Stranger Things Season 3: Recapping the Summer of Change, Part 1

By Christie | July 5, 2019

The kids are growing up, the adults are struggling to move on, and one big monster is not yet done with them, or our world.

Stranger Things, the Netflix phenomenon that combines 80s pop culture and popular story tropes with new horror heights, dropped its latest season on July Fourth (Happy Birthday, America!).

The third season’s promo line is “The Summer Everything Changes.” And the season is chock-full of change, even if the show’s structure is getting a bit staid. And the ending left me shook.

So lets talk about the first 4 episodes — what was good, what was bad, and what was bitchin.’

First, a quick refresher.

Stranger Things takes place in the 1980s in the town of Hawkins, Indiana. It features four boys, Will (Noah Schnapp), Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin), who are trying to navigate growing up in the USA while also battling the demons of a parallel dimension that was discovered by a secret government organization that also created a super human named Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown).

They’re aided by Police Chief Jim Hopper (David Harbour), now Eleven’s adopted Dad, Will’s mom Joyce (Winona Ryder), Will’s brother Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), Mike’s sister Nancy  (Natalia Dyer), Nancy’s ex, Steve (Joe Keery), and skateboarding friend (and Lucas’s girlfriend) Max (Sadie Sink).

BE WARNED: Spoilers are coming, though we’ll try not to spoil any major plot points. Nevertheless, if you haven’t watched the show yet and you don’t want to be spoiled, check out some of our other stories back on the front page. 

Episode 1: “Suzy, Do You Copy?”

A year has passed and it shows. The kids are sprouting, practically overnight from the way most of their clothes seem to fit. Hawkins has made some changes too — the new mall, Starcourt, is now open, and it’s killing Main Street.

But not everyone is happy. Hopper, for instance, can’t deal with all the spit Mike and Eleven are swapping.

Will is not a big fan of it either, or how Lucas and Max are always off doing their own couple thing. The party seems to be coming apart, and Dustin, who just returned from summer camp, is not helping. He’s trying to talk to his new girlfriend (Suzy) on his super-powered radio… but instead picks up a coded Russian message.

Oh yeah, and the beast that rules the Upside Down has found its way back to our world — and it’s claimed a new victim.

THE GOOD: 

As far as first episodes go, it’s a good season premiere. It’s setting the table well. And it ends with a couple bangs.

David Harbour is the one to watch this season, for my money. For me it’s normally Winona Ryder and Millie Bobby Brown (and it still is), but this season Harbour’s Hopper is at turns intense, funny, chauvinistic, tender, and at all times warm. His meltdown over El’s romance with Mike, while a bad move, is also hilariously done on his end.

THE BAD:

First off, the Hawkins Post newsroom. We are a long way from Woodward, Bernstein and Ben Bradlee, folks. Nancy and Jonathan are working internships at the paper, and Nancy is treated poorly. Now, she’s an intern, getting coffee and sandwiches is something interns, in the old days at least, might do.

Still, the level of misogyny makes me ill. I want bad things to happen to Jake Busey’s character. Mouth-breathers, all of them!

Also, that scene where the gang surprises Dustin with the moving toys and he sprays hairspray into Lucas’s eyes. Why wouldn’t Dustin even consider that Eleven might be the cause of the toys moving on their own?

While the episode is a good season setter, the pace is slow. Annoyingly so. The season’s structure mimmicks the first two seasons. The repetition is tiresome.

THE BITCHIN’:

The mall makes me feel all kinds of childhood things. I loved malls as a kid, because I lived in a mostly rural area, and malls had EVERYTHING. I miss those malls!

Eleven’s growth as a normal human being. She’s come a long way from the days of the shaved head and wearing Nancy’s old dress and not understanding simple concepts.

That Nancy and Jonathan are working at a newspaper is a natural progression from their sleuthing and I am here for it.

And finally — did women really get all dolled up to go to the community pool in the 80s? I don’t remember. Mike’s mom Karen even goes for a swim and her makeup is perfect. It was creepy. Not the creepiest thing in the episode, but it was up there.

Episode 2: “The Mall Rats”

Hopper’s feeling pretty good after he puts the fear of God in Mike, which leads to chaos between Mike and Eleven. El seeks advice and companionship from Max, which is good for El, bad for her relationship to Mike.

Steve and Dustin reconnect and try to decipher the Russian message Dustin intercepted. This is where new castmember Robin (Maya Hawke) comes in.

Meanwhile, Max’s stepbrother Billy is getting used to having a monster that’s not him inside his body. It’s not just the mall that’s the center of the episode and the season… rats are a big part of the story, and it’s gross and cruel, but… monsters, amirite?

And Joyce, Nancy and Jonathan, separately, are starting to make the first connections that there’s a new problem in Hawkins. Which is convenient for Joyce, because now she can get out of her date with Hopper (even if it’s not a date, but it was totally supposed to be a date).

THE GOOD:

Joyce as normal 80s mom is frustrating for me. She’s so spacey and she never seems to know where her kids are!

However, Joyce as the show’s number one Cassandra and badass theorist is my top reason for loving this show. She’s like Sarah Connor from the Terminator franchise, but not as apocalyptic. She wants to believe the world is a good place and their aren’t monsters trying to take her children or kill her boyfriend (RIP Bob the Brain).

But if she thinks something bad is about to happen she goes into a beast-destroying, evil government fighting mode that is a sight to behold. I love Joyce and I love Winona Ryder as Joyce.

El and Max going shopping was great because it felt like a different friend dynamic from the boys. The realistic nature of these friendships is one of the things that makes you come back each episode.

The Steve-Dustin bromance continues and I can’t help but feel that Dustin has changed Steve way more than Steve has influenced Dustin.

