[8.5/10] This is both the saddest and most epic finale that Stranger Things has offered us so far. It is epic because there is more going on, with more character, with more literal fireworks, than in any prior season. It is sad not just because Hopper dies (maybe? probably?) but because this feels like the closing of a chapter, with half the cast having to say goodbye to the other half as folks move away.
Who knows how much any of this will stick. I don’t imagine there’s a show without Eleven, the Byerses, or the rest of the Hawkins gang next year. I suspect any divide will be matched with a Thanksgiving and/or Xmas reunion. What’s more, we never saw Hopper’s body, and he could very easily be “the American” mentioned in the post-credit scene from a Russian gulag.
But taking “The Battle of Starcourt” at face value, it works for what we get here. There’s enough spectacle and tension to let the finale hum and sizzle, and there’s enough quieter or more emotional moments to give it ballast. But let’s focus on the most important development here first.
Dustin and his Salt Lake City girlfriend, Susie, singing the theme song to The NeverEnding Story to one another via ham radio! I feel like this is going to be controversial. It’s a little weird. It’s a little Ready Player One in just directly referencing a piece of 1980s pop culture ephemera. And it comes right in the middle of the raging climax. But that’s what I love about it. It’s the part of this episode that, ironically, feels the most distinctive and unique, a little blot of joy and goofiness amid the otherwise world-threatening stakes of the whole thing. I gotta imagine it’s an acquired taste, but god bless ‘em, I acquired it.
Those stakes involve the giant Mindflayer monster going after Eleven at the mall, while the rest of the team works to either protect her or work toward blowing up the Russian portal generator. The most interesting wrinkle to all of this is the Eleven is rendered powerless by the Mindflayer slug left in her leg. (Not for nothing, the extraction scene was gross and harrowing, in a good way.) The show’s big solution the past couple of years has been to fight the supernatural with more supernatural using Eleven’s abilities. It’s a good move, but you can only go back to that well so many times, and this shows our heroes having to find more creative solutions to the problem.
In truth, it becomes a little too much in places. The show does its best to keep it clear who’s doing what and where through all of this, but there’s a lot of moving pieces and a number of team members jumping between different squads or moving through different locales. Even if everyone’s exact whereabouts or goals aren’t clear at every single moment, the general thrust of the threat and vibe of any given scene is communicated well enough, and the climax of the story here can work on atmosphere and energy alone.
Part of that is just the visuals. Again, I’m impressed with the step up in special effects we’ve seen this year. The giant Mindflayer monster bursting through the mall and terrorizing our heroes within it makes for some striking, Jurassic Park-esque imagery. The same goes for it chasing Jonathan and the kids down the road (even if it reaching, leaving, and returning to the mall feels a little weird). Most of all, Chekov’s fireworks make an appearance at the end, not only providing a means for the good guys to hold off the beast until the portal can be closed and its mental link can be severed, but creating the cool imagery of an indoor fireworks display, earning the show its Fourth of July bona fides.
Hell, they even wring some pathos out of Billy, and I hated Billy! It’s rushed, but I like Eleven breaking him free of the Mindflayer’s hold by connecting to him through his pain and his good memories, finding that innocent little boy and bringing him back to the surface. He’s terrifying as hell until that moment. He’s quite heroic when he defends her from the monster. And he’s sad and sympathetic when he apologizes to Max, presumably for the abuse he perpetuated, dying a better man than he ever was in life.
Were that the same could be said for Hopper. The weird thing about this episode is that I mourn Eleven’s loss of her father more than I mourn Hopper himself. Part of that may be the fact that I’m somewhat skeptical he’s truly gone. But a large part of it is that he dies in a really cheesy way. Him turning into Rambo and going out with a generator-adjacent fight with Russian Terminator is just so cornball, that it’s hard to take the “You have to kill me to save the kids” routine with Joyce seriously.
There’s some emotional impact when he looks at Joyce and nods with a resigned smile (albeit one that’s mitigated by some awkward compositing/green screen effects). But the Hopper we’ve seen this season has been so much more cartoony and over the top than the hardscrabble guy we first met in the show.
And yet, ironically, for a moment he lives. Far from the cliché “We’ll have that date someday” conversation Hopper has with Joyce, the letter that she finds and gives to his daughter is moving. It shouldn’t be. It’s the oldest TV trick in the book -- voiceover from a dead character played over a montage of emotional moments.
