DO NOT CROSS HERE IF SPOILERS OFFEND
DO NOT CROSS HERE IF SPOILERS OFFEND
DO NOT CROSS HERE IF SPOILERS OFFEND
Amon Warmann:This season
sees Stranger Things’ core
foursome deal with something
just as terrifying as shadow
monsters or the Upside Down
— the inescapable fact that
they’re growing up. With that
growth comes girlfriends: Mike
has grown closer to Eleven (to
Hopper’s great chagrin), Lucas
and Max are a couple, and even
Dustin has found someone
to sing epic duets with. After
spending the majority of the
last season as the host for the
Mind Flayer it makes sense that
Will would try to hold onto any
semblance of normalcy with his
friends — aka many games of
Dungeons & Dragons — but
eventually even he accepts
change. Indeed, with it being
hinted that he’s on the cusp of
discovering his own sexuality,
Will could be the one to have
experienced the biggest
changes by the time we catch
up with him next.Stranger
Things:
Season 3
James Dyer:FromThe ThingtoTerrorVision
and evenThe Blob, the ’80s were awash with
amorphous monstrosities, which have all fed into
Season 3’s Mind Flayer. That it imparts a piece
of itself into each human it possessesis an
enjoyable riff on theBody Snatcherstrope, as
is the idea that multiplepossessions can smush
together to form a more formidable blob beast.
But while the execution is fun, it’s hard to see
a toothy mound of dog food fulfilling the promise
of the giant, portentous figure seen at the end of
Season 2. The glimpse of a full Demogorgon in
the end credits (as opposedto Season2’s lesser
Demodogs) may hint at a return to the original
pan-dimensional terror in Season 4.2 THE MIND FLAYER
1 THE GROUP
ALL GROW UP
IS REVEALED
3 THE POSSESSION OF BILLY
James Dyer: A general purpose douchebag in
Season 2, Billy steps it up a notch this time
around, not only taking his bellendery to
the next level but becoming the first of
the Flayed and driving the Mind Flayer’s
evil agenda by recruiting more
(unwilling) bodies for it to
possess.Amon Warmann: The Mind Flayer’s ultimate
goals are still frustratingly simplistic in Season
3, but its near single-minded desire to kill
Eleven gives focus. The first trailer (released in
March) made it look like the big monster had
already been revealed, but in hindsight it turns
out to be a marketing misdirect. It turns out that
this was only a prelude to a much, much bigger
monster — that’s impressively rendered with the
show’s increased budget — and it’s formidable
enough to even wound Eleven. What will the
Shadow Monster unleash on our heroes next?