Welcome to this week’s installment of the Summer TV Binge of Stranger Things, looking back at season two, episode eight, released October 27, 2017:
“Chapter Eight: The Mind Flayer”
Written and directed by the Duffer Bros.
On this episode, Jonathan, Nancy, Steve, Dustin, Lucas and Max reunite, and find the lab has gone into lockdown after being invaded by the Demogorgons. Bob volunteers to go to the basement to reset the circuit breakers and reopen the doors, allowing Joyce, Hopper, Mike, Will, and Dr. Owens to escape.
1. Billy Gets Bullied
Billy and Max’s parents, Neil and Susan, return home, and ask Billy to explain Max’s absence. He protests he’s not his sister’s keeper, claiming she’s “not [even] my sister,” causing Neil to grab and beat him for indirectly insulting his stepmother, and to order him to go and find Max. Billy was certainly out-of-line, but that doesn’t justify Neil’s physical abuse, or any of the other demeaning and vile language he uses (eg. he calls him a “faggot.”) It’s striking to see Billy being afraid of someone else, apologizing, and not fighting back: he holds back tears, suggesting he’s truly terrified of his father, and that Neil has always been an abusive parent. You understand why Billy is such an asshole, and how envious he must be that Max has found friends outside their dysfunctional family.
2. Oh No, Not Bob
Bob steps up to make sure those closest to him can leave the building: it’s so much fun seeing him mock Hopper, after the sheriff insists on going to the basement despite not having the required knowledge of BASIC, and asking him to teach him (“Shall I teach you French while I’m at it, Jim?,” Bob quips, “How about a little German?”), proving nerds can get the last laugh. Bob manages to restore the power, unlock the doors, and outwit and outrun the young Demogorgons (with the help of Dr. Owens, who nobly stays behind to watch the surveillance footage.) He makes it to the lobby after slamming an automatically locking door on one of the hunters, and turns and smiles at Joyce.
Then, bam: another Demogorgon pounces and tears into him. Hopper tries to intervene and fires a rifle, but realizes they’re surrounded, and grabs Joyce and flees, leaving Bob to his fate. It’s gut wrenching to see such a kind and loveable character be killed off so cruelly like that, and the Duffers really do rub salt in the wound with the final shot of Bob’s corpse being devoured to confirm he is dead. It is also all the more impactful given how much time was spent on Bob evading the little monsters, because it would’ve made him surviving feel more earned: but no, someone we loved had to die this season, and it turned out to be the show’s biggest sweetheart.
3. The Gang Gets Back Together
Like the penultimate episode of the first season, this chapter focuses on the scattered cast getting back together, sharing what they’ve learned, and figuring out their next step, a welcome breather after the drama and excitement of the first half hour. Mike explains what happened to Will, leading Dustin to dub the shadow monster the Mind Flayer (after the psychic Dungeons & Dragons monsters), and we also get a new name for the juvenile Demogorgons: Demodogs. Hopper gets irritated with Dustin for consulting a D&D sourcebook (“Great. So how do you kill this thing? Shoot it with fireballs?”), and Nancy and Mike both intuit you need to kill the Mind Flayer to shut down its army.
Realizing they need to hide their location from the Mind Flayer/Will’s peering eyes, the group gets to work tarping up the shed, where they’ll coax Will’s consciousness back to life for information on their adversary. Nancy compliments Steve for his babysitting skills; Dustin and Lucas make up, with Dustin conceding he could feel the “electricity” between Lucas and Max in the junkyard; and Max tells Mike she understands why he thought El was irreplaceable, though he still behaves like a dick to her. Sigh — still, the joy of simply watching all these characters catch up with each other is a testament to how compelling and well written they all are.
Continued below4. It’s Called Disquieting for a Reason
In-between Hopper making his phone call to the feds, and the gang figuring what to do, everyone is left awfully quiet after Bob’s death: Hopper decides to sit opposite Joyce, trying to be a balm for her, but unable to say anything, because what can he say? It reminded me of a lot of the passage in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, where C.S. Lewis describes how grief can make you feel like nothing will ever happen again.
Similarly, when Joyce, Jonathan, and Mike try to pull Will out of his possession by sharing old memories, the scene is so slowly paced (without any music), that it really feels like nothing’s happening, until Hopper notices Will is tapping a Morse code signal on his chair. Then, Jonathan grabs his cassette player and puts on the Clash’s “Should I Stay or Should I Go,” segueing into a montage where everyone shares a memory, encouraging him to continue tapping a message, which eventually reads “close gate.” This episode is ultimately a really great example of how much pacing defines the tone in a piece of storytelling.
5. She’s Baaack!
Unfortunately, the Byers’ phone goes off, informing the Mind Flayer they’re all at Will’s home. Everyone braces themselves for a huge Demodog attack, but the first one to launch through the window is, well, dead. The front locks open by themselves, and the door opens up to reveal Eleven, still sporting her dark clothes and make-up from Chicago. Mike and El gaze at each other in awe and joy, thrilled to be finally reunited with each other, an ending that leaves you so elated that you almost certainly don’t notice the next episode starting. It’s fascinating how Eleven is so removed from this episode that you forget she’s the only one who can telekinetically unlock a door like that, but it’s definitely a welcome surprise.
Other Things:
– The opening, where the hapless lab scientists trying to escape in the elevator before being slaughtered by the Demodogs, echoes the first scene in the series, where the scientist fleeing the Demogorgon was pulled up by it through the shaft.
– Would Bob have survived if he didn’t leave the pistol Hopper recovered in the basement? It’s impossible to know, but forgetting about his weapon was ultimately another example of how he was completely (and sadly) unprepared for a violent situation like this.
– Max calls herself a “zoomer,” which since the season’s release has been popularized as slang for a member of Generation Z (people born from the late ’90s to the early ’10s); back in the ’80s, it meant someone moving really fast, ie. a skateboarder like her.
– It’s fascinating how black the possessed Will’s eyes are despite how strong the lighting is during his “interrogation”: contacts, CG, or an unusual trick of the camera? In any case, the way the brown in his eyes subtly returns is a small but great piece of additional storytelling.
– The “rainbow ship” that Joyce says Will designed with the crayons he got for his birthday is probably another reason Lonnie called his son “queer.”
– If you look closely at Steve during the ending, you’ll realize he’s doing his best not to look confused, because he’s never met Eleven until now.
See you all next week for “Chapter Nine: The Gate.”
