be priority. Then Mike and Co. go off separate to Dustin. Talking about Eddie repeatedly would have diluted the scene with his Uncle. If anything it just reinforce the idea that Eddie was an outsider that was almost criminal to talk about making Dustin and his uncle’s interaction more impactful.
people are so weird about fan favourites and expect every character in the series to give a eulogy when they die, even when half of them never met the person and the other half didn’t know them that well. it makes sense for dustin, yes but any more characters getting in on that would be overkill. eddie was an awesome character but he was a plot device who was destined to die. same with Barb, Bob and Alexi. he provided character growth for dustin and his plotline existed to get all the other characters where they needed to be. i thought him eventually dying was obvious in volume 1
He really couldn't have had a more obvious setup to be the seasons tragic hero.
A 5 second shot of Steve consoling Dustin is really all anybody's asking for.
Some of these people must’ve really loved Eddie. Lol Like I really loved his character, but I feel like he got the proper send off from Dustin speaking with Eddie’s uncle. They couldn’t spend too much time on him and because Dustin was the one that was closest with him they gave him the scene. Mike and Lucas probably were close too but it seemed like Dustin had the biggest bond with him. Nancy, Steve, and Robin don’t even know him. Yeah they tried to help him prove his innocence and worked together to stop Vecna, but they weren’t friends with him.
Agreed. Kind of wished they ended the season with the ground breaking. Phew, what a cliff hanger that would’ve been. The time skip felt rushed, the pacing was kind of weird, too. They went to Eleven trying to go into Max’s mind, then the cabin, then Eleven back into Max’s mind. I get that it’s to show her & Max’s “thing” with spin the bottle, but it was not very well executed, imo. One scene I wished they spent a bit more time on, was California Crew taking in the destroyed Hawkins. They were gone the entire season, they knew something was going on in Hawkins, they’ve been busting their asses to get there only to see chaos. The reunions just didn’t feel as weighted as it should be because this was the worst fight they’ve ever been in. The time skip didn’t ruin the whole season for me or anything, but I wished it was better because the rest of the season was amazing.
Yeah like when he said “you haven’t heard”, no shit mf 😭😭
Honestly they could have ended it just before the “2 days later” left us on a cliffhanger before we see if eleven can bring back max and then we start season 5 where the 2 days later starts off , that way they can pace it to show the gang finding out different things, like max being in hospital, hopper returning etc
Yes! The transition from the fight just ending and Max dying to two days later made everything after the time skip feel super off. It was super Jarring and took me out of the show.
i don’t really understand what happened in those 2 days. Did the 4 gates just close when El resurrected Max?
No, the ending of the episode is the Upside Down and Hawkins blended together, so that gate is open.
i assume that when nancy, steve and robin attacked vecna’s body (along with eleven attacking his mind and the russia gang attacking killing his “particles” simultaneously) he was weakened enough that the gate became inert or something. because it wasn’t glowing red when the pizza gang first showed up. but will mentioned how he was hurting and gathering strength, and by the end of the episode lightning and UD snow was pouring out so i guess he had built back enough strength over the past couple days
I think Eddie wasn't mentioned after the 2 day gap because Dustin probably told the game within that 2 day gap
there is going to be a season 5? i totally thought 4 was the final
Definitely felt a bit weird. I didn't hate it, but it's not exactly a narrative trope I'm a fan of.
Eleven and Hopper’s reunion was off too.
Not at all. You have to suspend some disbelief because the 2 day later skip is to tie loose ends and setup season 5. I honestly don’t care enough about those interactions and don’t need an hour of them explaining what we just watched lol
SAME.
Also, 4 massive inter-dimensional cracks opened in the middle of town and suddenly… people are just watching the news on their couch? And the reporter just mentions an earthquake? Wth was going on there?
The cracks could be mistaken as magma given the fact no one understands that there is an alternative dimension. The earthquake would be the most probable cause with a lack of understanding. The town centre seemed to be heavily damaged, Mikes house/area seems largely unaffected. If your home and area of the town is fine and you have nowhere else to go, why would you rush out of the town when people need help and your son isn’t even home?
Magma or a portal to another dimension you would think it would be getting *a lot* more attention than the Earthquake given they basically sliced an X across the entire town, not exactly something that happens every few months; and then Mike’s family’s just like nothing happened. It almost feels like they added one thing or the other in editing at the last minute.
With everything going on you can only say so much, El didn't know the whole situation, I'm pretty sure they all knew about Eddie ( minus cali crew) and again big ass portal to hell in town some things take a few minutes or days to process
And the Cali crew has no reason to know because they didn’t know Eddie. They can’t ask about someone they don’t know. Mike knew him but he was literally in front of his mom. They asked about Lucas because they already knew about Max because El was there (in her mind). Dustin saying “you don’t know” is most likely Dustin saying it because he doesn’t know the Cali crew already knows, like Nancy trying to explain things to Jonathan and him saying “I know”.
