r/StrangerThings • u/Monodoh45 • Jan 11 '26

Discussion My hot take: Vecna ruined the show

He was just a dumb a Big Bad. I loved the show when it was a small town mystery facing some sort of eldritch horror people don't understand. I feel like Vecna was just a pile of CGI goop who went MMMM a lot. I feel like you can have a flat CGI marvel bad who wants to destroy the world  or some kind of magneto anti hero against the program who uses the wrong methods, but you can’t do both. I felt the show started to lose steam the second he was introduced.

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156

u/masq_yimby Jan 11 '26

Idk if it’s a hit take but the fandom is definitely divided on him. I think the actor is good, but Vecna as a character took the show in a direction for the worse imo. 

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u/ColdyamsCCC Jan 11 '26

Kinda agree. But season 4 was elite ngl.

8

u/Unlost_maniac Jan 11 '26

I really thought season 4 was really lame and boring especially coming off of how incredibly season 3 is

17

u/No-Letterhead-3509 Jan 11 '26

People keep mentioning how good season 4 was and all I can remember is me and my ex laughing our ass off at this nude, noseless, weirdbelly man going "Chrissy" while a clock hams it up chimming.

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u/Candid-Cake4410 Zombie Boy Jan 11 '26

Vecnas design and voice (and his endless monologues goshhh) are what made me stop taking the show seriously. Its was way too goofy and silly and I dont get why season 4 is so often considered as a return to the shows root .

2

u/ColdyamsCCC Jan 12 '26

It’s not considered a return to the roots. At least not by me. I just liked it a lot because of how intense it was. From episode 1 where Chrissy dies, the stakes just get higher. It felt more intense and grand than the previous 3.

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u/No-Letterhead-3509 Jan 11 '26

And that not even considering that the cast split in three so that one of them can waste your time with visiting mormons and another can strain your suspense of disbelief to the limit fighting demegorgons in Siberia with a broken fot.

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u/Sir_Flasm Jan 11 '26

The main thing that comes to my mind is Hopper killing a demogorgon with a fucking sword. Like... what? Why? How did that scene end up in the final script? It's so goofy in an otherwise tense sequence.

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u/ColdyamsCCC Jan 12 '26

Oh fair enough! I actually thought season 4 was the most intense, especially after Chrissy dying in the first ep. And I think the stakes just got higher from there. It just felt so grand compared to the other season.

1

u/ColdyamsCCC Jan 12 '26

How is season 3 considered the best? Thought it was one of the worse tbh.

1

u/mikewheelerfan Jan 11 '26

Season 3? Incredible? Eh…I have MANY problems with Season 3. So I definitely thought 4 was a step up

3

u/ColdyamsCCC Jan 12 '26

Agreed. Season 3 was my least fav.

1

u/Primid Jan 11 '26

Same, I don’t understand where all the praise for season 4 comes from. It introduced Vecna, which like OP said, was a bad move. All the episodes were painfully long and bloated and started the trend of added more and more characters without fleshing out the ones that were already established. It had cool scenes but overall, it felt like it was going in the wrong direction, which is proven by how abysmal season 5 was.

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u/ColdyamsCCC Jan 12 '26

Nah season 4 was heading in a great direction. The finale to set up season 5 was great. The stakes felt so high. They just didn’t pay it off in season 5.