But it does, because the story of Hopper having fallen into a cave of emotional deadening after the death of his first daughter, having those feelings reawakened by Eleven’s arrival and the joyful time they’ve shared together, and his paean to the value of hurt in letting you know you’re still alive and not numb, is moving. The story of a man still laboring under an unfathomable loss who finds a way to heal through adopting and raising a young woman with unfathomable family issues of her own was always far more compelling than “Discount Magnum P.I. fights Russian action movie goons.” I’m glad Stranger Things remembered that in the end.
Still, half the credit owes to Millie Bobby Brown for another stellar performance beyond her years. She sells the fear of her near-death experience at the hands of the monster, the desperate relief when it’s over, the painful realization of why Hopper isn’t there to greet her like Joyce is for Will, the love she has for Mike, and the grief she’s grappling with as she both says goodbye to both her father and the community that lifted her up at once. Most of this is nonverbal, and Brown reacts to all of these events in such a visceral, believable way that it pierced me when I wasn’t expecting it. Otherwise, “The Battle of Starcourt” offers texture and tidbits that are good to great. A greater role for Murray (with his reactions to the code name “Bald Eagle”) was a boon to the finale like it was for the whole season. Mayor Kline going down is a nice coda to his story. Nancy and Jonathan having to say goodbye didn’t do much for me, but I guess they had to. Will donating his D&D game to Erica is a nice grace note for his “growing up” story this year and Erica’s induction into nerdom. Steve having found a true friend in Robin (and a potential job at the video store) is a lovely beat to go out on for him. Max and Lucas poking fun at Dustin’s song is delightful. Paul Reiser’s return at the last minute is just enough to pay that off. And Dustin’s welcome back to the group and reunion of the original party makes for a very nice moment as well.
The truth is that at an hour and fifteen minutes, with scads of storylines and fights and characters and goodbyes, “The Battle of Starcourt” feels like a lot in places. In an ideal world, they might have found a way to split this into two episodes, or spaced things out differently to begin with.
The scope and reach of this thing is one of its merits, though. This is as big as Stranger Things has ever gone. You wouldn’t want that from the show every season, otherwise it spins out of control. But to have such a massive confrontation, paired with such a heartfelt set of farewells, makes for one of the show’s major highpoints, dripping with breadth and ambition, and pushing the right buttons when it needs to, in so many ways.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2021-01-13T08:12:53Z
[8.5/10] This is both the saddest and most epic finale that Stranger Things has offered us so far. It is epic because there is more going on, with more character, with more literal fireworks, than in any prior season. It is sad not just because Hopper dies (maybe? probably?) but because this feels like the closing of a chapter, with half the cast having to say goodbye to the other half as folks move away.
Who knows how much any of this will stick. I don’t imagine there’s a show without Eleven, the Byerses, or the rest of the Hawkins gang next year. I suspect any divide will be matched with a Thanksgiving and/or Xmas reunion. What’s more, we never saw Hopper’s body, and he could very easily be “the American” mentioned in the post-credit scene from a Russian gulag.
But taking “The Battle of Starcourt” at face value, it works for what we get here. There’s enough spectacle and tension to let the finale hum and sizzle, and there’s enough quieter or more emotional moments to give it ballast. But let’s focus on the most important development here first.
Dustin and his Salt Lake City girlfriend, Susie, singing the theme song to The NeverEnding Story to one another via ham radio! I feel like this is going to be controversial. It’s a little weird. It’s a little Ready Player One in just directly referencing a piece of 1980s pop culture ephemera. And it comes right in the middle of the raging climax. But that’s what I love about it. It’s the part of this episode that, ironically, feels the most distinctive and unique, a little blot of joy and goofiness amid the otherwise world-threatening stakes of the whole thing. I gotta imagine it’s an acquired taste, but god bless ‘em, I acquired it.
Those stakes involve the giant Mindflayer monster going after Eleven at the mall, while the rest of the team works to either protect her or work toward blowing up the Russian portal generator. The most interesting wrinkle to all of this is the Eleven is rendered powerless by the Mindflayer slug left in her leg. (Not for nothing, the extraction scene was gross and harrowing, in a good way.) The show’s big solution the past couple of years has been to fight the supernatural with more supernatural using Eleven’s abilities. It’s a good move, but you can only go back to that well so many times, and this shows our heroes having to find more creative solutions to the problem.
In truth, it becomes a little too much in places. The show does its best to keep it clear who’s doing what and where through all of this, but there’s a lot of moving pieces and a number of team members jumping between different squads or moving through different locales. Even if everyone’s exact whereabouts or goals aren’t clear at every single moment, the general thrust of the threat and vibe of any given scene is communicated well enough, and the climax of the story here can work on atmosphere and energy alone.
