00:00I do send voice notes to my friends and they can voice up those.
00:02What, are they like, please don't do this, I'm going to have a nightmare.
00:04Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:06Who's going to die? Who's going to get killed off?
00:07And you as writers, you can wield the axe at any time,
00:10and you kind of have it with the main cast.
00:11People have a bloodlust, which they seem to have.
00:14Your personal most surprising moments of the season.
00:17Can I have a word from each of you to sum that up?
00:19Oh, man.
00:21The...
00:24This is Streamline, your weekly guide to what's actually worth watching
00:28across film, TV, and everything in between.
00:31I'm Jacob Stowe, the chief film and TV correspondent,
00:34and I'm filling in for Eliza this week,
00:35who I believe might be trapped in The Upside Down.
00:38Now, let's talk Stranger Things and the end of an era.
00:43Almost.
00:44We have a plan. It's a bit insane.
00:47Yeah, what could go wrong?
00:49No idea, but I think we should find out.
00:51Volume one is out now, volume two drops on Christmas Day,
00:54and the final ever episode airs on New Year's Eve.
00:57This might be the most drawn-out finale in TV history.
01:01But it does give you the perfect excuse to dip out of Christmas dinner
01:05just after the pigs in blanket,
01:07and before your uncle summons the spirit of Nigel Farage.
01:10For those of you who are playing catch-up,
01:11Stranger Things follows a group of young friends
01:13who band together to defeat supernatural forces
01:16in the small town of Hawkins, Indiana.
01:19In the final season, the group tried to hunt down and kill Vecna,
01:22the entity behind all the terrifying and deadly chaos unleashed upon Hawkins.
01:27Everyone in?
01:30I want to see Vecna's heart on a platter.
01:34A lot's happened to the cast since the season four finale dropped three years ago.
01:38Joseph Quinn and Sadie Sink joined the MCU,
01:41Millie Bobby Brown became a mum,
01:43and David Harbour, well, I don't think anyone needs reminding of what happened there.
01:47You have a lot of nerve showing up here.
01:50What?
01:50The season four finale clocked in at a humble two hours and 20 minutes,
01:54so here's a very brief recap of everything you need to remember.
01:58Vecna tries to open a massive rift between Hawkins and the Upside Down by killing Max.
02:03Eleven revives her, but the damage is done.
02:06The portal tears open, Hawkins is a war zone,
02:09Max is in a coma, and Vecna is nowhere to be seen.
02:12Now, while I couldn't find Vecna,
02:14I did track down Jamie Campbell-Boer to ask him how he brought the villain to life.
02:18And before you ask...
02:19No, I'm not going to do it in Vecna's voice.
02:21No!
02:21I had to ask, I had to ask.
02:24One day I'm going to see you in a pub and I'm going to be like,
02:26say something in Vecna's voice.
02:29I do send voice notes to my friends in Vecna's voice sometimes.
02:31What are they like?
02:32Please don't do this, I'm going to have a nightmare.
02:34Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
02:35You've probably spoken about the voice a lot, but I am fascinated to know your technique.
02:41That is your voice?
02:42It is.
02:43Yeah.
02:43Wow.
02:44So what techniques do you have to kind of draw that voice from within?
02:46Just listen to a lot of Tom Waits.
02:51That beggars the conversation, Tom Waits conversation,
02:53which we don't have time for.
02:54We don't have time for that either.
02:55I spent a long time crafting it and it started with this thing of like,
03:02we hear this deep booming voice come out of the darkness and that's a really good starting point.
03:07And then I was trying things on for size.
03:09And again, I came back to Doug Bradley as Pinhead.
03:12The box, you opened it, we came.
03:17And it really was that grounding moment because I think Pinhead's such a beautiful character with
03:21regards to everything that he does is done with purpose.
03:24He's not one of those villains that's like running around chasing people.
03:28He's very considered, very precise.
03:30And the way Doug used his voice for that particular film or those particular first three movies is so
03:35beautiful.
03:36But I'm a singer too.
03:37So a lot of it was the idea of just relaxing, being able to be relaxed, opening up the larynx,
03:42using the diaphragm to make sure that it wasn't too forced.
03:46Because obviously when you force everything, your vocal cords close up and you get stressed out.
03:50Whereas when you're more relaxed, it's down here and open.
03:53I saw a means to realize my potential.
03:58There's a reason you hide from them.
04:02Stranger Things is Netflix's biggest cultural phenomenon.
04:05Not bad for a show that was actually rejected ten times before it got picked up.
04:09Fast forward nine years and it spawned a global fan base.
04:12It's own stage play, comic book franchise and of course, there's a spin-off in the works.
04:17Season four smashed a record for most views of an English language series in just one week.
04:23With a total of 7.2 billion minutes watched.
