Last night – or should I say last year – Netflix dropped another teaser for the highly anticipated third series of the 80s sci-fi fest that is Stranger Things, along with an official season three poster.
Appropriately, the new teaser started with some vintage footage of Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve, – an annual New Year’s Eve television show which culminates in the midnight ball drop and fireworks display to ring in the new year.
The show is counting down to 1985. However, this is Hawkins, Indiana, we’re talking about, so it doesn’t quite all go to plan.
As the ball descends, it seems as if the screen is turning sideways or… upside down??
Check it out:
We’re also treated to some upside down fireworks (ok, we get it), some glitchy, retro computer graphics which focus on the words ‘Silver Cat Feeds’, and lastly the tagline: ‘One Summer Can Change Everything’.
At the beginning of the teaser, under the title of the TV show, we also see it’s ‘Brought to you by: Starcourt Mall’, which fans of the show will know is the new shopping centre in town, and where Steve has got himself a job as an ice-cream seller.
Although they’re not giving much away, there’s a few clues here which will have fans counting down the days to July 4, when the series will finally air.
For example – what does the new shopping mall have to do with everything? Does Steve love his new career as an ice-cream man and climb the corporate ladder of frozen confectionary? What does ‘Silver Cat Feeds’ mean? And were those fireworks meant to be upside down, or did the display just go horribly wrong?
You can watch the Starcourt Mall teaser here:
The team behind Stranger Things certainly know how to keep us on our toes. Before announcing the release date last night, last month they also revealed the titles of the eight episodes which’ll make up season three, throwing a few more tantalising clues our way.
The eight episodes are titled:
Suzie, Do You Copy?
The Mall Rats
The Case Of The Missing Lifeguard
The Sauna Test
The Source
The Birthday
The Bite
The Battle Of Starcourt
So it seems the new mall will be playing a part in at least two episodes, meaning we’ll get to see the beginnings of Steve’s career progression. I sure hope it goes well for him.
Netflix have also graced us with an official poster for series three, featuring fireworks again, most of the lead cast and, most prominently, Eleven and Mike holding hands (which they’ve dubbed ‘Mileven’). They grow up so darn fast, don’t they?
As Dustin, Max, and Lucas look at the fireworks exploding over Hawkins, Mike stares lovingly at Eleven.
Eleven and Will, however, are looking back at the camera and – presumably – at the strange pair of alien limbs which seem to be sticking out from underneath it…
What does it all mean?! We’ll have to wait ’til July to find out…
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Charlie Cocksedge is a journalist and sub-editor at UNILAD. He graduated from the University of Manchester with an MA in Creative Writing, where he learnt how to write in the third person, before getting his NCTJ. His work has also appeared in such places as The Guardian, PN Review and the bin.