After nearly ten years and five seasons, pop culture phenomenon Stranger Things has come to an end. It’s a bittersweet conclusion to one of the few shows in the streaming era that almost everyone watched together. While many (including myself) found the Stranger Things finale both heartwarming and satisfying, there’s a vocal contingent proclaiming it as the worst ending since Game of Thrones.
Ironically, the boo birds likening the Stranger Things finale to Game of Thrones share more in common with Thrones scribe George R.R. Martin himself. Hell, Martin doesn’t just love to kill his own characters! This is the same guy who thought that J.R.R. Tolkien should have had Gandalf stay dead in the Lord of the Rings saga.
Note: Light spoilers ahead, for those who have not yet watched the last episode.
Apparently, not enough main characters died in the Stranger Things finale for the liking of some. A common complaint was that it felt “unrealistic” for characters to survive when faced with insurmountable odds like a wormhole, mind flayers, interdimensional creatures, and a massive military-led program working against our heroes.
It feels a little ridiculous to claim that the ending is “unrealistic” when you’re dealing with a premise that’s pretty unrealistic itself.
But that’s the allure of shows like Stranger Things. It’s a sci-fi/horror story with friends, family, and found family at its beating heart, set in the 1980s in the Midwestern town of Hawkins, Indiana. Like most modern fantasy series, it throws everyday people into extraordinary situations.
To me, it’s easier to wrap my head around interdimensional portals and screeching monsters running around a food court than it is the current trend of dismissing anything that has a (mostly) happy ending. It often feels like the constant stream of infotainment, on-demand social media, and inflammatory talking heads in a 24-7 news cycle has created an insatiable appetite for doom and gloom. It’s become the norm for movies and TV shows to peddle a narrative that “resistance is futile and the world is bleak… Deal with it.”
That’s not to say that happy endings are a guarantee in real life or that we should bury our heads in the sand to shield ourselves from ugly truths. Sometimes you need a break to think up solutions instead of just revving on problems.
In turn, the best stories simultaneously offer an escape hatch from reality and a source of inspiration.
You forget about the problems of the day. You get attached to characters. You cheer for them. And sometimes you see a bit of people you know in them.
If anything, having had to come to grips with the mixed bag of happy and sad in Supernatural’s final episode, I was relieved to see a happy ending for most of the Stranger Things characters that I watched grow up over the course of a decade.
“Bleaker” Doesn’t Mean “Better”
Most modern storytelling seems designed to beat viewers into submission, sending a subliminal message that we shouldn’t even bother to try. We’re conditioned to believe that a bleak ending is a more satisfying one because it mirrors how life works.
So, what’s behind this craving for grim endings? It’s often said that “art imitates life.” However, in a period where we’re bombarded with unsettling stories of crime and violence, it’s easy to lose sight that the news is supposed to report events that are unusual at best or sensationalistic at worst. In the field of mass communication, this is dubbed “gatekeeping theory.”
Gatekeeping is the process of selecting, and then filtering, items of media that can be consumed within the time or space that an individual happens to have… These gatekeeping decisions are made every day to sort out the relevant items that audiences will see. Every day the news channel receives various news items from all over the world. The channel has its own set of ethics, policies, and biases through which the editor decides the news items that will be published, aired, or killed.
For instance, it’s more common to see someone holding the door open for a person coming out of a 7-11 than it is to see an individual assaulted with hot coffee to the face. However, the hot coffee splasher might make for a more newsworthy story because it’s not an everyday occurrence. When people are fed a steady diet of these stories — even if they’re not typical — they buy into the fear of some random lunatic running around, dousing people with a half-caf hazelnut latte with extra Splenda.
But think about it: What would the world be like if we had more stories about people doing things as simple-but-day-making as opening the door for a fellow patron or asking the cashier if they could pay for someone else’s order? (Okay, the latter might not happen in this economy, but it’s a nice thought.) Could a news feed packed with those stories cause a shift that prompts us to tap into our better natures instead of pulling back in fear and isolation?
Connecting Stranger Things, Lord of the Rings, and The Nothing
While it wasn’t a reboot, nostalgia was a guiding light for Stranger Things. Well-chosen songs from the era were almost as much of a character as the characters themselves. (Here’s looking at you, “Running Up That Hill” by Kate Bush and Metallica’s “Master of Puppets.”) The costuming and (often bad) hair design gave the show a throwback feel. Even ’80s mall culture got its due in Season 3 as the setting for an epic showdown between the Hawkins kids and The Big Bad after hours.
Season 3 also referenced the classic ’80s fantasy flick, The Neverending Story, with one of the young protagonists and his long-distance girlfriend singing the film’s theme song to each other.
It’s easy to dismiss these references as dated. Yet, much like The Neverending Story, our world is facing down something like The Nothing that rolls in with waves of despair and a loss of imagination. That drive to imagine and think outside the bounds of possiblity can keep you moving forward, even when it feels like all hope is lost.
That’s the same message tucked inside Lord of the Rings. Written by J.R.R. Tolkien after returning home from the horrors of World War I, LOTR became a blueprint for fantasy novels, teaching us that even the smallest of us can make a big difference.
It’s no surprise that Stranger Things’ ending took a page out of Tolkien’s playbook, with minimal main character deaths and showing that evil can be defeated when people work together and don’t give up. That sentiment showed up in the series’ final moments during Dustin’s valedictorian speech:
I thought about the past six years and realized that, even though there was a lot of bad, there was so much good, too. There’s this game I like to play called Dungeons & Dragons. And in this game, there are two types of chaos classes. Chaotic Good and Chaotic Bad.
Now, bad chaos brings anarchy, destruction, war. But good chaos can bring innovation, change. And this school, frankly, it needed to change. Because we were so divided into the jocks, the nerds, the freaks. And in the chaos, all those walls broke down and I made new friends. Friends who were never supposed to be my friends. This wasn’t just me. It happened to so many others.
When you know people who are different from you, you begin to learn more about yourself. You change. You grow…. But I am worried. Because now that the chaos is over, Principal Higgins and every square like him is going to do their damnedest to put everything back in order. And I don’t want order…Screw the system. Screw conformity.
Stories Bring Us Together
Today, it’s becoming harder to find common ground with others. Like any technology, the internet and social media have the power to bring people together, but also divide us further. And in the wake of AI and deepfake technology, it’s becoming harder to distinguish truth from fiction.
With more people having cut the cord on cable TV and hopscotching around an endless parade of streaming services now, Stranger Things was one of the last cultural touchstones that had broad appeal and storytelling that created a modern mythology. Dating back to ancient times, stories of heroes and legends created a unified set of cultural reference points and gave people something to aspire to. Having shared stories didn’t remove individuality. Rather, they offered a common starting point to talk to your neighbor and forge a bond with someone who might seem a little different.
Right now, there’s a greater need than ever for stories that tell us that the good guys can win, even when things look dire.
Sure, Stranger Things struck some flat notes here and there. But the ending was far from disappointing. It’s comforting to see that, even when bad things happen, life goes on and there are still good times ahead if you just hang in and take care of each other.
In its final episode, Stranger Things stayed true to the core message it sent from its very first season: The world can be dangerous, but when people of all ages and backgrounds work together and apply their unique skills, they can beat back the darkness through the powers of determination, imagination, loyalty, and friendship.
That’s the reality I choose to imagine. And if that feels unrealistic or hokey, in the words of Stranger Things character Derek Turnbow, “Suck my fat one!”
Photo: David Gomes