STRANGER THINGS: Season 1: Holly, Jolly

Here's the honest tension in this episode. The Duffer Brothers give you real stakes: a mother who refuses to stop searching for her son, boys who won't give up on their friend, and a battle building against something genuinely evil. That's a strong moral spine for a science-fiction thriller, and the episode's twist ending will leave you wanting the next one.

But there's a cost. A scene of two teenagers having sex is cut away from before it turns graphic, but it's followed by jokes and crude gestures about it and about oral sex — and the source calls this the season's "most unfortunate" stretch so far, unnecessary to the story it's telling.

If you're an adult who can watch that scene and the jokes around it without it dulling your conscience, the rest of the episode rewards you. If you're choosing for teens or younger viewers, this is the hour to sit out or fast-forward through.

The search for Will continues. His mother believes he's trying to reach her through electricity and light, so she fills her house with strand after strand of Christmas lights — and finds no one willing to believe her. Meanwhile Eleven, the girl with telekinetic powers, tries to help the boys pinpoint where Will actually is, though communicating what she sees proves harder than anyone expected.

Three stars, and here's what that means: this is a strong, emotionally landed episode of television, even with real flaws in its choices. The source calls it "emotional and jarring," with a twist ending built to leave viewers wanting more, and the plot visibly widens here. That's craft doing its job — tension, momentum, a mother's desperation played straight.

The drag on the episode isn't pacing or performance — it's a choice. The teen sex scene and the joking aftermath add nothing the story needed, and the review says so plainly. Take those minutes out and you'd have an easy four-star hour of genre television.

This episode earns its subtitle. The dominant worldview here is a strong moral one: a battle forming against an evil entity that preys on innocent people, boys who won't abandon a missing friend, a mother who won't stop searching no matter who doubts her. The show also lets its characters feel real conviction and guilt over wrongdoing, and lets consequences land — which is rarer in genre television than it should be.

The counterweight is Eleven's storyline, where light occult elements attach to her powers — including a moment where she's ordered to kill a cat with her mind and is punished for refusing. It's handled with some moral seriousness (she refuses the cruelty), but it's still occult framing, and families should know it's there.

The episode's title comes from its clearest theme: a fight against something unseen and genuinely evil, fought by people who refuse to give up on each other. Scripture names that fight directly — "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places" (Ephesians 6:12). A mother's relentless search for her lost son echoes something older still — the God who leaves no one missing on His watch.

This is a well-made, morally serious hour of television carrying one scene it didn't need. The search for Will, the mother who won't quit, the battle taking shape against real evil — all of it works, and works well. But the teen sex scene and its joking aftermath are reason enough to pause before you let anyone younger watch. Our answer: wait and see — adults only. Looking for something the whole family can watch together tonight? Start here:.