THE BAD:

The lack of communication among the teens!!!! It ruins everything! I blame their parents, they don’t really communicate either.

Lack of communication is also becoming a crutch for the writers, I feel. One season is one thing, but every season it’s a plot device, and it’s getting old.

The way Hopper kowtows to the mayor (played by a very sleazy Cary Elwes this season) regarding the mall protesters is a bit disappointing.

I know that their relationships are a big concern right now, but the way Lucas and Mike treat Will is really sad. They just sort of leave him behind. It’s wrong.

THE BITCHIN’:

Robin proves her worth in episode 2. She’s not just there to be dismissive of Steve. She has depth, and purpose, and is smarter than Steve and Dustin put together, which is saying something since Dustin is pretty smart.

I love that mall so much. They have Sam Goody and Waldenbooks! And do they have a Ground Round restaurant? I LOVED The Ground Round growing up!

Science teacher Mr. Clark makes an appearance this episode, and it’s so great. He’s spending his summer painting mini-figures and listening to Weird Al Yankovic. Sounds like how I spent some of my summers (ahem).

Episode 3: “The Case of the Missing Lifeguard”

Billy (the Mind Flayer) is expanding his army, and El and Max are suspicious enough to investigate.

Will is over obsessing over girls, and tries to get the guys to play a D&D quest, which does not work out the way he hoped.

Joyce and Hopper investigate whether the government is back in Hawkins Lab with a new science project.

The third episode is the one where all the different groups — the boys, the girls, the adults, Dustin and Steve and Robin, and Nancy and Jonathan, start to recognize a larger danger at foot.

Just like the last season. By the end of the episode, most of them know what it is too.

The loss of innocence theme also plays into this episode in a big way, particularly with Will. I think there is also an inference that he actually may be gay.

Another theme for the overall season is big this episode: boys are dumb.

THE GOOD:

Will the Wise wakes up his friends for the D&D quest with music — and it’s the Podling song from The Dark Crystal. It took me two viewings to figure it out, but it made my nerd heart happy.

The conversation between Hopper and Joyce at Hawkins lab is intimate and well-acted. Like a breakthrough between them. Hopper wants to date Joyce. He wants to protect her and her family. She doesn’t get it though and that’s sad.

“Don’t you think you should move on from primitive constructs such as popularity?” Dustin is smarter than Steve and probably most of the adults in Hawkins. Except Robin.

THE BAD:

Hopper not trusting Joyce is another one of those lazy plot devices. Joyce has been right every time she starts investigating these theories of hers. Why would he just assume that she’s using it as an excuse to blow off their date? I feel like he should know her too well at this point.

Nancy’s continued mistreatment on the paper is tough to watch, but she’s also making some ethical mistakes as a journalist that I find bothersome. Lying to Mrs. Driscoll for a start and several local businesses about her position with the paper for a start.

But then again, she’s calling these businesses and telling them she’s a reporter. It’s a small town. That’s been drilled into this from the very beginning. No one would recognize that’s odd?

I dunno, I guess I don’t buy anymore that all these adults are continuously oblivious to things going on in this town.

THE BITCHIN’: 

Eleven is so comfortable with her powers. She’s just the girl next door with telekinetic abilities.

Steve’s and Dustin’s comedic stakeout of the mall.

Robin breaking the code because she’s brilliant.

Episode 4: “The Sauna Test”

The kids (minus Dustin) try to capture Billy and see if they can draw the Mind Flayer out of him.

Both Jonathan and Nancy are fired from the paper after Mrs. Driscoll is hospitalized, leading to a big fight between the two.

Hopper and Joyce take their concerns about the Russians at the Hawkins Lab building straight to the mayor… because he’s been helping the Russians “expand.”

And Dustin, Steve and Robin try to get into whatever the Russians are hiding at the mall, requiring them to bring on another teammate — Erica, Lucas’s boisterous sister (Priah Ferguson).

THE GOOD:

Hopper kicking the crap out of Mayor Kline was satisfying. Joyce was her usual badass self. That always makes me happy.

I both love and hate Erica. She’s sassy and strong and knows her worth. She’s also annoying and awfully stereotypical.

The fight between Jonathan and Nancy rings awfully true in 2019… Jonathan is a man from a poor background who is working hard to make something of himself.

Nancy is an upper middle-class woman who has had every opportunity thrust her way, who thinks she should be listened to by the newspaper staff. But she is also being constantly demeaned because she is a woman.

Both say they just don’t understand each other, but really — they need to realize they’re both being held down by crappy people, just in different ways.

The fight also leads to an amazing heart-to-heart between Nancy and her mom Karen, where we get to the heart of Karen’s whole character. She’s a woman who could have been anything, but she went with the traditional path because it was what was expected of her as a woman.  Nancy has in the past sort of disparaged her mom because of this. Now she sees her in a different light.

It’s all part of a fourth theme I see throughout this season — woman rule!

THE BAD:

Starcourt is a Russian plot to get at Hawkins lab to open the portal to the Upside Down. I suppose we should have suspected that but it still seems a bit weak.

Cary Elwes is gross as Mayor Kline. Just scummy. Which is great acting, but he gives me the heebie-jeebies.

THE BITCHIN’:

This episode is really good and feels like the point in the season where the story finally picks up.

Eleven continues to kick ass with her powers.

Not that it’s cool, but the power of the Mind Flayer this season is incredible. The way he has basically created a hive is frightening and creepy and cool to watch all at the same time.

And I love the use of “We’ll Meet Again” at the end. It adds extra creepiness.

Finished the season? Check out part 2 of my Stranger Things season 3 review.

PS: The women of Stranger Things ruled this season. Check out the latest Women of the Week article to find out why!