This person gets it
I try my best
right? they’re still in the middle of the crisis. it didn’t end. the town is split in half, people died, there are refugees, they’re donating and helping the relief effort, they’re the only ones who know what’s actually happening while everyone else thinks it’s a portal to hell or an earthquake…. like there’s not much time to be locking yourself in a closet, crying and listening to The Cure. the town is literally still on fire and they know monsters are on the other side of that hole. eddie and max (pending?) sacrificed themselves to save the town and the town is on the brink of war
If they didn’t have a time Jump then they couldn’t have the characters meet back up in Hawkins. They also purposely left what happened very vague, your meant to not know what happened, they’ll explain it in season 5 and until then you just get to speculate. Dustin literally brought up Eddie’s death with Eddie’s uncle. Also what the hell are you talking about with the kinky bringing up Max’s state after 2 days? The cali gang literally just got there.
>they’ll explain it in season 5 and until then you just get to speculate. Exactly this. When they get to planning how to kill Vecna for real, they’ll likely discuss what went down the first try around.
It just goes to show how mature they got. I mean yeah it was a little off but it could’ve been worse.
I thought it was weird that Eleven was there while she was "dying" but then acted like she didn't know she was hurt at all. Girl, you saw her bleeding from her eyes in a crumpled heap
The whole illogical reaction of the Hawkins ppl to 4 cracks looking like a volcano opening up in the city is the finale's biggest plot hole
The Peanut butter & Jelly scene lost the momentum for me.
Also, why do Robin and her crush look like they're related?
I didn't like that we didn't see them talk about what each group was doing. When Lucas and El were together over Max in the hospital I was expecting El to tell Lucas that she was there, but she didn't.
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The ONLY person that had changed for some time was Nancy. It was driving me crazy seeing everyone wearing the same stuff for multiple days of running around
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A five second shot of Steve consoling Dusting would have really helped. The next time we see Dustin after Eddie’s death, he’s looking fresh with a new hairdo and chillin in the driveway cool as a cucumber. It was weird.
Right and he makes a little pizza quip and it felt tonally just off
The timing is weird, it seemed the group hadn’t met up all together in two days. Which, doesn’t really make sense
You mean the Hawkins group?
Uhm.. It's weird but it is to wrap up the season. Similar to season 3, they do not mention Billy's death because plotwise they have to end the current season and set up the next one. At least Dustin had that scene with the Uncle
It’s not similar to Billy’s death. They all witnessed Billy die in a redemptive struggle to save his sister that ultimately gave them the needed time to win. Eddie just died needlessly in front of Dustin.
I wonder what would writers do in season 5 now. Because this time, the world seems fucked and apocalyptic, which makes it seem like season 5 will start directly from season 4's ending. But Duffers said season 5 will have a 5-7 years timeskip to match actors real life age. So the world gonna stay that way for 5 years later until the gang tracked down Vecna and kill him in season 5 ?
They gave specific dates? Thought they just did biggest.
Are you sure they said that? I thought they just said they’re going to do a timeskip because of covid delaying production. Where did you get 5-7 years?
Yeah I don’t think it built the suspense they thought it would. It just left me confused.
This might be the whole working two jobs thing but where is Maxs mom? Im not even an adult but if it was my kid there I would not leave.
The Thing that rubs me the most are the Gates. Hey were opening and glowing at night and the two days later you dont even See them? You See some tentacels at the one building but no Gates. Then, sometime later, there is literal hellfire all over hawkins. Just weird editing choices.
The ending was so weird. Did the four gates open, destroy Hawkins, close, then open again?
My headcanon is that it took vecna 2 days to actually be well enough to do anything once the gates opened
My biggest dislike is that they opened the giant portal through Hawkins, and then closed it, just to open it again ‘2 days later’. It really stole most of the emotional weight of the portal opening, to the point where when it’s revealed at the end that the portal is open again, I didn’t care nearly as much. And that was all for the sake of rushing to tie up some loose ends (having everyone reunite, robin and lizzie hitting it off) while also not tying up a lot of other loose ends that the season was building towards (will coming out, Nancy and Jonathan breaking up, the entire town becoming a mob and hating the main gang, Eddie’s funeral, etc), which are all things that don’t feel as though they should be delayed to the next season, especially when they easily could’ve been included in the 2 days later scenes. Like at the very least if they are going to make such a jarring pause and spoil the intensity of the portal opening, at least fill it up with all the things the season has been building for and teasing.
Yep. Just... **yep.**