Stranger Things Online: Trick or Treat, Freak

The narrative is chugging along at a nice pace--a great thing since despite being one more than last season, nine episodes still is not very many.   It's somewhat anticlimactic for Eleven to have only crawled from the upside-down mere minutes after disappearing from this classroom, but it puts her back into the narrative.  Hopefully, she will get to leave Hopper's cabin shortly.   His stiff parenting makes sense but doesn't automatically understand that.  One slight mystery from the premiere that is now apparent: Eleven has definitely been calling Mike.  Furthermore, she has been developing her abilities together with all that spare time.  Remember when she needed an entire sensory deprivation thing to go into the black room?

And a more significant one: Given the state Joyce finds him standing over the toilet, it is clear that Will has been puking up slugs annually.  The child is still himself, so it is not quite Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but it can be an invasion nonetheless.  Just what did Dustin find in that garbage can?  No doubt we will find out in episode 3. Up to now, Stranger Things Season 2 is doing an adequate job weaving together plenty of disparate characters, stories, and conflicts.  And even more so than in Season 1, it captures the innocence and humiliation of being the age--if it is the children being the only ones in costume school, Dustin and Lucas sputtering to speak with a woman, Jonathan feeling awkward in a party, or Nancy just getting too drunk and saying hurtful things to her boyfriend.
All the children are great, although Max is difficult to read.  What is real--her too-cool-for-the-nerds disposition or her good-natured enthusiasm?  Is her brother, Billy, actually that big a douche?
It is David Harbour and Winona Ryder as Hopper and Joyce who so far have provided Stranger things Season two's emotional core.  The bond between them has grown, and though the rest of the show bombards us with '80s references and higher school parties, it is their silent scenes reminiscing about high school and happier times that actually capture the nostalgia stranger things online is constantly pursuing.

The subject of PTSD continues as well, and Will is not the only one suffering.  It is great that Stranger Things is able taking the opportunity to demonstrate how these characters were influenced by their own experiences, from Mike's lashing out about Max to Nancy's debilitating guilt within Barb.  Hopper even discussed it more in this episode with Joyce, stating he understands some men who've been through it.  It seems more like he is speaking from personal experience, and there might be more trauma in his past than just his daughter's death.  That kid with the cap gun freaked him out a bit more than you would expect.   All the while, Will's visions/nightmares/trips into the upside-down are just getting worse.  No doubt we will learn more about them--and the giant shadow--shortly.