# Stranger Things - Final Season
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Tags:** tv-shows-scripted, netflix
**Created:** [July 16, 2025, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926 "2025-07-16T17:13:16Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 9
### Author:  [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/161 "2026-01-09T19:23:31Z")
So, the finale is behind us. I’m left with one main question.
What in the world was up with Nancy and Jonathan…unengaging? Engaging-to-not-date?
What was up with that? I don’t get that scene at all.
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### Author:  [@Pork\_Rind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pork_Rind)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/162 "2026-01-09T19:31:47Z")
They realized that they had been on diverging paths for some time and had been hanging on out of fear of change. They broke up. Duffers have confirmed this.
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### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/163 "2026-01-09T19:46:03Z")
It was a breakup scene - a couple realizing that they don’t work as a couple and deciding to be friends instead. I found it heartwarming.
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### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/164 "2026-01-09T19:54:03Z")
Me too.
I’m not sure whether I’m an anomaly for action fans, but for me, action works best as a grace-note to character interactions. When percussive bursts of violence are interrupted by long scenes of intense dialogue, I’m at my happiest (and _Heat_ is therefore the best action movie of all time, fight me). When the percussive bursts are the main storytelling, I lose interest.
That scene could so easily have gone wrong. So many other shows would have had them realize they were about to die, and either get engaged or enact an informal wedding ceremony so that they could die as husband and wife–and then come out the other side, bashful and married and having to tell everyone.
The fact that their impending doom instead spurred them to break up in the most loving way possible was genius, and one of my favorite scenes of the final season.
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### Author:  [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/165 "2026-01-09T21:32:02Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#):
>
> The fact that their impending doom instead spurred them to break up in the most loving way possible was genius, and one of my favorite scenes of the final season.
You can also see things building up to it. Johnathan planning to propose, because they are constantly being thrust into situations together, and it just seemed inevitable.
I don’t remember if it was he or Nancy that said it, but it was stated that shared trauma should not be the basis for a relationship. That is just absolutely true and I think it really happens.
I think it was also a deliberate rejection of a common trope you see in television… The protagonist couple has to keep progressing into marriage. Unless something dramatic happens, like a betrayal. But instead, they treated the situation like real adults, realized that their relationship wasn’t healthy, and decided it was better for both of them to find lives apart from each other. And it was done with no animosity; rather, they were both so relieved and breaking up made their relationship stronger.
I also can identify with that. When my first wife and I divorced after 7 years of marriage, it was amicable, mutual, and we got along _much_ better afterward. We have now been divorced for 17 years, but we are in each others’ lives because we have a daughter. We still will share stories about cool things each other would like, when she needs help with something she knows she can ask me and I won’t hesitate to help, and next year she will be coming out here to visit, hang out with my mom (her ex-MIL), and of course our daughter will come too and split her time here between doing things with her mom and doing things with me. There is no awkwardness, my wife gets along with my ex as well, and was very encouraging of it all.
That is how real life is. Not every breakup is tragic and dramatic. Sometimes it’s peaceful and a relief. How often do you see that portrayed in media?
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### Author:  [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/166 "2026-01-09T21:33:05Z")
> [@Alessan](#):
>
> It was a breakup scene - a couple realizing that they don’t work as a couple and deciding to be friends instead. I found it heartwarming.
I’m disappointed I guess. I had the two of them as being together. It worked fine enough, I guess.
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### Author:  [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)
#### Post date: [January 9, 2026, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/167 "2026-01-09T21:37:56Z")
If it makes you feel better, I understand that the actors are still a couple IRL.
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### Author:  [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2026, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/168 "2026-01-11T18:11:57Z")
> [@GargoyleWB](#):
>
> I rolled my eyes at the Rambo-izing of Natalie Dyer into a heavy weapons soldier, it would have been acceptably believable on just about any other actor in the cast. I can happily accept the waif-fu of Buffy and Firefly, for example, but this was a waif too far for suspension of disbelief.
>
> Linda Hamilton’s storyline was left unresolved
Funny you should mention Linda Hamilton right after saying you found Natalia Dyer’s character’s transformation hard to believe. I imagine that Linda Hamilton was chosen as part of the cast in part because of her legacy with the apex sci-fi dystopian movie franchise of the 80s / 90s. Her Sarah Conner character underwent a similar transformation from an ordinary, unassuming young woman to a hardened guerilla fighting against Skynet. I don’t see why, in the world of dystopian sci-fi logic, it’s difficult to believe Nancy Wheeler could have the same character arc.
