I decided to watch Season 5 without watching any of the 4 previous one because from the trailers this one look like there is a lot of action into it and now that I have seen Volume 1 already I can tell its not hard to follow up and understand whats going on so from that stand point the series is well done, but three damn years for this show to come back and now it finally drops with over an hour of content which is basically a movie at this point, they really said fuck it we going big for the last season. There is also how all this actors basically grew up together through the show and now all the characters on screen at once without it feeling too packed or messy, shows that been on this long usually struggle with juggling so many people but they pulled it off here and it felt natural. The way they used radio broadcasts to fill you in on what went down after season four was smart because it kept things moving without boring me with long context scenes that nobody wants to sit through anyway at this point considering is the last season, we get caught up fast and then jump straight into the action which is exactly what you want from a premiere. As for someone who watch the series for the fisr time I got to say the 80s nostalgia is strong with all the references and throwbacks and it does not feel cheap like they are just throwing random shit at you to make you remember the good old days, stuff that actually matters to the story instead of being there just because. The stakes feel real too like any of these characters could actually die at any moment since this is the final season and they gotta wrap everything up so the truth is that would be awesome if someone important dies on Volume 2 just to spice up things and keep going.
- IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4574334/
- Platform: AppleTV+
Episode 1 of S05 Volume 1, opens up with a completely new scene that takes you back to November 12th 1983 witch is the exact same way season one started, this whole sequence shows what happens to Will right after Vecna grabbed him at the beginning of the first season and its meant to set up this Harry Potter Voldemort type connection between them. Turns out Vecna did something to Will that gave him powers without even realizing what he was doing, basically creating his own worst enemy just like Voldemort did with Harry Potter which is a pretty cool twist even if its kinda obvious. The way they show Vecnas eyes during this scene makes him look flayed just like Will was back in season two, witch got me thinking maybe the Mind Flayer has been controlling Vecna this whole time instead of the other way around like we thought, there been theories about this online for a while but the show has not confirmed anything yet. Fast forward to present day and we see Holly Wheeler who is Mike and Nancys little sister and she becomes super important for this episode and I would assume for the rest because she starts seeing what she thinks is an imaginary friend but we know its Vecna in his Henry Creel human form so she does not get scared. Eventually he takes her inside this special wall he built in the Upside Down and says he is gonna save all her friends witch really means capture them and plug them into tubes just like he did to Will, later on Will has another vision where he sees them all hooked up getting goo pumped into them confirming that this is Vecnas plan for everyone. The whole setup is probaly inside Hawkins lab witch is at the center of this massive wall around Hawkins that Vecna built, its like Game of Thrones level huge and they been trying to find him for months but could not because of this thing blocking them.
At first I wonder why they staying all together before I start noticing how the town is in quarantine, but seems that since season four ended pretty much everybody except Hopper has been staying at Mike and Nancys house witch is super crowded and they play it up for comedy but its also kinda sad seeing them all crammed in there living in this military quarantine. Robin became the new DJ with her radio show called The Morning Squawk and she uses it to give coded messages to the group while also catching people up on what happens with exposition that does not feel too forced, she mentions that Vecnas discharge spread through the air infecting the whole town and the military is trying to cover up all the tears between dimensions with metal bandaids. They call the main military zone with the big portal the MAC Z but Robin calls it the Big Mac, the truth is that some of the 80s references are not so funny, this looks more like a tv series for teenagers rather than an action series that might be very interesting for viewers of all ages. This Military zone has this huge portal where probably Vecna is gonna walk out when he breaks into the Right Side Up eventually. Keep in mind that my opinion on this series of posts is from someone who has never seen the show but honestly Dustin is one character that annoys me similar to Maximus on Fallout. At school other kids also dont like him but for other motives, mainly because he was Eddies friend and he wears his Hellfire Club shirt all the time, there is also Lucas who quit the basketball team and became the muscle of the group standing up for Dustin witch shows how much these kids have grown since season one. Eleven has been hiding from the military since season four and apparently other townspeople have been pretending to be her to misdirect the soldiers witch is pretty cool, shows that she has friends around town and people actually like her. That sscene where she is training with Hopper in another Jedi montage trying to beef up her powers was cool, a show of what she could do when the times come to fight, Hopper is like her personal trainer getting her ready, her outfit definitely says 80s in it and was a very classic thing to wear although she does all the time? dont she get a shower??.
There are these dungeon crawls into the Upside Down trying to find Vecna but they done it over 30 times and still have not found him, and there is Will having visions of Vecna seeing through his eyes and eventually figures out the connection between them, he can see what Vecna sees witch means he can track where the Demogorgons are going and where Vecna is hiding behind in the Upside Down. The whole thing with Max in the hospital is really sad, if this is your first time dont worry they will provide more context and thats really cool how they keep providing context all the time, Will and Lucas visit her on the regular just talking to her like she can hear them even though she is in a coma, witch is actually a real thing coma victims can hear you they just cannot respond back. Will catches Robin with Vicky at the hospital and this sets up his whole sexuality thing where he is gonna come out eventually.
Through the season there are portals everywhere, from a little research I made this was not the case before seems things are way easier for Vecna and his squad of Demogorgons, going through dimensions, at this point that a Demogorgon can just rip right through it and open a new portal whenever it wants, this is exactly what happens when one breaks into the Wheeler house and yoinks Holly right in front of her mom Karen. I still dont understand why the military wants to keep the portal open and they just keep burning it down but I guess has to do with Dr. Kay experiments. I really liked how the episode wraps up is that it does not try too hard to explain every little detail, it gives you enough context to understand whats happening without holding your hand through boring exposition that would slow everything down. The pacing for a first episode that runs over an hour is actually pretty solid considering how much ground they cover and for the most part is just small talk and planing, nothing of impact really happens except for Will's visions, from catching everyone up on what happens since season four to introducing the new threat with Holly getting taken to showing Wills connection with Vecna and how his powers are starting to manifest. For someone jumping into the series without watching the previous seasons I can say this episode does a decent job making you care about whats going on even if you dont have all the backstory, the action is good enough to keep you interested in seeing what comes next.
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