04:26That's 13,000 years of tweens fighting interdimensional goo.
04:30Pretty wild.
04:31And season five shows no signs of slowing down.
04:34Each episode costs reportedly between 50 to 60 million dollars and is between 90 to 120 minutes long.
04:41With huge success comes ridiculous pressure.
04:44I spoke to creators the Duffer Brothers about the stresses of bringing one of the biggest
04:48and most beloved shows of our time to an end and the legacy they hope it will leave behind.
04:53The pressure of ending a show that's as big as Stranger Things, I can't even imagine.
04:57What needs to happen for you guys to be satisfied with the legacy of Stranger Things?
05:01Oh my god. Well, I mean, something like that you don't know.
05:04I mean, we're really happy with how it ends.
05:06I mean, it all kind of comes down in so many ways to the last, you know, 10 minutes of the show.
05:11So we're really proud of that, but we were always aware of the fact that, you know,
05:16if you don't get that, you know, last 10 minutes or last half hour right, it doesn't matter how good the rest of it is.
05:23That's where we started. And when we were working on the season, we started there.
05:28We spent weeks on that, making sure we were happy with that and our writers were happy with it.
05:33And then we started from the beginning and outwards.
05:35I hope the fans are happy and satisfied with the ending.
05:40That's sort of, that's really the goal more than anything.
05:44I hope that it's one of those shows that people can look back on in years to come and remember exactly
05:49where they were when they first saw it and keep coming back to it.
05:53I have shows like that from my childhood, things like Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
05:57When I see them on planes, I'm like, oh my God, nostalgia, bring me back.
06:01But I think also one of the great things about it from people that I've met and from experiences
06:05that I've had and some of which have been highly emotional experiences is it's been that show
06:12that has like brought people together and either friends or family and loved ones.
06:17And that's a really beautiful thing.
06:20I hope that that memory is pervasive for people for a very long time.
06:25One small criticism the show has faced, sometimes gently, sometimes with intense rage
06:31burning through the pages of Reddit, is its reluctance to kill off its main characters.
06:35It's rare for a drama of this scale to have all the main lot make it through to the end.
06:39I mean, more of them should be dead by now.
06:42I'm just saying.
06:42But for the Duffers, this show was never about the dramatic death.
06:46We don't want to just be killing people for shock value.
06:49Of course, it's easy.
06:49We could kill anyone off at any point very easily.
06:51It's not difficult.
06:53It's more about the repercussions that that would have for all of our other characters.
06:59And at its heart, this show is a coming of age story, but it's also an adventure story.
07:03And so this isn't Game of Thrones.
07:05It's a very different type of story than we're telling.
07:08So we just need to make sure if and when we do it, it doesn't alter the tone of the show
07:13in a way that we don't want.
07:15We're just always trying to think ahead and not just doing it to shock people.
07:20Or because people have a bloodlust, which they seem to have.
07:23I mean, in terms of who came the closest, probably Hopper came the closest at the end of 3.
07:28And I think it was just hard for us to let go of that character.
07:33And obviously, you know, we talked about Max.
07:35But Max, you know, it's just kind of like that's a good example, Max, in terms of it sort of
07:41would defeat the purpose of her growth that entire year.
07:46It's like she goes through all of that just to die.
07:50It just feels mean.
07:51And it feels like it goes against what you've been trying to say.
07:56Stranger Things isn't just ending a story.
07:58It's closing a chapter of modern pop culture,
08:01especially because we watched the cast grow up in real time.
08:04No, it was your first kiss. Is that right?
08:06Yep.
08:07It was what?
08:08It reshaped how genre television works, revived 80s nostalgia,
08:12launched half a dozen acting careers and made Kate Bush a global chart-topper again.
08:17And since there are only 35 hours of Stranger Things,
08:21if you cancel all your plans and start right now, you'll be all caught up by Christmas.
08:25While Jamie and the Duffers were under strict instruction by Netflix
08:28to give nothing away about the final season.
08:30Oh, man.
08:32They did promise surprises ahead.
08:34There was an experience that we had that's later on in the show,
08:41where I can't wait to talk more about it.
08:46But it was a, uh, uh, uh, yes.
08:51That's all I can give you.
08:52Can you say a word?
08:52Just watching me.
08:53Can I say a word?
08:54Um, uh, ah, is the word.
08:56Ah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
08:58Well, look, thank you for, you, you successfully got through this without giving anything away.
09:02Yes.
09:02Relax now.
09:03This has been Streamline.
09:05Let us know in the comments section what you're hoping or dreading about the final season.
09:09Who do you think is actually making it out of Hawkins Alive?
09:11Don't forget to like and subscribe.
09:13And we'll be back next week with more recommendations just for you.
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