Stranger Things

Stranger Things is an award-winning American TV series directed by the Duffer Brothers and released in July 2016. Serving us a chilling mix of science fiction and horror, the first season stars Winona Ryder, Millie Bobby Brown, David Harbour, Funn Wolfhard, and an array of other more or less famous actors. The story revolves around a disappearance of a young boy in 1980s in a fictional town Hawkins, Indiana. The boy’s mother, his friends and the police will have to face supernatural creatures and events in order to find him and bring him back to safety. Will they succeed, or will the terrifying forces claim victory?

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Beware the Consequences of Paranormal Experiments

As far as the town’s inhabitants know, the Hawkins National Laboratory performs scientific research for the US Department of Energy. But things are not always what they seem... The scientists are in fact using human subjects to experiment with the paranormal and supernatural, and as one would expect, eventually something goes wrong. They unintentionally create a portal to the “Upside Down”, an alternate dimension which is home to powerful and not necessarily friendly creatures portrayed as humanoids with long arms and no face. Feeling the chills yet?

Let’s start at the beginning, which is when a scientist in the Hawkins Laboratory suffers an attack by an invisible creature, and 12-year-old Will, bicycling home with his friends, sees something terrifying and disappears. His mother Joyce, Jim Hopper the police chief, and Will’s friends Mike, Dustin and Lucas, all go out in search of the missing boy.

At the same time, a young girl in hospital gown appears at a local diner and tries to steal some food. Learning that her name is Eleven, Benny the owner takes pity and feeds her, after which he calls social services. An unknown woman pretending to be a social worker shows up and kills him. Eleven escapes as a group of armed men searches the premises to capture her.

The girl is in fact a human test subject the scientists from Hawkins Laboratory have been experimenting on. We’ll later learn that her mother Terry was exposed to a series of dubious testing exercises while pregnant, only to have her daughter kidnapped at birth. Eleven has consequently acquired psychokinetic abilities which she was expected to use for evil but instead employs in helping Will’s friends save the unfortunate youngster.

An Alternate Dimension Populated by Monsters

Will's mother receives mysterious phone calls and believes she recognises her son’s voice, hears music playing in his room, and even sees creatures moving through the walls. At one point she will hear him speaking out of the living room wall, tear off the wallpaper to see her son behind a kind of membrane, but further attempts to reach him only result in demolishing her house and finding herself on her front porch. The two, however, manage to establish a light code which Will uses to let his mum know he’s alive, even if not safe. This will come in handy as Will’s body apparently turns up at a quarry.

Having found Eleven while searching for their friend, Mike, Dustin and Lucas take the girl to Mike’s home. Gradually they learn that Will has been stuck in an alternate dimension and threatened by a monster similar to demon prince featured in Dungeons & Dragons. The little group, helped by Joyce and Hopper, manage to enter the Upside Down and find the missing boy. Will they defeat the monster and escape unharmed? Watch the show and find out!