'Stranger Things'' is a loving homage to great sci-fi thrillers of the 1980's -- ''Poltergeist,'' ''E.T.'' and others -- and you may have heard that already. But there's another reason the eight-episode Netlifx series is so memorable: It also harks back to a time when TV and popular culture seemed at least to be more innocent, less complicated and simply more fun than it is today.
The series, currentl available for streaming via the online service, was developed by brothers Matt and Ross Duffer and of course it's set in the 1980s. Four boys are riding around town at night when one of them, Will (Noah Schnapp) goes missing near a heavily guarded mysterious installation which purports to be an electric utility. Joyce (Winona Ryder), his single mom, goes into an immediate panic, but it takes a while for officialdom to respond.
Right away, there are two reminders that that was then and this is now. First, kids certainly ride bikes these days, but you don't see them in film and TV as much as you used to because riding bikes is a carefree activity and kids don't really seem as carefree in the 21st century. It's probably an exaggeration, but if you see a kid riding a bike in a movie today, you're likely to expect him to get kidnapped...
