Heryland

With the release of Stranger Things Season 5’s trailer this week, my social media algorithms have been inundated with speculation and conversation by the show’s fandom. The idea of a Stranger Things stan account as always been interesting to me, especially when considering the tone (and reception) of the first season; an atmospheric sci fi mystery that wears it’s Stephen King and Spielberg influences on it’s sleeve. When show was first released, I remember the show being praised for it’s accuracy to the 80’s small town setting, or at least it’s impressive imitation of the King/Spielberg tone of their 80s’ work. I got the impression, as a preteen whose dad recommended the show, that many people’s enjoyment for the show came from it’s ability to capture something from their childhoods.

And yet, I doubt that the average Stranger Things stan account, who spends their free time speculating over which character will end the show dating who, was alive to experience the time that the show is attempting to capture. Now, as a member of Gen Z who has seen the entire show thus far, I am aware that the show has appeal beyond it’s 80’s nostalgia, but it is also undeniable that 80’s nostalgia was brought to the forefront of entertainment by shows like Stranger Things, and it is still prominent today, with many of the biggest popstars of the 2020s’ imitating 80’s synths, consistent Hollywood reboots of old IP, and fandom developing around art released within the time.

While the mainstream media is imitating decades past in a broadly comforting, unironic fashion, indie and alternative scenes are ( as you’d expect) being a little more subversive: especially in horror. Stranger Things is not without it’s scares, but the horror of Stranger Things is firmly routed in it’s 80s’ influences. Gaming and online fiction has taken the nostalgic settings of the past 30-40 years and, unlike Stranger Things, corrupted it.

Low-Poly Horror is all the rage in the indie gaming scene, imitating games from past gaming eras, yet introducing a cursed edge. Once again, the clearest explanation for what makes this trend appealing to audiences is clear: there is a simultaneous charm and horror to revisiting something from our childhood with adult eyes. That said, stopping the analysis there overlooks the massive audience online for indie horror, a large part of which simply were not alive for the time these games are referencing. Despite this, the fondness remains.

I believe this disparity is often overlooked, especially with Five Nights at Freddy’s, a massive franchise for children built around distorting 80’s animatronic mascots. Especially when you consider the audience outside of America, most of the audience do not have any real memory of that FnaF references, so it’s hard to argue that the fear comes from a corruption of their nostalgic memories. Instead, it is important to remember that stripping away the horror elements of FnaF still leaves child friendly mascot designs. To somebody who has no nostalgia for this imagery, the subversion is inverted once again: instead of the horror perverting something comforting, it is softened by a gentler aesthetic. I would argue this is a large part of nostalgic horror’s success, as it makes the fear factor more accessible to younger audiences.

Nostalgic imagery is also designed to be appealing in ways beyond the acknowledgment of older things. I don’t have to have any memories of the 90’s to see a hazy photo of a 90’s bedroom, coated in band posters, lit only by the warm lighting of a PS1 game painted across the screen of a CRT to think the room looks cosy. This further explains the appeal when nostalgia is applied to horror, as this comforting edge still stands out without a personal reference point.

As a brief aside, in looking for images to puncture this post, it surprised me to discover that it wasn’t easy to find a real photo fitting the criteria described in the paragraph above, but it was incredibly easy to find a poorly rendered AI imitation. While I am certain I have seen real photos along these lines, there is something to be said about the only images I can find being wholly digital attempts at recreation. Truly, I wonder if my childhood memories are going to be smoothed over by uncanny, inhuman resemblance. I hope not.

Putting this nostalgic imagery in context is also important. We live in an era where logos are repeatedly simplified, imperfections and flair is smoothed over in entertainment; everything is cleaned. At the same time, entertainment is always encouraging a nostalgia for older visuals, there is money to be made in replicating consumer’s childhood memories. That rubs off on younger generations, who are being encouraged to fondly remember things from before their time. In this sense, franchises like Stranger Things become fully fantastical settings for younger audiences, giving them an image of a simpler time that (in reality) never existed. This false image has become a greater focus over time. It is worth noting that early seasons of Stranger things had a habit of introducing flawed characters that fit in the Stephen King esc Hawkins (Johnathan was a peeping tom, Billy was a racist) only to gloss over these complexities in the next season, redeeming the characters (and by proxy the time they’re rooted in) by ignoring the problems. Everybody knows that it’s too easy to believe that “things were simpler” when you were a child, who likely just wasn’t as privy to political, economic, and social disparity, but it is even easier to convey this concept to people who weren’t even there.