The Netflix Original series Stranger Things is, and I don’t use this term lightly, a masterpiece. It combines Stephen King spookiness and supernatural horror with Spielberg heart and character development, without ever devolving into gratuitous gore or maudlin sentimentality. All wrapped in an accurate 80s nostalgia, with a synth soundtrack reminiscent of John Carpenter and extremely period accurate and meaningful era appropriate pop/rock songs.

The show was able to lean into its nostalgia with casting 80s icons who turned around and gave career high performances, not smug stunt casting winks. The child actors hired 10 years ago turned out to be real talents. The writing and direction is all top notch and excellent. And obviously the show has the advantage of modern effects that real 80s shows only dreamed of.

In between the fantasy it deals with real issues, always in a raw and emotional way. The show has been praised for it’s sensitive and accurate portrayal of various types of neurodivergence, isolation, coming out, and more. Despite the supernatural nature of the show, evil is exposed to not conveniently be an abstract, otherworldly terror, but in choices that humans make—just as heroism is not accessible only by a rarified few, but by anyone, no matter how “mundane” they may seem.

Placing it in the 80s feels less like nostalgia, and more like a historical record (especially for those of us who really were kids in the 80s). It captures not only the era and the “culture” but so many of the issues we had. It creates characters we knew—or were.

The final episode of the entire season dropped on December 31st, 2025. It is never easy for a series that beloved to end in a way that pleases everyone but this one really stuck the landing. It was a tear jerker as well as action packed and while it wasn’t flawless it was an excellent and earned finale.

Overall the show treats its audience as intelligent and with care. It knows the formula and when to break it. Not every episode was a classic, some seasons were better than others, but it was always gripping, had real stakes for characters, and was eminently watchable. As a work of televised fiction, Stranger Things will go down as a popular, high quality example of genre fiction. But as an event, a moment, as a love letter to the freaks and misfits and nerds and gamers of a certain mindset and a certain era, it reminds us that we are worthy, that we can find our place, that as David Bowie sings, we can be heroes.