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Stranger Things Season 5 Will Have Shorter Runtime Than Season 4


The fourth season of Stranger Things is easily its longest season to date as all episodes spanned for at least more than an hour each while the season finale clocked at a feature film-type length of 2 hours and 20 minutes. In total, the season had a massive runtime of around 13 hours. Now, the question is whether the fifth season will also have a similar runtime? As it turns out, that might not be the case at all.

Speaking recently with Collider, the Duffer Brothers revealed that the fifth and final season of Stranger Things will not be as long as the fourth season since they are planning for it to have a shorter runtime. However, it is still going to be longer than the earlier seasons.

"We thought Season 4 was going to be eight [episodes], and they were going to be regular length. So if you had interviewed us before four, that's what I would've said," Matt Duffer explained. "I think we're aiming for eight again. We don't want it to be 13 hours. We're aiming for more like 10 hours or something. I think it's going to be longer than Season 1 because we just have so much to wrap up, but I don't think it's going to be as long as Season 4."

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Ross Duffer added, "This season, for instance, it was two hours before our characters even realized the monster was killing people in Hawkins. They know what the threat is now, and so that will help speed it up."

It is surprising to hear that the fifth and final season will have a shorter runtime since it will be the last one and a final season always tend to spend much more time with its story than the previous seasons (with the notable exception of Game of Thrones which only had 6 episodes on its final run).

However, in the end, the runtime is irrelevant and the most important part is the story itself. The length will depend on the pacing or the structure that they're planning on the series' final run. As Ross noted, the characters are now aware of the threat so they don't need to do a lot of exposition regarding it.

Whether the season will be longer or shorter, we definitely can't wait to see what they have in store for its last hurrah and how they will end the story. One thing's for sure is that it's going to be an epic conclusion.

Also Read: Stranger Things 4 Writers Reveal Moments in Volume 2 That The Actors Improvised

The entire fourth season of Stranger Things is available to stream on Netflix. There is no release window set yet for the fifth season.

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