Part of that is just the visuals. Again, I’m impressed with the step up in special effects we’ve seen this year. The giant Mindflayer monster bursting through the mall and terrorizing our heroes within it makes for some striking, Jurassic Park-esque imagery. The same goes for it chasing Jonathan and the kids down the road (even if it reaching, leaving, and returning to the mall feels a little weird). Most of all, Chekov’s fireworks make an appearance at the end, not only providing a means for the good guys to hold off the beast until the portal can be closed and its mental link can be severed, but creating the cool imagery of an indoor fireworks display, earning the show its Fourth of July bona fides.
Hell, they even wring some pathos out of Billy, and I hated Billy! It’s rushed, but I like Eleven breaking him free of the Mindflayer’s hold by connecting to him through his pain and his good memories, finding that innocent little boy and bringing him back to the surface. He’s terrifying as hell until that moment. He’s quite heroic when he defends her from the monster. And he’s sad and sympathetic when he apologizes to Max, presumably for the abuse he perpetuated, dying a better man than he ever was in life.
Were that the same could be said for Hopper. The weird thing about this episode is that I mourn Eleven’s loss of her father more than I mourn Hopper himself. Part of that may be the fact that I’m somewhat skeptical he’s truly gone. But a large part of it is that he dies in a really cheesy way. Him turning into Rambo and going out with a generator-adjacent fight with Russian Terminator is just so cornball, that it’s hard to take the “You have to kill me to save the kids” routine with Joyce seriously.
There’s some emotional impact when he looks at Joyce and nods with a resigned smile (albeit one that’s mitigated by some awkward compositing/green screen effects). But the Hopper we’ve seen this season has been so much more cartoony and over the top than the hardscrabble guy we first met in the show.
And yet, ironically, for a moment he lives. Far from the cliché “We’ll have that date someday” conversation Hopper has with Joyce, the letter that she finds and gives to his daughter is moving. It shouldn’t be. It’s the oldest TV trick in the book -- voiceover from a dead character played over a montage of emotional moments.
But it does, because the story of Hopper having fallen into a cave of emotional deadening after the death of his first daughter, having those feelings reawakened by Eleven’s arrival and the joyful time they’ve shared together, and his paean to the value of hurt in letting you know you’re still alive and not numb, is moving. The story of a man still laboring under an unfathomable loss who finds a way to heal through adopting and raising a young woman with unfathomable family issues of her own was always far more compelling than “Discount Magnum P.I. fights Russian action movie goons.” I’m glad Stranger Things remembered that in the end.
Still, half the credit owes to Millie Bobby Brown for another stellar performance beyond her years. She sells the fear of her near-death experience at the hands of the monster, the desperate relief when it’s over, the painful realization of why Hopper isn’t there to greet her like Joyce is for Will, the love she has for Mike, and the grief she’s grappling with as she both says goodbye to both her father and the community that lifted her up at once. Most of this is nonverbal, and Brown reacts to all of these events in such a visceral, believable way that it pierced me when I wasn’t expecting it.
Otherwise, “The Battle of Starcourt” offers texture and tidbits that are good to great. A greater role for Murray (with his reactions to the code name “Bald Eagle”) was a boon to the finale like it was for the whole season. Mayor Kline going down is a nice coda to his story. Nancy and Jonathan having to say goodbye didn’t do much for me, but I guess they had to. Will donating his D&D game to Erica is a nice grace note for his “growing up” story this year and Erica’s induction into nerdom. Steve having found a true friend in Robin (and a potential job at the video store) is a lovely beat to go out on for him. Max and Lucas poking fun at Dustin’s song is delightful. Paul Reiser’s return at the last minute is just enough to pay that off. And Dustin’s welcome back to the group and reunion of the original party makes for a very nice moment as well.
The truth is that at an hour and fifteen minutes, with scads of storylines and fights and characters and goodbyes, “The Battle of Starcourt” feels like a lot in places. In an ideal world, they might have found a way to split this into two episodes, or spaced things out differently to begin with.
The scope and reach of this thing is one of its merits, though. This is as big as Stranger Things has ever gone. You wouldn’t want that from the show every season, otherwise it spins out of control. But to have such a massive confrontation, paired with such a heartfelt set of farewells, makes for one of the show’s major highpoints, dripping with breadth and ambition, and pushing the right buttons when it needs to, in so many ways.