Stranger Things - Language (Genre & Postmodernism)

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Genre
  • Sci-Fi
  • Horror
  • Mystery
  • Teen/Coming of Age
Genre Pleasures
  • Having things repeated to us
  • Repetition
  • Triggers same kind of emotional responses
  • Reminds us of past pleasures
  • Horror - being scared, excitement and fear. 
  • Catharsis, idea of relief, feel close to that moment and then brought back.
  • Familiar character types, seeing the same types of people again and again, familiar settings which goes back to this safety.
Pastiche - paying your respects, a tribute

By watching genre films, and TV shows like Stranger things a lot of the pleasures (for older audiences) will be in the realm of pastiche.

Pleasures of problem solving, we like to solve problems, like to solve mysteries. 

Primary target audiences - teenagers, seeing versions of themselves on screen.

Codes & Conventions:
  • Settings
  • Character types
  • Narrative events
HORROR:
  • Low-key lighting
  • Diegetic Sound of the Demogorgon creeping up on Will
  • Settings - The Upside Down, Domestic space of the house & Basement
  • Narrative Events -
SCI-FI:
  • Costume of Scientist
  • Setting - Medical Research Lab
  • Narrative Events - Eleven + The Demogorgon
  • High Pitched sounds
MYSTERY:
  • Establishing shot in research lab leaves audience curious
  • Dark Lighting
  • Character Type - Detective/Sheriff  (Mystery Genre Trope)
  • Costume - Police Uniforms, Eleven's costume and her shaved head
  • Narrative Events - Will Disappearing, Eleven escaping the officers
TEEN/COMING OF AGE:
  • Costumes for Nancy, Steve & Barb - Typical teen outfits from that period
  • Bright colours (in terms of High school)
  • Main characters are all young
  • Settings - High School
  • Narrative Events - Romance between Nancy and Steve
  • Character Types - Bullies, Nerds, Popular kids, Good Girl 
Stephen Neale - Genre Theorist
  • Genre is about the repetition of codes & conventions.
  • These are not fixed but evolved overtime
  • Producers can use hybridity 
Subversion:

SCI FI:
  • The character of Eleven, she's not your typical alien, she's actually a human girl. 
  • She's too normal for SCI-FI but not normal enough for teen coming of age
  • We're in the PAST, not the FUTURE
TEEN COMING OF AGE:
  • Primary focus on Nerds/Losers rather than popular kids.
MYSTERY:
  • Character of Hopper is meant to be the one in charge but he's not very organised
  • Detectives are put together, well dressed, but Hopper is none of this.
  • Goes Beyond the stereotype, starts out as one character but then becomes somebody much more heroic
HORROR:
  • Not seeing the blood/the guts/the destruction
  • Character Types - children
  • Convention - more to do with older people
Genetic Hybrid:
  • Target different audiences
  • Multiple Target Audiences
  • Might be risky because it may be frustrating if you only like one specific genre
  • You might risk alienating everybody
Stranger things is a great example of genre hybridity.

Neales theory is useful in showing how genre influences narrative.

  • Stranger things is about films of the 80s not really the 80s
  • Done through intertextuality
Jean Baudrillard
  • 'Hyperreality' & 'Implosion'
  • Going beyond the modern, society has moved beyond modernism.
Postmodernism, modernist art and culture, from the late 19th century and early 20th century up until the 70s/80s this is seen as the modernist era. Alternatively modernism as a belief in progress. In a way postmodernism is post history, post modernist say that history came to a stop around the 1970s and what has happened since then is no longer progressing forward but looking backwards.

Hyperreality. we can describe Stranger Things as Hyper real version of the 80s, not the real 80s but just 80s based films. Even within the marketing, the poster is a clear direct reference to star wars.
  • Matthew Modine - Dr Brenner
  • Winona Ryder - Joyce Byers
  • Sean Astin - (Season 2) - The Goonies
Secondary Target Audience - people who love films from that period/who grew up in the 80s.

Baudrillard didn't particularly like postmodernism, the concept is more in the negative. Baudrillard discussion of postmodernism is dystopic, he is saying that Postmodern condition, we've lost touch with the real. We have nothing left but a continuing fascination of it's disappear.  Baudrillard highlights that it's merely nihilism and melancholia. 

Postmodern intertextuality can be used to create something new. Stranger things misinterpretations can create something new.

 Implosion, this is the idea that distinctions have collapsed within themselves, less about looking backwards and more about collapsing in. Distinctions that were important to modern society have disappeared; high & low culture, gender, and working class. These would be questioned around implosion.


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