Characters and plot points
Ohhh boy.
Episode 4 is for sure where the mystery element grips you by the chin, stares into your soul, and demands that you acknowledge it as the captain.
There are still some small things that don’t quite fit, especially once you learn more about what is going on, but they are hard to notice during a first watch-through.
So, let’s dig into it, starting with the individual character threads.
First up, we have Joyce and Jonathan. Jonathan becomes fully convinced of his mother’s insanity. Meanwhile, Joyce becomes fully convinced of her son being alive. An interesting difference in viewpoints that ends in them having a very large argument in the middle of town. Joyce also meets with her ex-husband at the end of the episode, and decides to do some home renovating.
Moving to Jonathan, Nancy and Steve. Jonathan starts the episode completely convinced that Will is dead, but ends the episode with a good deal of hope that Will and Barb are both alive.
Similarly, Steve starts the episode thinking everything is fine, and ends the episode thinking his parents shall murder him for having a party at their house.
In stark contrast with all these changing viewpoints, Nancy both starts and finishes the episode thinking something terrible happened to Barb. At least someone is consistent.
Of course, one cannot speak of Nancy without thinking of her sibling, so we turn to the dynamic quadro in Mike, El, Lucas, and Dustin. They decide to do some reconnaissance to listen to Will. Initially, not content with only listening to Will breathing while he sleeps, they head to the school to get a better radio. While at school, they encounter both the nerd teacher and the bullies, who add enough tension to make one wet themselves.
But one cannot bring up the topic of tension without mentioning Hopper in this episode. OHHHH my, he does some glorious policing shenanigans, interrogation, investigation, umm, other police sounding “i” words. He plays his role reeealy well here, and adds the most tension, intrigue and action.
Oh no, inconsistencies grow
Now, this episode also had many more errors than previous episodes. I have decided to add these with the general plot summary so I don’t need to include them in the Easter egg section.
First up, this episode shows El’s powers functioning in two very different ways. With the handheld radio and the flashback to her lab days, the equipment she uses does not combust after being used. However, for reasons unknown, once she uses her powers on the radio in the lab, the entire electrical system gets fried. This is also not consistent in future seasons at all.
Moving on to another thing I cannot understand, we have women. After seeing Will’s fake body, I cannot comprehend why Joyce doesn’t say, at any point, that Will’s body is fake. She knows it isn’t him. Just think about it for a second. If you found out that a body is fake, what would you be spouting the entire time? You would be focusing on what it is that proves the body is false. Joyce wouldn’t have just been saying “That’s not my son. No. Noooo.” She would be shouting about the missing birthmark or other differences.
Her first scene after realizing the body isn’t Will is “I don’t know what you think that thing is, but it’s not my son.” Unless this had already been discussed, why wouldn’t she also add “I told you, my son has x birthmark on his arm, he has y birthmark on his left pinky toe, etc.”
But moving on to something I do understand, awkward moments. Dustin was able to see through the gymnasium doors before entering. Why would he slam open the doors like he did?
Jumping over to the scientists, the breathing noises the portal makes are very ominous, and also very strange. Why does the portal breathe/growl?
You also have the scene setup. I would love to know, how far in was this scientist when he was attacked? The wire whips around like he was 3 feet into the portal. When the rope does finally fully pull out, for some reason we only see the metal point that is secured to the suit, wouldn’t there also have been some leather mixed in with that? Also, why was this adult not also used as part of Vecna’s experiment like Will? Genuinely, the guy should be experimenting with everyone at this point. He has the hecking mind control dust.
Anyway, spooky scene aside, we move onto some confusion with Hopper. I am very unsure how Hopper was able to find the man who was on the TV. I’m sure he has connections, he is the sheriff after all, but I have no idea how you would get that information that quickly in the 1980s. Can you imagine trying to call around and ask people about that? How awkward would that conversation be?
“Yeah Jim, it’s Hopper. Tell me, did you see that state trooper guy who was on tv for like 3 minutes earlier today (in the middle of the afternoon)? … Yeah, where does he like to drink?
For some reason, the electrical company is also not on high Hopper alert after his encounter with said man.
Delving to the last inconsistency, we have Joyce’s scene where she peels back the wallpaper and sees Will in the Upside Down. The amount of time that this portal was open makes 0 sense. There are no other instances in the show where a portal stays open or visible this long. Nor are there moments in this show where the portal being open allows you to spot the person on the other side before it closes. It seems like it is only there to get Will to speak so the Will-hunting team gets Will’s voice to convince Lucas.
Now, with how fast the show is moving these are all pretty small nitpicks. So let’s get into something that doesn’t get the right attention, the relationship dynamics.
Steve and Lust
We see Steve exactly once this episode. However, this brief sighting tells us a good deal about his character. In his one scene, he tells Nancy to lie to the police to save his own hide from his parents, with little to no concern for Barb.
