We Asked The ‘Stranger Things’ Cast About Spin-Offs, Steve’s Hair, And That Kate Bush Scene
"It was just the most impressive thing in the world."
Stranger Things 4 is here.
A warning: it might give you genre whiplash after the neon-soaked feelgoodery of the previous season. The fourth epic installment in this unparalleled nostalgia trip is a complex, fractured narrative with all of our heroes scattered to the four winds, trying their best to deal with an absolute deluge of BS, running the gamut from high school bullying to Lovecraftian serial killers. So, you know. Very on-brand for *gestures wildly at all of… this*.
Stranger Things 4 is… well, in a word, it’s harrowing. This season is legitimately an emotional ordeal, a sprawling foray into the filthiest, darkest nooks of the Stranger Things universe, into places the Duffer Brothers have been bold enough to magic up for our heroes to be thrown into. It’s bloody good television.
As the season kicks off, El is in California with the Byers family -Joyce, Will and Jonathan. She’s being bullied relentlessly. Steve, Dustin, Lucas, Max, Robin, Nancy and co are all back in Hawkins, but the town has been emotionally gutted after the loss of Hopper, and Max in particular is suffering deep, deep trauma after her brother Billy’s death. Everyone is sad, tired and lost, but when a new threat begins murdering teens in Hawkins, they’re all forced to rally in the most spectacular way.
There’s a lot to be drawn to in Stranger Things, and the exceptional cast is the biggest part of the equation. Sure, it looks like a Formica-swaddled dream. Sure, it has a soundtrack that would make Giorgio Moroder blush. But the thing that makes Stranger Things an absolute diamond in the rough? The onscreen talent.
Junkee sat down in Sydney with Sadie Sink (Max), Gaten Matarazzo (Dustin), and Priah Ferguson (Erica) to talk about Kate Bush, Dungeons and Dragons, and a Cobra Kai / Stranger Things crossover. Watch it all unfold below.