Stranger Things; The Thrilling Netflix Show is Going to Take Over Your Weekend!

Network: Netflix

Directors: Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer

Executive producers: Matt Duffer, Shawn Levy

Created by: Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer

The new eight-part mystery is the perfect summer show.

Trailer Video: https://youtu.be/XWxyRG_tckY

Stranger Things is a show so '80s, it's almost tempting to make fun of it. Created with nostalgic affection by Matt and Ross Duffer, it looks like Spielberg, sounds like John Carpenter, and smells a bit like Stephen King. It feels like a scary story told over a campfire, about a thing that happened to a friend of a friend a long time ago, about what really goes on in that mysterious building at the edge of town no one knows anything about, and what might happen there late at night. Altogether, it's pretty wonderful.

The plot is a simple one: Mike is a kid who loves playing Dungeons & Dragons with his pals Dustin, Lucas, and Will. After a game one night, Mike takes the spooky way home, and goes missing after a terrifying encounter with something unknown. When his friends go looking for him, they find Eleven instead—a girl with a shaved head and strange powers. Trouble is, she's being hunted by shady government agents, whose involvement makes the hunt for a missing child all the more, well, strange.

Part of what's so great about Stranger Things is that it feels so unlike most Netflix shows. The eight-episode series is not very concerned with being aggressively binge-able, ditching the crazy twists and turns that leave you hankering for the next 40-minute hit. It's much more relaxed and confident, lovingly telling a new story in a familiar language, widening its scope just enough to justify its eight-hour length. Will's friends are the center of the show, with Mike becoming the de facto protagonist as the gang goes deeper down the rabbit hole opened up by Will's disappearance and Eleven's sudden arrival, but their adventure eventually intersects with his teen sister Nancy's coming-of-age story. She in turn finds herself crossing paths with Will's older brother Jonathan. The setting of Hawkins, Indiana, feels extremely Spielbergian in its warm portrayal of gloomy small-town America, where everyone knows everyone, which in turn means no one is safe when bad things happen.

Tying everything together is Winona Ryder's Joyce, mother to Will and Jonathan and the first adult to believe that something supernatural is going on in Hawkins. Joyce's hunt for her missing son drives the plot, while the actor who plays her is also the show's biggest '80s nod. Ryder is more than just a reference, though—she also turns in a compelling performance as a very ordinary woman grappling with something extraordinary.

But the best thing about Stranger Things is the kids. They check off all the '80s Amblin movie boxes—Dungeons & Dragons, bicycles with headlights, walkie-talkies, and a pluckish sense of adventure that compels them to stick their noses where they don't belong and make life difficult for shady government agents. Will's gang of pals—played by Finn Wolfhard, Gaten Matarazzo, and Caleb McLaughlin—are charming as hell, and wonderfully depicted.

The '80s setting also helps—because in an era before cell phones, digital photography, and the Internet, all these kids have to confront the extraordinary with are their bikes and their imaginations. And watching them do just that is some of the most fun you'll have watching TV this summer.

Credits:http://www.gq.com/story/stranger-things-netflix