Stranger Things, Season 4, Episode 3: The Monster and the Superhero
Again, a lot of my complaints still stand -- too many characters, and while this episode does a decent job at gathering some of them together, well... don't split the party, I guess? Or at least don't really show the parts of the party that aren't really doing particularly interesting stuff? At least there's a bigger sense of urgency this time around. Vecna is still mostly an unknown and how he relates to the rest of the Upside-Down's aberrant monstrosities is still up in the air, but we're progressing on multiple fronts in untangling the mysteries of Hawkins.
It's just that... there's really not a whole ton that's particularly super-exciting or super-interesting. Everything's just progressing and moving along, and that's pretty neat for the hour of television I got out of it, but it also kind of feels like it's missing the storytelling charm that the previous seasons get. I just hope it might just be the setup before the horror/action comes along that's making me kinda antsy, but every time we cut to not-really-plot-relevant characters like Argyle I just really roll my eyes.
We get the return of Dr. Owens from season two being confronted by a bunch of governmental people, and they make the assumption (not unreasonably) that the grisly remote murders happening in Hawkins are caused by Eleven. And Eleven, as always, proves to be one of the more engaging characters in the show, particularly with her breakdown at, well, beating the shit out of that bully girl. With Joyce and Murray shunted off to Alaska and Jonathan being high on drugs half the time, this means that there's nothing to stop the very unsympathetic policemen from arresting Eleven and tossing her into juvie.
What I do have to praise is the superb acting and direction from the show-writers and show-runners that make the characters that they handle well... done amazingly. And, again, I have to focus on Eleven once more. It's easy to go 'oh, yeah, she had a bit of a mental breakdown in this episode', but the acting as she's just essentially zombie-ing through everyone's attempts to tell her that everything's going to be okay; comparing how everyone looked at her to her traumatic experience in that lab... and in a scene that would normally be something that's cheesy as all hell, Eleven's self-worth problems in thinking that the world views her as a monster translates to what would otherwise be typical boring teenage angst. Now seeing Eleven freak out over Mike never writing 'love' in the letter (and Mike, bless him, is trying his best but he's a teenage boy).
And a combination of the conflict Eleven and Mike, as well as Eleven's own personal angst at remembering how she massacred so many staff and children in the government facility she broke out of, Eleven is... kind of catatonic and responds to questions of 'did you want to kill that girl' with answers like 'I don't know'. Ultimately, though, Eleven's prison convoy ends up being stopped by agents led by Dr. Owens, who gives her a superhero choice in a diner -- Owens can make everything go away and let Eleven return to her peaceful life... but Hawkins itself is in danger from the Upside-Down and Owens has a plan to return Eleven's power. She can choose to be a superhero, or the monster she thinks everyone sees her as. Pretty basic 'call to adventure' stuff, but all the acting as she is conflicted about her role in the world is definitely pretty well done.
...okay, admittedly Owens' sales-pitch is a bit too obviously something that the writers made to fit in the background of a trailer. And I haven't even watched any of this show's trailers. But it's kind of obvious, right? Anyway, Eleven accepts the deal, and heads off while Mike and Will panics.
Speaking of Hawkins, while Team Dustin ends up bumping into Nancy and they all decide to investigate what's going on with Vecna... and there's a ticking time bomb in regards to Eddie being hunted down not just by the police (who found Nancy's friend's body) but also Lucas's insane basketball friends. Some neat acting on Lucas's part for sure, who shows the face of someone who realizes he's in to deep with basically a lynch mob as they beat up the rest of the D&D club. I do like how Lucas ends up kind of basically having to throw the rest of the D&D club under the bus -- calling them 'people who try to recruit [his] sister into their cult, club, thing'. Partially for his own safety, sure, but that's a great conflicted face from the actor.
Sadly, despite the original merger of Team Dustin and Nancy, the group is split up again, with Nancy and Robin heading off to the library to research ancient murderer Victor Creel. Again, while I really don't care too much about the teenage drama, at least Nancy and Robin's actors are actually funny... but it really does feel like we're just having scenes from the investigation just play out slowly. Sure, we do get information and everything, and a lead, but it's kind of frustratingly slow. Dustin, Steve and Max go and get a key from the school therapist in order to sneak into school and look at some records, and it's nowhere as fun as Robin and Nancy's polar-opposite personalities.
Meanwhile, as far as the sub-plots go... I guess the Jim Hopper in a Russian prison stuff are well-done taken on its own. But really, I do feel like it's just so kind of far removed from the rest of the cast that it just feels like it's a way to get our adults out of the way, while allowing Hopper to return to the cast without it feeling too cheap. They're all done well and David Harbour's fun, but I must confess that I don't really care for all the chain-bashing and trying to get allies out of guards and prisoners... again, especially since we're going to get something similar next episode.
Of course, with Max being Vecna's next target since she's starting to see that ominous damned clock, it does seem like the tension is finally going to rise with members of our main cast finally coming in the crazy demon-wizard's crosshairs. The basketball jerks are also antagonists that want to hone in on Eddie and, by proxy, Dustin, but... they kinda feel so small compared to all the Upside-Down stuff, and don't quite have the family factor that Billy had last season. Anyway... I don't know. I think I'm being a bit too harsh on this episode -- I enjoyed my time watching it, but all throughout the episode I kept thinking 'could this really be edited to be shorter or more concise'.
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