STRANGER THINGS - Details on The Arcade and New Season 2 Character and Netflix Wanted to Shoot Seasons 3 and 4 Back-to-Back

We've got some more Stranger Things news for you that includes some interesting information regarding the arcade and a new character in Season 2. It's also been revealed that Netflix wanted to shoot Seasons 3 and 4 of the series back-to-back.

Don't worry, there are no huge spoilers here that will ruin anything for you. Entertainment Weekly recently shared two script pages from the upcoming series that focus on the town’s arcade, which is called The Palace, and a new character that will be introduced in the series named Keith.

The scene centers around Will (Noah Schnapp), Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) as they are playing Dig Dug and arguing with Keith (Matty Cardarople), who is an older boy that works at the arcade, over the identity of "Mad Max" who holds the high score on the game Dig Dug. For the answer, Keith wants a date with Mike's sister. You can read the script pages below. I also included The Duffer brothers’ annotations of the scripts, with the numbers coinciding with their notes. 

1. “Our very first idea for season 2 was to introduce a local arcade (named The Palace, in a nod to WarGames!). We love board games but in truth have spent more time playing videogames (too much time, our mom might say), so we wanted to weave them into the fabric of the show. An added bonus: every game in the arcade worked, so we got to play between takes!”

2. “Keith is a new character who works at The Palace.  He’s several years older than our boys, but he’s somehow less mature. The only thing he likes more than Cheetos is Nancy.”

3. “We always try to make sure that — when faced with a dilemma — our boys have different perspectives and solutions. This makes for fun conflict and helps further define their characters. The problem they’re facing in this scene is not exactly life or death: Are they willing to hook Keith up with Nancy in exchange for Mad Max’s identity? We like that Mike stands up for Nancy here; he may be a jerk to her in person, but deep down, he’s very protective of his sister. We feel this is very typical sibling behavior. Not that we would know anything about that….”

4. “The slang ‘wastoid’ became popular after The Breakfast Club, which was released February 1985, four months after our new season takes place. But it’s such a great insult that we couldn’t help but fudge history a bit here. It was also a fun way for us to tip our hat to the great John Hughes.”

5. “‘Focus our attention on Will’ is really a sign of things to come this season, as our main storyline centers on Will and his recovery. Just because Will was rescued from the Upside Down doesn’t mean he’s safe…”

Just reading this stuff gets me more pumped up for the second season of Stranger Things! In a separate report from THR,  we learn that Netflix wanted to shoot Stranger Things Seasons 3 and 4 back-to-back before the kids started getting even more awkward as they go through puberty. The Duffer Bros. and their creative team didn't want to do that, though. 

A source with knowledge of the Stranger Things world says Netflix had hoped to shoot seasons three and four back-to-back to get ahead of any potentially awkward adolescent transitions for its young actors. “Every time you have a show that relies so heavily on the charm of kids, you want to capture that,” says this person.

The Duffer Bros. run and write the series with Shawn Levy and Dan Cohen and it just would have been too hard for them to turn those episodes around so quickly. There's also the hard logistics of shooting with underage actors for extended periods of time. For the team behind Stranger Things, it's quality over quantity. When previously talking to The Playlist, they said: 

“I think people want us to keep doing more, but you know for us, it’s all about quality control. Like people want, television particularly, they want it on this annual cycle. Movie sequels never come out on an annual cycle, unless they’re shooting back to back.”

It's good to know that the Duffer Bros. are sticking to their guns and making sure that fans will get quality entertainment over pumping them out as fast as they can. 

The cast of the series are signed on with Netflix for six years and the Duffer's plan on ending the series after Season 4 so they have the time that they need to finish what they started without shooting back-to-back. 

Stranger Things season 2 premieres on Netflix on October 27, 2017.