Stranger Things: S2, E2

Flashback to Eleven breaking into Hawkins Middle from the upside-down, and it's pretty fucking cool. She comes through via paw mural, covered in upside-down goop. I don't know what it is about goop and free-floating moss, but the upside-down appears to be chock full of it.

Through the rest of the episode we get a handful of scenes with feral El hiding out from the lab associates before Hopper gets a hold of her. A decidedly satisfying holding pattern for El, however there's a significant number of growing pains she must go through in order to be better socialized.

She clashes against Hop for more freedom, but her guardian rebuffs anything which has to do with her being out in the open and exposed. With reason, as El is still very much sought after.

Mike and the boys are distracted by her absence with the advent of the arrival of Mad Max. She is the spunky counterbalance to the kid's dynamic--more ballsy, more daring, more loyal to a fault.

Steve and Nancy go through growing pains of their own; they bicker over the loss of Barb, grades, and drinking. A wasted Nancy tells off Steve before Jonathan puts her to bed, and suddenly it's ridiculous to imagine these two won't hook up.

Little Will continues his tests and upside-down relapses. Mother Joyce goes ape whenever he's out of her sight, something he manages to do frequently in spite of her paranoia. Apparently not even overprotective Joyce can stop her son from being rendered useless to the arachnid grotesques from the upside-down.

The JVC/Polaroid montage featuring the boys in their Ghostbusters outfits is priceless. Who would've thought freshman weren't still dressing up for school on Halloween 1984?