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### Author:  [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2026, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/169 "2026-01-11T18:14:42Z")
Yeah. The whole show is an homage to movies from the 1980s. I thought that was an homage to Sigourney Weever, but Linda Hamilton (duh) makes more sense.
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### Author:  [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2026, 6:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/170 "2026-01-11T18:16:51Z")
No shortage of Alien/Aliens homages though, up to including a redemption character for Paul Reiser. But the kids trapped in the Mind Flayer was very Aliens-like.
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### Author:  [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2026, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/171 "2026-01-11T18:25:03Z")
For sure @Elmer_J.Fudd , no shortage of Alien/Aliens references. And I wasn’t even thinking of the Paul Reiser actor connection until W\_E just pointed it out.
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### Author:  [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2026, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/172 "2026-01-11T18:36:09Z")
We just finished it. I have deliberately avoided any discussion of S5 to prevent spoilers.
I liked it. I thought the world building made some amount of (fantasy) sense. I thought the action was great, although the plot armor was pretty thick.
I had re-watched s1-4 over the summer, so the storyline was familiar to me.
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### Author:  [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2026, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/173 "2026-01-11T19:32:52Z")
I mostly saw negative reactions to the finale over the Internet and was expecting something pretty dumb. Glad to see that the thread, here, largely agrees that they landed the plane pretty well. Certainly far better than the whole super science underground Soviet base, hidden below a US military station on US soil that no one noticed!
I’d guess that the broader Internet didn’t like the ambiguity of El’s fate?
But yeah, overall a better ending than I’d have expected from the middle period of the show.
One question though: If all of them must had magic inherited from Henry, and both El and Kali could be completely shut down by the boom boxes… Why not just point a speaker at Henry and the giant spider?
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### Author:  [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)
#### Post date: [January 11, 2026, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/174 "2026-01-11T19:42:18Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> I mostly saw negative reactions to the finale over the Internet and was expecting something pretty dumb. Glad to see that the thread, here, largely agrees that they landed the plane pretty well. Certainly far better than the whole super science underground Soviet base, hidden below a US military station on US soil that no one noticed!
This was a great opportunity to pretend the internet doesn’t exist. If MASH had its finale today, people would complain.
It’s a great finale. The internet is just never pleased.
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### Author:  [@zbuzz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zbuzz)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2026, 9:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/175 "2026-01-12T09:42:48Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#):
>
> I thought that was an homage to Sigourney Weever, but Linda Hamilton (duh) makes more sense.
Nancy’s season 5 hair was definitely a Ripley homage.
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### Author:  [@zbuzz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zbuzz)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2026, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/176 "2026-01-12T09:57:25Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> Certainly far better than the whole super science underground Soviet base, hidden below a US military station on US soil that no one noticed!
You mean Starcourt Mall?
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### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2026, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/177 "2026-01-12T14:01:15Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#):
>
> I’d guess that the broader Internet didn’t like the ambiguity of El’s fate?
On Reddit, over and over I saw people saying things like, “If the Duffer Brothers want us to decide what El’s fate is, why did they bother writing a show, why not just ask us to write it ourselves?” These people do not understand the value of ambiguity. It’s not that they don’t like it–they don’t understand it at all.
I love a well-done ambiguous ending, and I thought this one was really well-done.
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### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2026, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/178 "2026-01-12T14:30:36Z")
I’m not crazy about ambiguous endings myself, but the ST ending was what I’d call “non-ambiguous ambiguous” - it feinted toward ambiguity, but we were clearly supposed to believe that it actually happened that way.
That said, I’d have loved it at the very end, they’d show us El alive - but in the Abyss, surrounded by thousands of demogorgons… all of which then bow to her, their new queen.
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### Author:  [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2026, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/179 "2026-01-12T14:36:39Z")
Getting some real [Sarah Kerrigan](https://starcraft.fandom.com/wiki/Sarah_Kerrigan) vibes here.
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### Author:  [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2026, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/stranger-things-final-season/1020926/180 "2026-01-12T14:45:42Z")
> [@zbuzz](#):
>
> Nancy’s season 5 hair was definitely a Ripley homage.
Great point and for sure.
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