Stranger Things Season 4 Needs Fear Street’s Darker Edge

Stranger Things Season 4 Needs Fear Street’s Darker Edge

Stranger Things season 4 should follow in the footsteps of fellow Netflix retro horror Fear Street and up the edginess of the series. When Stranger Things debuted in 2016, the series was an instant word-of-mouth hit for streaming service Netflix and its creators the Duffer Brothers. Despite some seriously dark moments in the show’s first season, it is easy to see why Stranger Things had massive mainstream appeal.

Stranger Things combined sci-fi horror with nostalgic coming-of-age dramedy in its story of a group of misfit kids from a small town accidentally uncovering a government conspiracy and attempting to escape an inter-dimensional monster. Add in an adorable but surprisingly powerful telekinetic kid heroine, and Stranger Things was all but guaranteed to be a success. However, despite all its flashier elements, Stranger Things season 1 took inspiration from the dark kidnapping drama Prisoners, and the show’s early episodes were often brutal and bleak.

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Related: Stranger Things Fans are Focused On The Wrong Season 4 Trailer

After all, Stranger Things takes place in small-town America during the ‘80s, and its location of Hawkins, Indiana is home to many shuttered shopfronts, closed-down factories, and other signifiers of Reagan-era economic hardship. Stranger Things season 1 did not shy away from the darker side of the decade and the show’s tone reflected this, with innocent characters often being butchered in early episodes. However, with Stranger Things season 3, the show’s tone took a swift shift into broad comedy territory, and despite a rising body count, the series started taking things much less seriously. A plethora of goofy subplots soon became the weak point of Stranger Things season 3, which is why the series would do well to learn from the critical success of Netflix’s recent Fear Street trilogy and bring back some darker edge to Stranger Things season 4.

Stranger Things Seasons 1 & 2 Took No Prisoners

Shannon Purser as Barb in Stranger Things

Stranger Things season 4 should stop pulling punches, just like the first season. Early on in proceedings, Stranger Things was a pretty unsparing series, with the season 1 finale seeing Eleven fell slews of government agents to save her friends. Meanwhile, earlier episodes saw said agents killing off civilians with little pause, including a diner proprietor whose only crime was housing the lost, hungry Eleven. Fan-favorite Stranger Things supporting star Barb was infamously offed unceremoniously despite being well-behaved Final Girl material, and even Stranger Things season 2 mercilessly killed off poor family man and all-around good guy Bob Newby. Stranger Things season 2 did feature more comic relief than its predecessor and a faster pace, but the show’s mean streak was still in full effect and no character was too nice to be offed out of nowhere, a quality that the series lost in Stranger Things season 3.

Fear Street’s Edge Serves A Thematic Purpose

Stranger Things season 4’s themes need to return to the corruption and deprivation of small-town America. Throughout the trilogy, the Fear Street movies have featured constant injections of sudden, brutally bleak violence, but the killings always serve a clear thematic purpose. When Fear Street 1978’s killer chops through a pile of likable campers only to leave the snide, bullying rich kids alive, for example, it is to reinforce that the town of Shadyside and its citizens are constantly mistreated and under-resourced. The trilogy’s setting is home to a lot of dreamers who want to escape their dead-end town and know how unlikely this is, and the tragedy of both Fear Street and Stranger Things is that many of its cast don’t survive to see a brighter future. Fear Street’s recurring theme of communities being disenfranchised is touched on throughout Stranger Things, too, with a corrupt mayor, downright evil government, and amoral corporations leaving the town penniless and without prospects.

It is easy, with all of the subplots going on, to forget that even Stranger Things season 3 reinforces this idea that Hawkins is a pit of ever-diminishing promise. The town sheriff spends season 3 harassing his love interest, threatening his adopted daughter’s boyfriend, and drunk driving (and he is the show’s hero), while the Mayor is in bed with (at best) shady corporate interests, and is happy to lease land to the highest bidder despite this gutting the local economy. Cary Elwes’ sleazy mayor may end Stranger Things season 3 beaten up by Hopper, but he still comes to represent the dearth of opportunity available to the teen heroes of the series when they grow up, something that is even more clearly illustrated in Stranger Things seasons 1 and 2 by the show killing off even the most likable characters.

Related: Why Fear Street 1978’s Stephen King Shout Out Is Ironic

Hawkins and Shadyside Are Similar Settings

Fear Street Maya Hawke Heather Death

Both Hawkins and Shadyside are towns where job opportunities are non-existent, business is dwindling, families fall apart, and life is surprisingly cheap despite their Amblin-esque outward appearance. They are bleak depictions of small-town 80s Americana and the frequent, brutal violence of their horror stories reflects that — or at least in the case of Stranger Things, it used to. Stealing a page from Fear Street’s darkest moments, Stranger Things season 4 should return to killing off fan-favorite characters to establish stakes in the show and remind viewers of how grim life in its small-town setting is.

Stranger Things Needs To Give Death Gravitas

Death needs to mean something in Stranger Things season 4. Although Stranger Things season 3 did boast a high body count, with shopping montages set to Madonna’s “Material Girl” and a goofy subplot about a Soviet spy learning the joys of Independence Day carnivals, it’s fair to say the series also featured a far lighter tone than earlier seasons. The dead characters were either nameless henchmen like the Soviet soldiers Hopper kills or cartoonish bad guys like the Hawkins Post staff, resulting in a lack of impact in the show’s deaths. Despite the show killing off plenty of characters (like the loathsome local newspaper staff) Stranger Things season 3 reduced the gravitas of death on the series, with only minor, hate-worthy, or background characters being killed off and the only death of apparent plot significance (Hopper’s) being an obvious fake-out.

How Stranger Things Season 4 Is The Darkest Yet

New monsters stranger things season 4

It already looks as though Stranger Things season 4 will be the show’s darkest season yet in the available footage. While there are some lighthearted moments like the young cast rollerblading, most of the season’s details are ominous. Dr. Brenner’s return and the Hawkins Lab experiments on young children, Hopper’s torture in a Siberian prison camp, the grisly Vecna figure, and the all-out “war” warned by Dr. Owens all point to Stranger Things season 4 being a darker, higher-stakes affair than season 3. Sadie Sink, who stars in Fear Street: 1978 and plays Max on Stranger Things, has confirmed the darkness of Stranger Things season 4 (via RadioTimes):

“Each season the production scale gets bigger and bigger and the stakes are really, really high this year, as they are always… But there’s something about this season, it’s really intense.”

With the apocalyptic feel of Stranger Things season 4, maybe the series is primed to take a lesson from Fear Street and pull off some gruesome surprises. Ultimately, what will derail Stranger Things season 4 won’t be how dark it gets, but whether or not it’s able to recapture the smaller-scale, slow-burn work of the original season. Part of what makes the Fear Street trilogy so critically acclaimed is the fact that the movies are unafraid of depicting bad things happening to good people, and illustrating the reality of life in its setting as a result. Stranger Things season 1 and 2 proved the Netflix hit could do the same, and season 4 should see the show return to this darker tone.

More: David Harbour’s Comments Confirm A Major Stranger Things 4 Problem

Fear Street Part 3: 1666 (2021)Release date: Jul 16, 2021

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About The Author

Cathal Gunning
(1462 Articles Published)

Cathal Gunning has been writing about movies and TV online since 2020. His obsessions include The Simpsons, Stephen King, the Scream series, and the horror genre in general. He has spent more time thinking about Stranger Things than the writers of Stranger Things, and he has never seen a Star War.

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