Shawn Levy Says STRANGER THINGS Season 2 Will Be Darker and Scarier, But Have the Best Heart

I loved Stranger Things. It was beautiful, and while many people say it harped on the nostalgia of 80's movies, I ask, what's wrong with that? 80's movies were great and I wish we had more movies that used that era's sensibilities. But besides the nostalgia, the show itself was creative and was obviously an interesting and ambitious story that someone wanted to tell, and apparently, they are ready to tell even more but are gonna get a bit darker.

Shawn Levy, who is an executive producer and director for Stranger Things recently opened up about the upcoming second season to THR, and he hyped up some of the things to expect.

"Season two makes the Demogorgon look quaint. I was just in the edit room with the brothers yesterday, and we’re like, ‘this is definitely darker, I hope everyone’s down with this,’ because the threats to Hawkins and to our characters are bigger, darker, often times scarier. So people who found season one too scary for them, probably you’re going to be more scared by season two. But again, the best thing I can tell you is that through it all, it’s got the best heart. But it is, cinematically and budgetary, it’s definitely more ambitious."

Quaint? Seriously? That thing was nightmare fuel! How are you gonna make something more terrifying that that? Part of me worries it will suffer from trying to please fans with darker storytelling but according to Levy, pleasing the fans is not their primary goal.

"We are going to do things that fans will be disappointed in, but I think they will be more satisfied by… I’ll give one example that I’ve been asked about a hundred times which is people still think Barb’s alive. Because you think you want that, but you wouldn’t really want that. I’ve had a lot of people, some huge celebrities come up to me at these awards shows, like, ‘So, between us, Barb’s coming back, right?’ I’m like ‘No, you saw, she had like a creature, slug, worm, snake, coming out of her mouth. I don’t know that there’s a bounce back from that!’ So no, we are not going to cravenly service the wish-list of fans, we’re going to service the Duffer instincts and what they feel is the right story to tell."

Good for them. Pleasing the fans is always something that can be helpful, but more often than not, it's distracting. The fans are not the people telling the story, the writers are. I'm glad that they are telling the story they want. Even if it is darker. And good on the producer's by letting the Duffer Brothers tell the story they want and trusting their instincts. If only we could get more producers like this, who trust their storytellers to tell a good story. All this just makes me even more excited for season 2. Nightmares be damned.