Introduction

Let me begin this review with a big notification first. Warning, this review is going to contain spoilers for Volume 1, Volume 2, and Volume 3 (the finale) of Stranger Things Season 5. As much as I try to avoid spoilers in my reviews, to really review this show I need to discuss various bigger scenes/moments, as they really are what drives this show toward its final end results. So come back to this review after you’ve watched the entire final season or keep reading at your own discretion. That being said, let’s enter the strangest world we know one last time for some laughs, cries, and smiles. Here is my review of the final season—basically the last four episodes—that is Stranger Things Season 5!

Story

Volume 2—the three episodes that released on Christmas Day—returns our party from Hawkins after their failed attempt at stopping Vecna (Henry) from taking the children like he did with Holly. Despite their egos being knocked down, you know the party, and you already realize that this wouldn’t be where they give up. Will has powers now—yay—meaning they have a new means of fighting Henry, locating Holly, and stopping whatever Henry has planned.

I’ll be honest, episodes 5, 6, and 7—Shock Jock, Escape from Camazotz, and The Bridge—were the weaker episodes of Season 5, despite them also having bigger moments. Max finally finding a means to return to her body—thanks again to Lucas, but even bigger thanks to Mrs. Wheeler—or the big revelation of what the Upside Down and Vecna’s new lair really are in Shock Jock (episode 5). All these events help the story move to the grand finale and help every character slowly reunite and rekindle their friendships and relationships, but many moments feel bogged down with annoying issues.

Let’s talk about the two bigger events in Volume 2 and why I feel they are necessary but ill-timed. We can’t ignore Will finally coming out and revealing his feelings in The Bridge (episode 7), but as impactful as this scene felt, it equally feels thrown in at a bad time. We have sequences later in episode 8 (The Rightside Up, AKA the finale) where Will had ample time to reveal he was gay and it would have been more wholesome story-wise, but no—he comes out during the chaos of everyone scrambling to enter the Upside Down one last time. Again, good on Will for finally breaking through as a character and saying what his heart felt, but timing…

Another moment lost to me in silliness is yet again Max with Holly stopping to discuss something when the exit to their problems was right in front of them. See, Holly, I can understand needing some updates on what would happen when she escaped—this happens in episode 6—but Max has missed this opportunity before and yet again misses it due to Vecna appearing and nearly stopping them. If Will hadn’t risked his life to enter Henry’s mind, Max and Holly would be possibly stuck in his mental world forever or worse.

If I had to score Volume 2 by itself, it would be a 6/10. Yes, it had some drama and some cool fan-heavy moments, but at the cost of odd pacing and even stranger story plotlines being almost rushed in before the finale. Luckily, episodes 5–7 weren’t the end of the series. Volume 3 is the single episode (8) that acts as the finale, and this is where we see the final battle and the epilogue to Stranger Things.

Volume 3, episode 8 of Season 5—that’s a mouthful, I know—is where Stranger Things ends with a gigantic final fight involving almost everyone in some capacity. Let’s begin with the battle and split that into the good and the bad.

The good: the final battle was almost like a true RPG experience. One party—Nancy, Mike, Lucas, Steve, Jonathan, Joyce, Dustin, and Robin—enter The Abyss (Henry/Vecna’s true world) and battle against the Mind Flayer. This thing was akin to a gigantic kaiju, and I loved it, even if it seemed a bit lacking in the size department compared to past season interpretations. Meanwhile, Eleven, Murray, Kali, and Hopper go inside the Upside Down to enter Henry’s mind via the Tank that allows Eleven to use her powers on another level. We lose Kali to some military ambush—almost lose Eleven due to Hopper being manipulated by Henry—but Eleven finds a means to join her friends in The Abyss and enter the Mind Flayer. Eleven has a psychic showdown with Vecna while the others fight the Mind Flayer—truly epic as a fan of RPGs. Obviously, they win, and Joyce gets to deal the final blow, hacking Vecna’s head literally off with her axe. Beautiful.

The bad: if you try to analyze any of this story with a semblance of thought, you will realize absurdly fast that there are so many goofy elements here. The fact Eleven basically amplified her powers outside the tank for the final battle in some rather odd ways—the jump into The Abyss and the Mind Flayer—makes almost no sense. Likewise, how the party even fights the Mind Flayer—they run to the cliffs, which are gigantic, and somehow get up them in literal seconds—ruins any logic this final battle goes for. Yes, as a fan I was okay with all of this. As a reviewer, I was mystified and laughing.

