Stranger Things season 3


The third season of the American science fiction horror drama television series Stranger Things, marketed as Stranger Things 3, was released worldwide on the streaming service Netflix on July 4, 2019, coinciding with Independence Day, the season's centered holiday. The series was created by the Duffer Brothers, who also serve as executive producers along with Shawn Levy, Dan Cohen and Iain Paterson.
The season stars Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Millie Bobby Brown, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Noah Schnapp, Sadie Sink, Natalia Dyer, Charlie Heaton, Joe Keery, Dacre Montgomery, Maya Hawke, Priah Ferguson, and Cara Buono. Brett Gelman, Francesca Reale, Cary Elwes, Alec Utgoff, and Andrey Ivchenko appear in recurring roles. The season received generally positive reviews from critics, and earned eight nominations at the 72nd Primetime Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Drama Series, and won for Outstanding Sound Editing for a Comedy or Drama Series.

Premise

In the summer of 1985, the popular new Starcourt Mall has caused many of Hawkins' other stores to close. Jim Hopper intervenes in Mike Wheeler's relationship with his adopted daughter Eleven, and Eleven becomes friends with Max Mayfield. Still recovering from Bob Newby's death, Joyce Byers considers moving out of Hawkins with her children. Magnetic disruptions lead her to believe that the Upside Down has returned, though, and she enlists Hopper's help in uncovering the cause. While Mike and Lucas Sinclair attempt to repair Mike's relationship with Eleven, Will Byers begins experiencing premonitions from the Upside Down even though Eleven closed the original gate, believing the Mind Flayer, a many-armed shadow creature from the Upside-Down which previously possessed him, is still alive in Hawkins. As Nancy Wheeler and Jonathan Byers investigate the effects of the Mind Flayer's influence, Dustin Henderson, Steve Harrington, newcomer Robin Buckley, and Erica Sinclair begin investigating a potential Soviet infiltration of Hawkins. Meanwhile, Max's stepbrother Billy Hargrove is taken over by the Mind Flayer, who possesses other citizens of Hawkins to fulfill its plan.

Cast and characters

Main

Production

Development

noted in November 2016 that he and the Duffer Brothers had already begun planning a potential third season, saying, "We are not gonna be caught off guard and we don't wanna be making stuff up like the day before we have to write it and make it, so we are definitely optimistic and we have started thinking ahead." The Duffer Brothers anticipated having about four to five seasons to work with, but do want to "have a really finite ending" while the series is still at a height of success, according to Matt, rather than letting it draw out indefinitely. In August 2017, the Duffer Brothers confirmed there would be a third season, with the likelihood of one more season following that, with Ross saying, "We're thinking it will be a four-season thing and then out". However, executive producer Shawn Levy later suggested that either four or five total seasons were possibilities, claiming that "the truth is, we're definitely going four seasons and there's very much the possibility of a fifth. Beyond that, it becomes, I think, very unlikely." Matt Duffer later commented that no official decision has been made, claiming that "It's hard, like four seems short, five seems long. So I don't know what to do." In December 2017, Netflix officially confirmed that they had green lit the third season, consisting of eight episodes. Levy also confirmed that a fourth season was "definitely happening" and that there was potential for a fifth season. A year later, the episode titles for season three were revealed, along with confirming the season would be named Stranger Things 3, similar to the second season.

Writing

Writing for the third season began before the second season's premiere, with a good portion being written in twelve-to-fourteen-hour bouts by the series' creators. It was reported that Netflix wanted both the third and fourth seasons to be written simultaneously as to facilitate a back-to-back production schedule, for the actors were aging faster than their on-screen characters, but both the Duffer Brothers and producer Shawn Levy opted to focus only on the third season to ensure it was better-developed and more fleshed out.
In terms of narrative, Levy said the season would be less about Will, saying, "We're not going to put Will through hell for a third season in a row. He'll be dealing with stuff, but he won't be at rock bottom... We're dealing with forces of evil that are new." David Harbour has said that the third season also draws heavily from the film Fletch. Both Levy and Natalia Dyer echo sentiments that this season's events will be more adult-oriented, with Dyer calling the season's narrative "...Bigger, darker, scarier."
The early pitch documents for the season featured a scene that had the Mind Flayer monster rampaging through the Hawkins Fourth of July Parade, but the idea was later scrapped as the scripts were written.

