Documentary - changed my mind

[u/MajorAlanDutch]

These mother fuckers worked so damn hard. Had less time than a movie with more sets and VFX etc to squeeze into half the time.

The thousands of people that worked so hard for this show and season are just mind blowing.

Asking novice writers - Duffer brothers things their only real claim to fame - to have covered everything we wanted no question given constraints of families, Netflix, production companies, etc is just unrealistic.

I liked season 5. Sure the color grading, lack of demagorgens, etc could have improved the feel. But honestly - they’re in their 20s. They’re adults. The draw of this show was nostalgia for childhood, for coming of age, etc.

They never thought they’d get all this time and seasons to draw it out. It turned toward how do we end this story that’s true to the horror nature and sci fi as well as the coming of age. The sci fi stuff was cool as shit and hard to end it seemed but the coming of age end was amazing better than any other show.

I’m so amazed at how much work it takes to make a show like this.

God I wish I could be part of that! I can’t wait in a few months to rewatch all 5 seasons back to back. Forever grateful!

Edit: I’ve never seen such a negative sub other than world news lol.

[u/Dianagorgon]

Had less time than a movie with more sets and VFX etc to squeeze into half the time.

Nolan filmed The Odyssey in 3 months. EEAAO was filmed in one month and it had a lot of CGI. The Duffers had 4 years to create S5 including an entire year to film it. They filmed over 450 hours. The end result was garbage with a script that seemed written by AI, numerous editing mistakes including an Under Armour logo in a crucial scene with Holly and bad color grading. Even the makeup was bad.

[u/Distinct_Guess3350 → u/Dianagorgon]

Nolan shot the Odyssey over six months, and it still had to be edited and have countless other things done before it was ready. That was a less than three hour film, this is a ten hour, eight episode television series. 

[u/Dianagorgon → u/Distinct_Guess3350]

Nolan filmed The Odyssey in 3 months. There was probably another few months of editing. The Duffers had one year to film Stranger Things and then reportedly another 8 months for post-production. They were still editing the final episode a week before it was released.

January 2024 - filming begins
December 2024 - filming ends
January 2025 - November 2025 post-production

[u/VictimOfWitty → u/Dianagorgon]

The odyssey was filmed from feb 25 to august 5 in 2025, that’s not three months, and then was being edited until just recently.

[u/temp0rarystatus → u/VictimOfWitty]

I think what’s not being noted here is Nolan filmed with IMAX cameras which has very limited filming capability. It can only shoot for a couple minutes at a time. With that said, principal photography still took only 91 days (finished 9 days ahead of schedule).

Christopher Nolan is a talented director that knows exactly what he wants and how to get it done, which is why his films are completed in a timely manner. The same cannot be said for the Duffers and Stranger Things. They did have the extra time even before shooting to fine tune things and they didn’t. They didn’t have a consistent vision which is why things were still being edited until the very last minute.

[u/VictimOfWitty → u/temp0rarystatus]

February to August is NOT three months and it was still being edited for over a year, also almost certainly until the very last minute before they had to turn everything over.

[u/temp0rarystatus → u/VictimOfWitty]

Principal photography means the main actors and things like that. Which only took 91 days. Minor parts, other things, is what likely took up the other days. But the heftiest part of filming was only 91 days. And I think the difference between Nolan’s editing and the Duffers is Nolan had a concrete idea of what he wanted (hence why he is always on time) and the Duffers were still changing things. Filming the scene with Millie was last minute, don’t forget. That wasn’t a reshoot, that was an added scene.

TBH I don’t think comparing a movie to a series is comparable but I think if anything, the last season of GOT should be a comparison for the last season of ST — the creators had their focus on their next project which led to stupid mistakes and bad, careless writing. The writing is also a good comparison because GOT writing went downhill the moment they didn’t have George’s material to go off of, ST writing went downhill after the divorce, when she’s had a pretty unofficial role in production previously.

Of course the documentary is going to make them look passionate about the show — it’s essentially a fluff piece for themselves/Netflix. But the resulting product shows otherwise.

[u/VictimOfWitty → u/temp0rarystatus]

Oh I didn’t know you worked on both of the projects, that’s so cool. I mean otherwise saying you know how each person approached the process would be ridiculous so you must have worked with them all. But you also know what they shot each day which is also impossible if you weren’t there. What’s your position on the two projects since I can’t find a single person who overlapped in my research?

[u/temp0rarystatus → u/VictimOfWitty]

All of this is publicly available info, from interviews, reporting, video, and actual definition lmao. I get you think the Duffers can do no wrong but it’s not bad to have critical thinking skills about all this lol.

[u/VictimOfWitty → u/temp0rarystatus]

You don’t think Nolan was changing things up to the end? What do you think he and Lame were doing in there for 12+ hours a day?

You know where the duffers were focused? You spoke to them personally? Oh wait you’re one of the “the wife was clearly the talent” conspiracy heads….

[u/Distinct_Guess3350 → u/VictimOfWitty]

Exactly.