Stranger Things is one of the biggest and greatest shows ever. The show combines a mix of adventure, suspense, friendship, and the nostalgia of the 1980s. How has it grabbed the attention and hearts of so many people worldwide?

Season 5, Volume 1 was just released on November 26. Three more episodes will be released on Christmas day, and a grand finale will be available on New Year’s Eve. The show started strongly from Season One. The third season had 40.7 million accounts watching within the first 4 days of its being on streaming. With every new season, bigger viewing numbers come with it. When the third season was released in July of 2019, it broke multiple records for a Netflix program at the time. Within the first 4 weeks, over 64 million households had watched the season. In the U.S., Volume 1 of Season 4 was watched for 7.2 billion minutes. This broke yet another Netflix record as the highest weekly total. In 2022, the show was watched for 52 billion minutes and was the most-streamed show. Over the course of the first 4 seasons, Stranger Things has gotten over 404.1 million hours of viewing during the first half of 2025. This means there has to be a huge number of people repeatedly rewatching it.

Stranger Things takes place in Hawkins, Indiana, in the 1980s. When Will Byers disappeared after playing D&D with his friends one night, everything changed. His friends and family worked to uncover a government lab just outside of town that had been kept a secret. Eleven, a girl from the lab, tells the boys that there is a parallel dimension called the Upside Down–a replica of the world we know, but upside down and filled with monsters. As the show continues, the party comes face-to-face with many challenging adventures. 

And there you have the right side up of the Upside Down. This show is guaranteed to steal your heart and feed it to a demagorgon. If you were to ask 99 out of 100 people, they would tell you to watch it. And remember, your friends don’t lie.