The final episode of Stranger Things is the perfect tone-setter for the year ahead
On 1 January 2026, the world will wake up slightly hungover, emotionally vulnerable, and ready to say goodbye to Stranger Things.
After nearly a decade of kids-on-bikes, synths, nosebleeds and existential dread wrapped in Netflix compression, the final ever episode airs. No more Hawkins. No more Upside Down. No more pretending you didn’t cry at least once.
And honestly? It couldn’t be better timed. Even though I wish the yoghurt should have got more airtime.
Because if 2026 had a genre, it wouldn’t be optimistic futurism. It would be Stranger Things.
A world where the tech works… but feels wrong
Arguably the genius of Stranger Things was never the monster. It was the vibe.
Phones existed, but didn’t quite help. Authority figures were confident, but usually wrong. Science promised answers, then opened a portal to hell.
Sound familiar?
As we roll into 2026, we’re living in a version of that same Hawkins tension:
AI everywhere, but nobody fully trusts it
Automation promising safety while quietly deleting jobs
Data “helping” us while watching everything
Just like Hawkins Lab, we were told it was under control.
Could 2026 be Hawkins, but with better branding?
Let’s recap what’s supposedly defining 2026 according to LinkedIn.
Driverless cars roaming cities
AI companions filling emotional gaps
Smart pills monitoring us from the inside
Wearables deciding when we should sleep, work, or stop pretending we’re fine
Search engines fading while AI answers become reality
That sounds like the Upside Down with a UX team instead of tentacles.
The real villain isn’t the tech. It’s the loss of agency
With a 2026 lens, the scariest moments in Stranger Things weren’t jump scares.
They were:
Loss of control
Adults not listening
Prioritising outcomes over people
Which is exactly why 2026’s counter-trend could matters just as much as the tech itself.
We’re seeing:
A push back to offline community
Phones banned in schools
Humans re-learning how to be around other humans and finding their own cave to escape to.
“Connection” becoming a business strategy
Very Hawkins: band together, trust your people, ignore the clipboard guy. (Who?)
Controversial Take: AI is Henry (Not Vecna)
No disrespect to large language models/future overlords, but narratively speaking:
Always present, but not always seen.
Speaks calmly and says what you want to hear
Knows too much, like way way way too much
Henry didn’t smash through walls or send Demogorgon. He quietly gain confidence from the right people he needs for Vecna to do what ever it needs to do in season 5.
That’s 2026 AI.
Just persuasive. Just efficient. Just powerful enough to reshape the room while you’re still debating the next prompt.
Ending the show. Entering the era.
There’s something oddly poetic about Stranger Things ending just as we cross into a year obsessed with:
Human connection
Nostalgia
Control vs convenience
Tech that feels magical until it doesn’t
The show was always about growing up in a world you don’t fully understand, using whatever tools you have, and hoping your friends have your back when things get weird.
That’s not sci-fi anymore. That’s a business plan.
So yes, this sets 2026 up perfectly
The lights flicker. The synth fades out. The screen goes black.
And on 1st January 2026, we step into a year that feels uncannily familiar:
A little darker. A little smarter. A lot more powerful. And absolutely dependent on whether humans stay in the loop.
Stranger Things may be over.
But the vibe? Oh, the vibe is just getting started. 🧇🌀
So please do head over to Not Enough Bread and subscribe. Especially if you’d like to get irregular episodes of Stranger Bins (Unless Netflix picks it up). It will be like Stranger things, but set on a Yorkshire cul-de-sac in 2016. (The year everything started to go stranger)
Discover more from Not Enough Bread
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Leave a Comment