Why did the 'Stranger Things' finale hit us so hard?
Guest contributor Hannah Carapellotti reflects on the emotional aftermath of the Stranger Things finale, and the unique grief that comes with saying goodbye to fictional worlds.
It’s a few hours before midnight on New Year’s Eve, and I’m packed into an AMC screening room in Chicago for the last big event of the year: the Stranger Things finale. I’d spent my Thanksgiving and Christmas catching up on the episodes I’d missed in time for the release of the show’s fifth and final season. Now, armed with nearly $20 worth of concessions, I settle into my seat with excitement as the lights begin to dim.
Two hours later, I’m a bawling mess.
I wasn’t alone, either. My social media feed in the days following the finale was full of people experiencing the same thoughts and emotions that I did. Fans posted live reactions to big scenes, needle drops from the episode began trending, some called out plot inconsistencies, while others desperately clung to the idea that Netflix would surprise us with just one more episode.
I saw so many comments saying it felt like people were genuinely in mourning over the show ending, and it really did feel like I was watching the five stages of grief play out in real time every time I picked up my phone.
But how could we be grieving a place and people that aren’t real? Can you even call it grief?
I was only a casual watcher of Stranger Things, and it wasn’t the first time I’d shed a few tears over the end of a show I loved, but this felt like another level – and I wanted to know why. There had to be something deeper about this finale that made fans react so strongly to the screen fading to black.
Episode 8 wasn’t perfect by any means. There are certainly some questions I felt were left unanswered, even though I left the theater feeling satisfied.
Whether you loved it or hated it, I think the driving force behind it is a sense of attachment.
We’ve fallen in love with the world of Hawkins and we’ve cared about these characters for so long. Of course we want to feel like everything we’ve invested was worth it, to feel peace in leaving them behind. But goodbyes don’t always work that way. After all, they say grief is just love with nowhere to go.
Grief is most often associated with the physical loss of a person, but it takes so many other forms. We mourn our pets. A romantic relationship or a friendship coming to an end is a loss in its own way, even if those people are still alive.
Grief can also be more abstract. Maybe you’re grieving someone who isn’t dead, but you can’t stop thinking about the fact that someday, they will be. Maybe you feel a strong sense of loss for a time in your life or a version of yourself that you can never go back to.
Is grief acceptable when what we’re mourning is fictional? I don’t think that’s a question with a defining answer. But that doesn’t change the fact that so many of us are feeling it.
One thing I think Stranger Things did well in its finale is the closing of its character arcs, and I don’t mean just showing us where everyone ended up after the Upside Down. For a show that’s rooted so much in nostalgia, it perfectly captured what it’s like to be on the brink of a new beginning and having to say goodbye to everything you’ve known and loved for so long. I think that’s the other reason why it’s resonating with fans so hard.
Just think about how much time has passed since the first episode: it’s been almost a decade. We’ve gone through four different presidential administrations and a global pandemic in that time. I’d just finished my freshman year of high school when Season 1 dropped, and now I’m three years out of college. I remember exactly what it was like to leave it all behind — the excitement but also the sadness that accompanied it, and the promises I made to my friends even with the knowledge that things would never be the same as they were. I have no doubt that I was not the only one in that theater reflecting on how it felt to say goodbye then, just as we all had to do now to Hawkins.
Stranger Things may have ended, but like all beloved TV shows, it will live on. Whether that’s in endless rewatches, writing fanfics or as many spin-offs as Netflix can greenlight, there will always be something to satisfy the diehard fans.
Eventually new shows will come along, too, and grab our attention in the same way. But we’ll always remember the magic of Hawkins and the ways it brought us all together — even to the point of ringing in the New Year at the movies.
Hannah Carapellotti is a Chicago-based writer who covers pop culture updates, movie reviews, reading lists, relationship retrospectives and more. Art and pop culture are staples in Hannah’s life, whether she’s posting about her favorite books on her TikTok account, crafting the perfect Letterboxd review whenever she watches a good movie, or staying up to date on anything to do with Taylor Swift. She has always been interested in how the media we consume forms our personalities and our relationships with other people. When she’s not writing, you can probably find Hannah at her local record store, watching Gilmore Girls (again), or exploring Chicago with her friends.
Find her on TikTok here, Instagram here, and Letterboxd here.
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