This is a pretty large smack in the face to the audience’s view of Steve. It compounds the damage caused by his callousness at Barb’s plight in previous scenes, this one really hammers home that Steve isn’t a very mature person. You can see this in what he avoids in this scene.
First, he tries to avoid responsibility. Something bad happened on his watch, while he was being irresponsible. Second, and most importantly, he doesn’t want to take responsibility, and thus the punishment, that his actions should incur.
These two reactions tell us something very important about the kind of relationship that Steve has with Nancy, and which is very obvious to the viewer. This relationship is based on lust.
There are very few things more damaging than a relationship in which you view your partner as a sexual object. It is, after all, using a person as a different version of porn when you act in this way. I think this also reflects heavily on modern views of relationships.
I believe this show puts on full display the extreme desensitization of modern society to relationships like this. In the 1980s, this kind of relationship would have been heavily discouraged and punished. Especially in a small, religious town.
But why is it that relationships like this are so heavily discouraged? Defenders of the sexual revolution would say that such a relationship is a good thing. “The kids are out and about exploring their sexual nature.” “It isn’t hurting anyone, why do you care?”
Yet we often ignore the negative nature of these relationships. Especially on the young. I want to dive into how these relationships damage both people involved.
Firstly, we have Steve. Some of the effects of this relationship are readily apparent. He is regularly shown in the show to be a playboy, addicted to the dopamine obtained while chasing women. He is also, especially in these episodes, a pretty large douchebag baby.
We can see how seeking pleasure for its own sake warps his perception of what is important. Nancy tells him about Barb, and what is his focus? Self-centered, responsibility avoidant, and weak.
And this weakness is because of his lust. He attempts to avoid the problem for as long as possible because it prevents him from doing what he wants to do, which is continue to use Nancy like a sex toy.
This relationship isn’t helping him grow because he is actively seeking to avoid the growth opportunities that come from being in a relationship. Things like caring about what your partner cares about. His lack of empathy for Nancy shows just how shallow his relationship with her is. He barely even recognizes or acknowledges her stress in these situations.
He also deals with a completely different problem than Nancy when it comes to relationship fallout. Think about how other people in the community feel about his relationship with Nancy. For men lacking a moral sense, Steve’s ability to sleep around with a lot of women is praiseworthy. For women lacking common sense, his reputation as a heartbreaker is a sign that he is a “bad boy,” and makes him more attractive.
But his relationship has long-reaching implications outside of his immediate relationship. Every study conducted on sexual relationships finds that the more people you have sex with, the higher your chances of getting divorced if/when you do decide to marry. So, Steve has not only damaged Nancy (more on that in a bit), but he has also damaged his own chances of having a happy and stable relationship in the future.
And a good chunk of the blame here lies entirely with Steve and Steve’s parents for not properly socializing their child to refrain from lustful temptation.
But that isn’t to say that no fault lies with Nancy. We learn throughout this episode that her relationship with Steve is built upon a network of intricately growing lies. Nancy is caught in the same lust-filled trap that Steve is caught in, it simply shows in a different way because she is a woman, and such relationships are much more negative for women.
Now, there is a reason the negative view of these relationships falls much harder on women. Women are the defenders of the gate that is sex. If you can’t keep your gate closed, you are rightfully determined to be a slut. If a man can successfully break into multiple gates, he should be rightfully considered a slut as well. But breaking open a gate is much harder than keeping a gate closed, so the disparity exists.
Yet women take much more damage from these lustful relationships. Not only with pregnancy, but also with body functions and immune responses that protect women during pregnancy. Even if pregnancy is off the table, you still have the fact that women are much more susceptible to STDs.
Then, we can look at the emotional impact if a woman does get pregnant. In instances of pregnancy, women with children, and especially women with multiple children and multiple husbands, have immense psychological pressures. Pregnancies also clearly occur at an extremely high rate despite access to multiple methods that can prevent pregnancy.
But pulling us back towards Stranger Things, we have a relationship built on a fundamentally flawed understanding of how a relationship should function. Pleasure without consequence taking priority over accountability and aid.
Yet the show continues to show Nancy falling into this relationship dynamic. Is it any wonder she ends the show without any desire for a husband and a family? She never grows up enough to have a relationship that doesn’t rely on lust.
Steve also still remains a tail-chaser, and Jonathan becomes your average stoner. For a show designed to be a coming of age story, these characters start and end as emotionally stunted children.
This show highlights something fundamentally broken about modern views of sex. It isn’t just something you do for fun. It isn’t just something you do for stress relief. It is something you do when you are willing and able to accept the natural consequences of your actions. And when the consequences are as important as children, you can’t remain a child.
That is all for episode 4 of Stranger Things. If you would like to let me know something you noticed in this episode, feel free to comment.
If you missed any of the previous breakdowns, here they are.
Episode 3: Joyce and the love we are missing
Episode 2: Sex in a small town and the strength of youth