With the final battle over, the epilogue begins after—yeah—Eleven dies, sacrificing herself to ensure the party is never hunted again. (She did share a nice moment with Mike, though.) We then skip ahead another 18 months. The kids graduate, Hopper somehow gets his job back and more, and Robin, Jonathan, Nancy, and Steve meet and discuss their adult lives taking off and how that ruins their bond a bit—very relatable. The original party—with Max—have a final D&D session, and Mike discusses how Eleven may have survived in his theory of how Kali used her illusion abilities to hide her death. Realistically, we all know the truth, but it was a nice way of preventing Mike from wallowing in depression and allowing a possible return for our psychic superstar.

The epilogue is without a doubt the best part of Stranger Things Season 5, as it’s a memory trip us fans needed and a reminder of how this odd story still has some strange relevancy in our own lives. When our four young adults talked about meeting once a month to have a group day together, I thought of my friends in life and how that doesn’t pan out after the first few attempts, sadly. The scene in the basement involving the party putting their D&D books away and watching a new group—Holly and her friends—playing shows a new team starting, just like how life is.

The epilogue leaves a lot of unanswered questions—what happened to the military and why are none of them in trouble for killing military officers and their numerous broken laws—but with recent announcements that spin-off material will answer these questions, I sighed and just enjoyed the finale.

Stranger Things Season 5 as a whole is filled with easy things to nitpick and examine with a magnifying lens, but I enjoyed it. As a fan of Stranger Things since its creation back in 2016, this was the ending I had hoped for, more or less. I think that’s where the story for most will either work or not. Were you invested in this series since day one or did you get into it late? Those who really enjoyed this series will have very little to hate about Season 5, but newer fans—or those who love to tear down every series to its minor detail—will no doubt find a haven of issues to be found in this grand finale.

Acting and Cast

One of the few pieces of Stranger Things Season 5 that I think is almost perfect is the acting and cast. I won’t repeat the stuff we know like Holly being recast, but we have to hand it to Nell Fisher for doing a great job, as Holly is a prominent figure in the fifth season.

That aside, the entire cast—Finn Wolfhard (Mike), Millie Bobby Brown (Eleven), Gaten Matarazzo (Dustin), Caleb McLaughlin (Lucas), Noah Schnapp (Will), Winona Ryder (Joyce), David Harbour (Hopper), Joe Keery (Steve), Priah Ferguson (Ericka), Natalia Dyer (Nancy), Charlie Heaton (Jonathan Byers), and Jamie Campbell Bower (Vecna/Henry)—needs to be given their bow and round of applause. These actors have aged with us viewers and in many ways became their Stranger Things personas. I loved seeing the recap moments and older scenes—mostly played as Vecna’s head being lopped off—just reminding me these people were 10 years younger when this show started and still act even better now than they did before. Stranger Things Season 5 had some characters I know I failed to mention, but everyone here poured their souls into their roles and it came across.

Cinematography and Direction

The Duffer Brothers and Shawn Levy really knew where they wanted to go with this final season despite all the problems behind the scenes they were running into. Direction-wise, Stranger Things Season 5 wasn’t missing a beat in the sense it had a purpose and goal: to finish the show. Along the way, some issues arose, and we did have moments where I felt the story could have explained a bit more—what happened to all the enemies in the Upside Down, where did they go—but again, maybe the spin-off entries can do a good job of filling in those missing cracks.

Cinematography, however, was a mixed bag here. The Mind Flayer could have looked immensely better, and likewise I feel some of the backdrops just didn’t hit as hard as they could have. Still, the camera work and capturing every heart-filled moment or tense scene was great, and I’m sure on the big screen—where people could have watched the final episode since it clocked in at two hours—it might have made it look even better.

Conclusion

Stranger Things Season 5 felt like a good way to wrap up the series fully, even if it had moments that either missed the mark or left some rather big plot holes. In my opinion, even with those issues, the final season did what it needed to do, and as a fan, I was left feeling content. Like Mike, I walked onward to my unknown future and smiled, reminiscing about what went down—the good and the bad of it.

I’m sure there are many—many—who feel otherwise, which is fine. Comment below to talk to us and let us know if you agree or disagree with the review. Now let’s see if The Duffer Brothers have anything more in store for us.

—Aaron