Stranger Things: Tales From 85 movie review: Odessa A’zion is the rare bright spot in Netflix’s dull and unambitious animated film

According to my statistics, there are exactly two and a half good reasons to watch an anime show on Netflix; Stranger Things: Tales from ’85.

One: You are a child, and I mean a child in the literal sense of the word, not a childish, eccentric adult at heart. I’ve heard good things about him Strange thingsbut Mom and Dad consider you too young for the TV-14 rating. A little softer Tales from ’85with a TV-PG rating, could be enough to satisfy your curiosity for now.

Second: You are a Strange things The fan who expresses your devotion through fanatical completion – you won’t rest until you’ve consumed every last scrap of footage or word of dialogue this universe has to offer. In this case go with God. Nothing I say here will matter to you anyway.

The reason half is Nikki Odessa Azion. Burly, sassy, ​​and covered in a strawberry-pink mohawk, the new character is fresh and charming enough that he looks like a disgrace to the original flavor. Strange things He didn’t dream it up in time to give it a living counterpart. But unless they actually fall into the first or second category, even they’re not quite enough to justify sitting in a series that feels like more of the same, just less.

Since the new story, developed by Jennifer Morrow and showrunner Eric Robles, begins in early 1985 — that is, between seasons two and three, for those who aren’t as good at keeping track of ages and timelines as Mike’s father — our young heroes are still reeling from their latest triumph. After closing the gates to Upside Down forever, or so they think, they happily return to their normal kids’ lives full of fast food, Dungeons and Dragons And Twain’s flirtation is awkward.

What we know they don’t know, of course, is that they still have years of battles to fight. This quintessential winter vacation is just that: a break, and a short-lived one at that. Once the people around Hawkins start getting kidnapped by sentient, otherworldly plants, Mike, Will, Dustin, Lucas, Max, and El return to the case — this time with a little extra help from Nikki, the daughter of the new substitute science teacher (Janeane Garofalo as Mrs. Baxter).

Tales from ’85 Indicates very little interest in the vibrator Strange things The boat, narratively or tonally or whatever. Even the shift in the medium from live-action to animation seems rooted in a desire to take the story back to its stronger early seasons, when kids still acted and behaved like kids, rather than shaking things up. (Although the crisp, polished, colorful animated version is actually much prettier than the fuzzy CG in later seasons is a nice bonus.) Other than that, it’s all business as usual.

So, while the monsters are never-before-seen creations, they more or less amount to Demogorgons inoculated with Audrey II. When characters get embroiled in personal drama, they’re just rehashing arguments we’ve seen before. Although Nikki, who has a knack for DIY mechanical engineering, is able to provide the gang with new gadgets, their plans almost always end with her being eaten by some other massive creature before being saved at the last possible millisecond by El’s telekinesis.

Speaking of El, the character remains so overpowering that the only real tension across the season’s ten half-hour episodes comes from wondering what new excuse the show will come up with to hold her back long enough for her to swoop in for this “surprise” rescue. It’s not the only ongoing narrative issue to follow Strange things inside Tales from ’85but like Mike’s smug protectiveness of El’s genius or Dustin’s obnoxiously condescending smugness, it’s easier to forgive in live action, when the young actors’ brilliant individual performances and turbulent group chemistry often mask the script’s shortcomings.

In contrast, the all-new sound of Tales from ’85 It’s stuck trying to replicate performances that came before, though, as only Braxton Queenie, who plays Dustin, and occasionally Julie Huang Rapaport, who plays Max, sound like the real thing. If these actors (including Luca Diaz as Mike, Elisha Williams as Lucas, Ben Blissala as Will, and Brooklyn Davey Norstedt as El) were given the space to make these characters their own, the inconsistencies might not have been such an issue. But the show doesn’t dare let his performance delve too deep, for fear of coming across as anything uncomfortably incongruous.

These versions of the characters might go through the motions of a joke Max might crack or a declaration (“Friends helping friends”) that El might say, and in flashes it seems like enough is enough. But lacking the nuance and naturalism that made them so beloved, these dull imitations quickly became tiresome, and then annoying. It doesn’t seem like a coincidence that the only real bright spot in this group is Nikki. As a new girl who doesn’t appear at all in seasons three through five, she’s allowed to develop or grow her relationships in ways that familiar faces can’t, lest she break away from established canon.

In Nikki, Tales from ’85 It offers a glimpse into the potential this project could have had had it not been so determined to play by the rule book. Instead – perhaps for the better if you’re a CEO jealous of protecting your intellectual property, perhaps, but mostly for the worse if you’re everyone else – it’s playing things as safe as a brand extension can be. I think viewers are satisfied with the diet version Strange thingswhether because they’re too little for the real thing or too fanatical to pass up, they wouldn’t find much to object to in a faithful version of the spin-off if it were watered down to the appeal of the original. But I can’t imagine most of them find much to love either.