Stranger Things season 5 has officially ended with the Netflix series’ biggest critics and audience Rotten Tomatoes score division. Stranger Things season 5 reviews have been mostly positive from critics, who’ve praised the final three parts of the series. However, it also holds the lowest Rotten Tomatoes score of any season, holding a Certified Fresh 85% as of writing.
According to Rotten Tomatoes, however, Stranger Things season 5 also holds the most divided critic and audience scores among any of the show’s seasons. While critics gave the final season an 85% out of 147 reviews, audiences have scored it with a 56% out of over 10,000 ratings. This is the lowest any season of the show has been rated.
According to low ratings, many complaints involve a lack of stakes for characters, alongside too much exposition that waters down the presentation of the story. This includes disappointment in Stranger Things season 5’s finale, which has been criticized for playing it too safe with the way it ends the decade-long story of the show.
In addition to these founded critiques, there’s also been a homophobic review bombing campaign across various websites due to season 5, episode 7, where Will comes out as gay to the other characters. This may have contributed to the critic-audience score divide. However, it’s clearly not the only reason viewers aren’t enjoying the final season, which they say is littered with genuine problems.
This isn’t the first time Netflix has released a divisive season of one of their most popular original series this year. Squid Game season 3, which ended the Korean thriller, earned a critics’ score of 78% and an audience score of 51%. Wednesday season 2 faced a similar yet less drastic divide: critics at 87%, audiences at 76%.
However, this critical divide won’t stop the franchise from the future it’s building. The animated spinoff Stranger Things: Tales from ’85is set to premiere in 2026, while a live-action spinoff featuring new characters in a different time period is also in development. The final season’s reception is but a hiccup in the larger plans being drawn up beyond the show.
Still, it seems many were dissatisfied with the way Stranger Things ended, having genuine reasons for being disappointed in the way the final episodes played out. Even so, this divisiveness isn’t reflective of every opinion, considering the critical success the show still enjoyed. Whether this changes as viewers have time to sit on the ending remains to be seen.
- Release Date
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2016 – 2025-00-00
- Network
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Netflix
- Showrunner
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Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer
- Directors
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Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer, Andrew Stanton, Frank Darabont, Nimród Antal, Uta Briesewitz
- Writers
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Kate Trefry, Jessie Nickson-Lopez, Jessica Mecklenburg, Alison Tatlock
