As for spoilers, one of the worst rated episodes of this series has finally come to have some importance in the story.
I always knew it would resurface this way. I never bought for a second they'd written that off completely, despite the public outcry. I just kept yelling in the back of my head "But there's another one out there!" LOL
- There's way too much exposition for my liking. Lots of scenes where characters seem to get a "hunch" about something, and/or explain things back and forth to one another. All of this feels like it's for the convenience of viewers who are slow on the uptake, as if they started with the expectation that everyone would be watching on a second screen while doing their laundry and not pay attention to nuance.
I agree they've shoehorned in quite a lot of exposition & contrivance, but IMHO the show's always had contrivances like that. It's honestly not a perfectly written show. Never has been. It's even somewhat pedestrian at times. However, it IS still a really good show regardless. It ought to be for $480 million, for 8 episodes of tv show.
These kind of contrivances are becoming very standard in modern content anyhow. For a myriad of reasons, no one trusts the intelligence, recall, or imagination of there audience anymore, & one can hardly blame them, in modern times lol, but I sure do miss the days when we (especially US) were given credit for having thinking minds of our own.
But it still looks & sounds fantastic, & they've got quite a number of excellent cast members to make up for the shortcomings imho. (Schnapp has always impressed me) & even the ones who aren't as good aren't mucking things up much, this round. Experience has been helpful there, I think. Plus, they drew Frank Darabont out of retirement, for god's sake. C'mon.
Was thinking the same. He is trying to create lieutenants.
Maybe, but I'm not entirely sure about that, OR if it's him needing to draw mental power from others, to overpower Jane, who vanquished him to begin with, & because of that,
she might now need to rely on Kali & Will to combat his increased power, from syphoning brain power off these kids. Hopefully Max & Holly, in there, are also a factor in at least partially dismantling what he's amassing, in some way (like maybe that mega-wall housing them)
All in all, it's been enjoyable. I'm pleased with the direction for Will Byers. I was on the fence as to whether he'd go one way or the other, & this is by far preferable... so far. It's rather in line with the basic nostalgia factor of the show, instead of modern tendencies to do the opposite, & go dark with their heros, for artificially inflated conflict, before redeeming them. They still could do that. I'm hoping they don't.
I kind of suspected, in a way, that we'd be where we are with Max also, and I'm here for that too. I'm fond that Murray & others can still bring in some comedy. Heck, even
Breaking Bad had to sacrifice that by the end. I
didn't see the Holly (& other kid stuff) coming & it's been interesting. I probably should've seen it coming, what with some of the other kids he'd possessed.
There's probably some more interesting twists coming too, (Still wondering where Paul Reiser will surface) & there's likely also a tragedy or two pending. My money is on Steve now, with how the character dynamics are shaking out, & that he'd been intended as a short-lived character to begin with. If you want tears, you can find them there. He's got good friends now, & he's had a terrific journey from D-bag to unlikely hero. It'd gut millions.
I will say that I'm a bit concerned for Netflix after this though. They've got nothing of this caliber popularity after this, and it might signal the beginning of a major slump in continued memberships. Even Apple TV has better looking stuff now. I bet that the huge wait for this alone has had people frustrated enough to want to dump them. Their flagship is passing into history very soon
Also a touch of Holly Marshall from "Land of the Lost", but that's probably due to the character's name and the actress's appearance. 
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