Casting

The third season sees Ryder, Harbour, Wolfhard, Brown, Matarazzo, McLaughlin, Schnapp, Sink, Dyer, Heaton, Buono, Keery, and Montgomery return. In March 2018, it was announced that Priah Ferguson's character had been promoted from a guest role to a recurring role and that Maya Hawke has been cast as Robin, a new lead who's been described as an "alternative girl". Hawke's character was later revealed to be Steve's co-worker at the Scoops Ahoy ice cream parlor in the newly built Starcourt Mall. Cary Elwes and Jake Busey's castings were announced in April 2018; Elwes was cast as Mayor Kline, a "classic '80s politician – more concerned with his own image than with the people of the small town he governs," and Busey as Bruce, a shifty reporter who works at the Hawkins Post. Francesca Reale was cast as Heather, a popular lifeguard at the community pool. As of September 2018, casting had still not been completed for the season, which at that point had been shooting for five months and was less than two months from completion. Carmen Cuba, the show's casting director, attributed the slower-than-usual casting process to the heightened secrecy of the plot paired with certain roles' shifting characterizations and importance.
For the third season, it was reported that several of the cast members would receive pay raises. Ryder and Harbour received an increase to $350,000 an episode from $150,000 and $80,000 respectively; Wolfhard, Matarazzo, McLaughlin, and Schnapp earned a pay increase to over $200,000 an episode, possibly as much as $250,000, a significant increase from the reported $20,000 they had made in season one ; and Dyer, Heaton, and Keery received approximately $150,000 an episode. Brown's wage increase was not disclosed but was estimated to be bigger than that of her young counterparts. Some sources suggest she made at least $250,000 and may have received between $300,000 and $350,000 per episode.

Filming

Filming for the third season officially began on April 23, 2018. Jackson, Georgia remained as primary filming area for scenes in Hawkins' downtown area. The South Bend Pool in Atlanta served as the Hawkins community pool. The major setpiece of the season, Starcourt Mall, was filmed at a re-dressed Gwinnett Place Mall near Duluth, Georgia. The production team had searched around Georgia for a dead mall, one either closed or with significantly reduced vacancy, for film, and found Gwinnett was nearly perfect, having been built in 1984 and thus having the staples of construction from malls in that period. They secured a portion of the mall that had been vacant for some time, redressing the storefronts and food court to feature brands of the 80s, paying attention to which stores likely had made it to Indiana by 1985. Outside "Scoops Ahoy!", a fictional store, they had to make one exception for "Glamour Shots", which was a real chain of photo studios but did not come to malls until after 1985; as a scene of Eleven and Max enjoying a photo shoot was a necessary plot element, the design team created a similar photo studio but with a new fictitious name. Not only did they recreate the facade of each of the storefronts, but they worked to fully stock them as well, in anticipation of any last-minute filming ideas the Duffers may have had. A custom-built grid cloth was employed to completely block sunlight from entering the atrium of the food court to enable filming night scenes during the day.
In addition to the aforementioned sets, filming also occurred at pre-existing structures dressed as the Hawkins town hall and Mayor Kline's house. The production also used a total of seven sound stages, with an average of three sets per stage. To create the "black void", the visual manifestation of Eleven's telepathic ruminations, filming took place in a pool that was "painted black with about an inch of water, surrounded by 270 degrees of duvetyne around thirty feet high". The void's look was tweaked slightly for the third season and shooting in the newer, smaller space required a Technocrane and two boom operators. An empty field was used to film the scenes set at the Hawkins Fun Fair, with the crew arriving just three weeks prior to the opening of a previously booked medieval fair. Period-appropriate carnival rides were trucked into the set from locations across the country, and the crew retrofitted the rides' modern lighting with bulbs that would have been used in the 1980s.
On September 27, 2018, Brown was spotted filming an emotional scene with stunt doubles and a child dressed in a baseball uniform at a beach in Malibu, California. Filming for the third season concluded on November 12, 2018. Regarding the lengthy hiatus between the second and third seasons, Netflix programming executive Cindy Holland noted " understand the stakes are high. They want to deliver something bigger and better than last year. I think it's going to be a fantastic season. It will be worth the wait."