All that Glitters

My mother said, “if you have nothing nice to say, say nothing at all.” She didn’t, actually. But somebody did, and many have repeated it since. I confess, I am uncomfortable. I will not pretend to be a creature of such gracious loving kindness that to level criticism at my fellow man would be entirely foreign to my nature, but I will own a hesitance here. Do I have opinions that some books are shit, some movies suck and the budget for some TV shows might have been better spent on compensatory measures for the flatulence that the studio has issued forth? Of course I do. Do I own, too, that those opinions might be wrong? In almost every case, yes. Do I, in the privacy of a personal relationship, espouse these views anyway? Honestly not that often. The co-incidence of me finishing my consumption of a work of creativity and of me spending time with other humans with the mutual leisure to discuss said work is as rare as a baby panda. But I would, if life were more clement currently.

So where is the hesitance? Well, have you SEEN the world lately? I got negativity in my drinking water. I got it in the rain that falls (or doesn’t) on my roof. It’s there in the blood of babies and in samples from the polar ice. How much nicer would it feel to big up a book no-one rated, or praise a film everyone slated? Well, call me a rebel, but I’m taking this path.

Except… I like me some rules. That’s the challenge right? Write within the walls we didn’t build? Well, I am a both/and kind of gal. And so I give you…. Stranger Things!

Or rather, I give you my relationship with Stranger Things. Stranger Things was a hit by any measure. 1.2 BILLION views. I feel like that’s probably quite a big number, but given that I can’t really fathom how many 1.2 billion is, I am not certain. Anyway, it’s a couple more than my most read story on Vocal. And I feel rather like if one of us was to offer criticism to the other, it may be that either Duffer Brother might legitimately tear my writing to shreds as opposed to the other way around. Despite this, and standing on ground so shaky that I am speaking from a crouch, I, um. I thought… Well…. I thought – at times – I thought it was poorly written.

Phew it feels good to get that off my chest.

Now, I enjoyed Stranger Things. Let me just put that out there. Would recommend. 8/10 viewing experience. But I was so befuddled by the end that I can’t even say with absolute confidence that it didn’t hang together. But I didn’t feel like it did. My experience was somewhat like riding the plot around a large - sometimes upside down - hedge maze. Each time we neared what appeared to be a dead end however, rather than go back, we simply crashed through the hedge and made a new, if ragged, opening. Sometimes, it turned out that we could actually rematerialize on the other side of the hedge! Who knew! The injuries the cast get back up from! Their ability to cover ground! The emergence of new, strange and strangely opportune powers and the uncanny knack of those powers for moving things along a bit! I can only think that the team solicited audience engagement AFTER they brutally snapped every part of Max’s body before killing her outright. “We like the ginger one!” said the audience, and so Max, despite having been dead, lay in a hospital bed only threatened with death if we didn’t keep watching. And was it me, or did the efficacy of the monstrous vary considerably. I mean, I suppose that is true of all of us, one day I can tie a shoelace whilst maintaining full eye contact and an in depth discussion, and the next I might fumble over my own thumbs. The same fluctuating skills profile would probably apply should I take it upon myself to slay a group of pesky teenagers.

But here’s the thing. There was hype, there was marketing, there was the self-perpetuating snowball of fandom, and that may well have given the illusion of excellence. The populace, after-all, would surely be beguiled so by nothing less. But no one ever claimed it was high art. No one tried to sell Stranger Things as a masterstroke of storytelling. Was it over-rated? Well, what were we rating? Yes, I thought the writing was broadly akin to the cumulative addition of flimsy new walls that ultimately becomes a bustling shanty town, and the plot was the dirt tracks that weave through it. And do you know what else I thought? Stranger Things was fun. Fun, and almost entirely veneer.

The first series dragged us in with a goodly dollop of nostalgia. Décor and fashion took us some of the way, but then they added music and Winona Ryder. Once we were in, we were assailed with a gaggle of youths who may have been cast entirely for their pooled charisma, and we were then trotted around scene after scene which kept us merrily rooting for them and, frankly, not too worried if it didn’t wholly make sense because we were enjoying ourselves. It was the televisual equivalent of Christmas, with magic and fairy lights, an onslaught of items to tickle reminiscence and gold hued sentimentality, a soundtrack of hits and even a daddy figure for good measure. No one stopped to ask what the fuck a tree had to do with Jesus and why plum pudding would be on the menu. We just lapped it up and told our friends.

Any you know what? That’s ok. It’s ok to enjoy TV shows just because they are pleasing. Sure, we can talk about how and why some of these things may not merit the cultural elevation they achieve. That’s an interesting discussion. And we can find fault the piece of work. But right now, I don’t want to. There are more important places for me to apply my critical thinking skills than this. In a world where we shoot each other down so rapidly, where we other one another so easily, where we increasingly encounter creativity lousy with the voice of large language models, I would sooner applaud someone’s creative endeavour, warts and all, particularly where it brought so many people together. I know, I know, there are counter-arguments. The lactate of a tired cash cow. Opium for the masses. I know. And yes, I know that when I finished Stranger Things, I felt a gnawing sense emptiness, like I’d filled up on tortilla chips and salsa because someone said that was dinner. But I enjoyed that salsa. It was sweet, and spicy, and reminded me all at once of my grandfather growing tomatoes, and how it feels to step into an unplanned night in the company of die-for-you friends.