Once upon a time, American tv shows used to be around 22 episodes long, have a run time of around 45 minutes and feature a brand new season every year. Now, thanks to the era of prestige television that’s narrowed the gap between the cinema screen and it’s smaller counterpart, anything goes. Years now pass between seasons, production values gave go through the roof and as a result, seasons are much tighter, usually racking up half, or even a third of the normal episode we once we used to.
Some may think that the newer system is neater, while some still yearn for seasons of shows that went on for the best part of five months – however, one thing that prestige television can do that the old guard couldn’t was bang out a season finale so huge that it manages to equal, and in a lot of cases, utterly dwarf and average summer blockbuster. Anyone doubting the impact Stranger Things has had on popular culture may want to check their opinions at the dimensional portal as streaming’s biggest show just inexplicably got even bigger.
The time has come to finish things. Not just the desperate struggle that’s been going on between the select group of Hawkins’ citizens, but the other connected plot threads that have spread as far as Russia have each reached their various endgames too as both Eleven and Hopper’s parties know that they have no time to make it back to Hawkins to help in the final fight. Their numbers halved, the Hawkins crew have nevertheless less whipped up a multi-tiered plan that, if it’s successful, will advance on a distracted Vecna like falling dominoes and take him out before he claims his fourth victim and breaches worlds.
Max, Lucas and Erica head to the old Creel house to offer up escaped target, Max, up as a sacrifice in order to draw the attention of the artist formerly known as Henry Creel, in order for phase two to take place. This requires Steve, Nancy, Robin, Dustin and Eddie to enter the Upside-Down via the gate in Eddie’s trailer and split up to perform different tasks – Dustin and Eddie will perform some sort of distraction to lure Vecna’s protective swarms of Demobats away from his lair, leaving the remaining trio free to enter the lumpy bastard’s home unopposed and kill him while he’s focused on Max. If all goes well, everything will be hunky dory, but nothing ever goes right in Hawkins and if one group fails, Max will suffer a gruesome fate that will see the Upside-Down rushing into our world.
However, despite still being days away, their friends realise they have ways to help their friends and loved ones. Despite recently escaping a Russian prison filled with various forms of Upside-Down wildlife, Hopper, Joyce and Murray head back to wipe them out and use Vecna’s hive mind against him. Elsewhere, Eleven realises that she doesn’t have to be present to help Max when she can fight Vecna with her mind, so Mike, Will, Jonathan and Argyle whip up a makeshift sensory deprivation chamber in order for the telepath to settle her score with her old nemesis once and for all.
With one previous episode impressively clocking in at a hefty one hour and forty minutes, Stranger Things 4 had been moving into the feature length episode game with increasing confidence, however with The Piggyback, we find the show encroaching on Lord Of The Rings/Avatar territory as it racks up a truly staggering runtime of two hours and twenty minutes. Why Netflix didn’t just bite the bullet and release the damn thing in cinemas for a week or two, I’ll never know, but there’s inherent dangers that come with slamming out a season finale that’s longer than most Avengers movies. For a start, when creators are given virtually no limits on their projects, self indulgence tends to sneak in as there’s a reluctance on their part to cut things short or tighten things up to salvage a sense of pace. Also with so many characters that need addressing, it gets progressively tougher to keep the energy levels up if you have to stop and check in with a “lesser” characters when the literal world is on the line, and beyond that, the obvious bloat factor threatens to splinter an already strained plot that’s positively groaning under its own weight.
However, much like their beloved characters, the Duffer Brothers has somehow managed to pull off the impossible by delivering an absurdly long climax that somehow manages to not only give virtually every main character a signature moment (even the mostly discarded Will and Jonathan get the chance to deliver heartfelt pep talks), but manages to be almost effortlessly iconic for the majority of its bulk. For the space I’ve alloted myself here, it would be impossible to list all the punch the air moments the episode delivers, be it Hopper decapitating a Demogorgon with a Conan sword, Murray letting loose with a flamethrower or Nancy blasting away at a flaming Vecna with a shotgun like Sarah Connor with a voluminous perm. There’s also a complex, edge of the seat, Back To The Future style energy to the whole thing as last second saves, overlapping reactions and heart stopping rug pulls are delivered as if we’re watching the final reel of a H.P. Lovecraft inspired Return Of The Jedi.
However, as noticable as The Piggyback is for its triumphs as it weaves in the entire group together despite their various distances from one another, it’s also noticable for the fact that despite its gargantuan run time is really only an excessive preamble to Stranger Things 5 and some sacrifices have to be made. The most notable one is obviously that even in victory, our heroes technically lose as Max technically dies despite Eleven’s act of resurrection and as the show ends, the troubled teen lay broken in a coma. Elsewhere, the Upside-Down is finally leaking into Hawkins even if a “victorious” Vecna had his tentacled ass handed to him by three teens armed to the teeth and a telepath in his brain. However, the greatest triumph of the episode proves to be the genuinely moving death of the tragic Eddie Munson, who not only delivers arguably one of Stranger Things’ greatest ever moments (defiantly shredding “Master Of Puppets” by Metallica on the roof of a trailer home in the middle of the Upside-Down is fucking awesome no matter who you are), but gets a truly heartbreaking eulogy from Dustin in the aftermath.
While the 80s has always been the series’ touchstone, it’s in the oft referenced Lord Of The Rings where the episode manages to find it’s stability as its refusal to skim over anything means that even after threats like Vecna, the Demogorgon and Jason Carver are dispatched, the episode manages to wind things down gradually as it knows that’ll probably be years before we finally get round to wrapping all this up. Still, despite the sprawl and many moments drawn out to the max thanks to some epic slo-mo, it’s still great to see everyone all meeting up again – even if they’ve all technically taken quite a serious “L”.
With the status quo utterly changed, the Upside-Down finally creeping into Indiana, Max in a coma and Vecna off somewhere licking his wounds, Stranger Things 5 has a lot to play with before it ends things for good; but a question has to be asked. Now the door for much longer episode has been kicked open, what kind of runtime are the Duffers going to try and get away with next time? Time will tell, but for now, both the Duffers and the people of Hawkins can pat themselves on the back for pulling of a near two and a half hour juggling act with style.
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