The Best Part Of "Stranger Things 2"...Is The Dance At The Very End

Much has been written about Netflix's original series Stranger Things 2, and it's predecessor, Stranger Things. And for good reason--they're impressive on many levels. Most of the reviews and comments about both seasons have been positive. Of course, there's always a few who disagree. They think the stories are weak, and the effects are just okay.

Me?

I loved them both! 

The main reason I loved them is not because of the effects, or the stories lines between the adults--for me the draw was always the four friends, jr. high-aged kids facing unimaginable adventures while trying to understand the crazy world they're growing into--with or without the monsters. I relate to them because in real life, I was them, only for me I was their age not in the mid 1980s, but a few years earlier. Back then I hung out with my friends at arcades, I played D & D with those same friends in the basements of our homes, all while trying to understand life as soon-to-be-adults.

That's why, out of all the cool parts of Season One and Season Two, the part I liked the best was the last ten minutes or so of Season Two, Chapter Nine: The Gate. In the episode all the baddies were sent back to Hell, or wherever they came from, and the kids let their hair down (or up...) at the school dance, the Hawkins Middle School Snow Dance '84.

The set up is fantastic. We see the kids preparing for the big event, getting ready, trying out lines in front of the mirror. We see the nerves, the anxiety, the anticipation. We cheer for their successes and our hearts hurt to experience their failures. It was all too real, too many memories. Let's just say it struck really close to home.

When my friends and I roamed the mean streets of Farmington, Utah on our Schwinns, we did the things those kids did, albeit with less profanity, and without the monsters, portals into other dimensions, evils scientists, government cover-ups, and telekinetic-powered girls. But if we could, we would have had the courage to fight evil as they did. Or even enjoy a jr. high school dance. That's why I liked it so much, especially, the very very end.

All photos taken without permission from Netflix

Jr. High School Dances...The Horror

Tonight, my wife and I attended a dance recital that turned into a ball (not, "ball" as it "lots of fun" although that works too, but ball as in formal dance...). My daughter's dance academy put it on so we got to see several of the student's dances and afterward, the floor opened up to everyone to kick up their heels a bit. They played Boot Scootin' Boogie, The Macarena, and other songs, many of which we knew.

My wife and I hadn't planned on doing a lot of dancing. In fact, we thought we'd not stay long because of the storm--didn't want to not make it home, but it stopped snowing so we stayed while our daughter did a little dancing. The event was held in a community recreation center that doubles as a jr. high school gym.

And, boy, did it take me back--roughly forty years back--to the aging (even back in the 1970s...) gym at Kaysville Jr. High, home of the Knights. Just thinking about those afternoons when everyone in the school knew a school dance was scheduled sent shivers up and down my spine.

And not in a good way.

No, as if the overall experience of jr. high school wasn't bad enough, they had to twist the uncomfortable knife even deeper. It's like the final piece of the crap puzzle that was jr. high school. You throw hundreds of socially awkward kids together and then you tell them to dance. The most successful jr. high school dances were the ones where my friends and I snuck out through the back of the gym and caught a #70 bus home.

Tonight's dance was not like my childhood nightmares. Families, little kids, jr. high and high school aged people were on the floor. And the fact that it was put on by a dance academy meant the kids could actually dance. Still, sitting in a darkened jr. high school gym watching people dance while listening to poorly acoustically delivered music, those memories came flooding back. Those were tough times--glad I got through them.