We didn’t learn much new about Stranger Things Season 2 at New York Comic Con (NYCC). Instead, panel attendees witnessed a generational battle for the ages, as child actor Millie Bobby Brown (Eleven) and fully grown adult man David Harbour (Jim Hopper) debated the merits of the 1980s.
The Thing E.T., The Goonies. All movies with a strong 1980s aesthetic, stuffed with the storytelling tropes of the era that shaped Stranger Things. Also, all movies from decades before Brown’s 2004 birth date. So how did the Eleven actor get up to speed on the 1980s, a decade completely alien to her?
“I had Winona, David, Matthew Modine to help me understand the 80s,” Brown told NYCC attendees. “I really like it now. I want to live back in the 80s.”
The audience burst into applause, similarly nostalgic for the decade of Reagan and greed, perhaps desirous of anything except 2016 and its attendant stressors, embarrassments and tensions. But David Harbour wasn’t having it.
“No, no, no… don’t applaud!” Harbour said to the crowd. “It wasn’t as good as it was on Stranger Things. I lived it! I lived it!”
Harbour and panel moderator Matt Zoller Seitz listed a number of gripes about the era. If you missed an episode of TV you might have to wait months to catch it. Without cell phones you could never be late, could never modify plans. Sure, seeing the “Thriller” extended edition music video with Vincent Price was awesome, but was it worth all the hassle?
Still, Bobby Brown felt the 80s could have been alright, if only they got some better Internet. “I like everything,” she said, “Except there really was not good Internet. What am I going to do? I can’t go on Snapchat, can’t go on Instagram.”
