Stranger Things

Stranger Things was one of the happiest TV surprises in years — a genuine wordof-mouth sensation that came out of nowhere to hit a nerve with the audience. At first, the Duffer brothers’ Netflix drama might have looked like a harmless ’80s nostalgia trip about a small town that gets attacked by supernatural forces. But it really hit home, with Winona Ryder as the mom and a great cast of young actors — especially Millie Bobbie Brown, who made an instant folk hero out of a weird bald girl named Eleven.

The new season, its second, is darker — more of a horror show — but it still has that same emotional power.

All these kids are still reeling from the Season One monster. The adults learn about “post-traumatic stress”, a rather new concept in 1984. For all the geek bravado of

it’s that sense of trauma that makes it something special.