As Stranger Things season 4’s release date finally looms large, there are a few major mistakes that the Netflix hit needs to fix in the long-awaited new season. Stranger Things has changed a lot since the series debuted in 2016. While Stranger Thing season 1 was a dark, slow-moving small-town mystery with sci-fi and horror elements, by 2019’s season 3, the series was a fast-paced coming-of-age comedy with gory action and a high body count.
The scope of Stranger Things changed with each passing season, as the show’s growing budget meant its creative team could afford to get gradually more ambitious. However, this ambition came at a cost to Stranger Things. Season 2 featured an infamous standalone episode that ground the show’s narrative momentum to a halt, while Stranger Things season 3 featured too many subplots, too many characters, and not enough heart.
Now, there is a lot that the long-awaited Stranger Things season 4 needs to fix as the show finally returns. Stranger Things needs to tighten up the show’s focus and pick a villain to stick with, rather than bouncing between different antagonists. The news that Nightmare On Elm Street star Robert Englund will have a major role in Stranger Things season 4 is promising in this regard, but a solid choice of villain is only one of the elements that were missing from the show’s recent seasons. Stranger Things season 4 must also pick a tone and stick with it, whether the show is lighter and more action-forward than ever before or returns to season 1’s darker, more grounded atmosphere. Stranger Things season 4 also can’t keep introducing more new characters to the show’s already massive cast, a problem that could become a major issue since this outing will be longer than any of the show’s earlier seasons.
Stranger Things Season 4 Needs Fewer Villains
At first, Dacre Montgomery’s Billy was a perfect villain for Stranger Things season 3. A Stephen King-inspired bully with a mean streak a mile wide, the character was already unhinged and dangerous before he became possessed by the Mind Flayer and was a terrifying presence once under the monster’s spell. Unfortunately, Billy wasn’t the villain of Stranger Things season 3. Billy, the Russian scientists hiding under the Mall, a Terminator-style assassin, the remnants of Hawkins Lab, Cary Elwes’s corrupt Mayor, and eventually, even the staff of a local newspaper were all the villains of Stranger Things season 3. Thus, thanks to the show’s overstuffed storytelling, none of them got enough screen time to make an impression other than Billy, who could have been the season's sole focus.
Stranger Things Season 4 Needs One Great Villain
Stranger Things season 4 needs to choose an effective villain and focus on them throughout the season. This will be tricky, as there are more than five villains who could return in Stranger Things season 4. However, Stranger Things season 1 managed to clearly differentiate between Hawkins Lab (a vast conspiracy with many heads that was never going to be easily defeated) and the Demogorgon (a big monster the characters needed to kill as soon as possible) and succeeded in technically having two major villains at the same time as a result. Stranger Things season 4 could, similarly, make the supernatural Vecna its main villain and the more insidious human monster Dr. Brenner its secondary villain. However, bringing back the Russians (and the Mind Flayer, the Demogorgon, and the Hawkins Post staff) is destined to inevitably fail.
Stranger Things Season 4 Needs Less New Characters
While Stranger Things season 3 struggled to keep up with its many villains, the show might have fared better if it didn’t have even more heroic characters to contend with. While Joyce Byers deserves a Stranger Things season 4 love interest, other than that addition, the series should think long and hard before adding more characters to its huge ensemble. As of season 3, Stranger Things was trying to juggle the romantic relationships of Eleven and Mike, Lucas and Max, and Nancy and Jonathan while also featuring two sets of comic relief characters in Dustin and Steve and Erica and Robin. This is without even mentioning Hopper, Joyce, Murray Bauman, and the rest of the adult cast as well as all of the villains, making it inevitable that the series gave numerous fan-favorite characters the short shrift and ended up leaving entire plots unresolved for episodes at a time.
Stranger Things Season 4 Needs To Pick A Tone
The finale of Stranger Things season 3 featured one of its best scenes, wherein Dustin and his girlfriend helped save the day with a singalong cover of the Never-Ending Story theme song. It was a broadly comedic sequence that viewers loved, and the moment inevitably went viral after the episode was released. What a lot of viewers forget is that the scene takes place mere moments after Hopper callously slaughtered half a dozen Soviet scientists with a machine gun and a few minutes before Billy tragically sacrifices his life to save Eleven from the Mind Flayer. The wildly inconstant tone of Stranger Things season 3 makes it easy to forget that these moments occur almost concurrently, but the comedy makes the drama less impactful and the dark moments make the comedy less fun.
Stranger Things Season 4 Needs To Stick With One Tone
Upon its return, Stranger Things season 4 needs Fear Street’s dark edge. The series should be able to kill off major characters without sacrificing its dark sense of humor, and should be able to make its cast likable and worth rooting for without losing tension and terror by becoming a full-on comedy. Alternatively, Stranger Things can take the opposite route and make season 4 a lighter, more fun-focused experience than ever before. A vocal portion of the fandom preferred season 3’s less grounded tone and broader character comedy, meaning there is an argument to be made for the show to avoid brutality and bleakness altogether and become more of an adventure series than a horror show. However, whether Stranger Things season 4 is funnier or darker than ever before, the series needs to stick with a tone instead of bouncing between extremes every few minutes. This does not mean that Stranger Things can’t include moments of levity during its scarier scenes, but the series can’t be both a broad goofy comedy and a tragic, brutal horror at the same time.