{"id":490850,"date":"2026-01-04T03:11:22","date_gmt":"2026-01-04T03:11:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/490850\/"},"modified":"2026-01-04T03:11:22","modified_gmt":"2026-01-04T03:11:22","slug":"the-one-stranger-things-character-who-had-a-totally-satisfying-arc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/490850\/","title":{"rendered":"The One Stranger Things Character Who Had A Totally Satisfying Arc"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBy Robert Scucci<\/a>
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t | Published 16 seconds ago\t\t<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Now that we know that Dustin Henderson graduated at the top of his class, it\u2019s safe to say that he\u2019s the smartest kid in the room. Watching him get his flowers in the Stranger Things series finale was one of the most satisfying story arcs in the series because if anybody deserved peace and happiness, it\u2019s our little Dusty Bun.<\/p>\n

While I\u2019m not alone in railing on Stranger Things for undermining its own appeal with its final season, I\u2019m thrilled that we got to see Dustin grow through his struggles and become a fully self-actualized young adult in the process.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I know that all of us here over at Giant Freakin Robot have been hyper-critical of Stranger Things season 5, but it\u2019s for good reason. As fans who have been following the series for a decade, we felt let down because nearly every single memorable character became a one-dimensional shell of their former selves.<\/p>\n

Mike Wheeler\u2019s presence was sleep-inducing. Max<\/a> and Holly loved explaining things when they should have been running for their lives. Joyce was written dumb. Hopper became little more than a concerned parent who knows how to use automatic weapons. I could go on for days.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

My main takeaway after Season 5 kicked off was that it felt like everybody involved with the series fell out of their flow state<\/a>. Nearly every actor failed to lock back into their characters and fire on all cylinders because too much time had passed between runs. It\u2019s nobody\u2019s fault. That\u2019s how time works. However, it\u2019s still worth noting because the fallout is obvious to anyone who watches TV and movies critically.<\/p>\n

It never felt like Gaten Matarazzo stopped thinking about Dustin, though, and it shows on screen, making his character arc by far the most satisfying in the series.<\/p>\n

Stranger Things\u2019 True Reason To Be<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Stranger<\/p>\n

We can talk ad nauseam about what Stranger Things is truly about, but to me it was always about the loss of innocence. The small town of Hawkins and all of its residents were changed forever when the Upside Down opened up, something that everybody not in the know considered a curse of the highest order.<\/p>\n

The sentiment that always echoed in my brain is that once you leave home, you can never go back. Nobody ever left home in the literal sense in Stranger Things, but their community<\/a> was altered in such a severe way that it told everybody there was no turning back.<\/p>\n

As a coming-of-age vehicle about child outcasts who end up saving the day with their Dungeons & Dragons knowledge and love for science, Dustin, in my mind, is the character who lost the most innocence. We could argue that case for Eleven and Will Byers as well, but let\u2019s really break it down for a second.<\/p>\n

\"Stranger<\/p>\n

Eleven has always been a prisoner of institutional malfeasance. Her entire character is based on impropriety, which robbed her of her childhood. In other words, Eleven never had innocence to lose, but rather innocence she longed to gain because she never had a place to truly call home.<\/p>\n

Will Byers, who went missing in Season 1, was also robbed of his childhood, but we all knew that already. He unwittingly and unwillingly became a vessel and spy for Vecna, setting the entire series\u2019 conflict in motion from day one. However, he\u2019s dealing with a cosmic terror that the average person doesn\u2019t ever encounter, making him a sample size of one.<\/p>\n

\"Stranger<\/p>\n

Everybody else in Stranger Things, the humans living in the regular world who have to witness the fallout, have their own raised stakes. I\u2019m not trying to downplay anybody else\u2019s struggles here. Everyone has been traumatized and robbed of their innocence in one way or another. Dustin sits at the center, though, as he\u2019s the smartest kid in Hawkins, more often than not the voice of reason, and not afraid to tell it like it is, even if he\u2019s going to face pushback every step of the way.<\/p>\n

Dustin\u2019s Grief Is Palpable, And Gaten Matarazzo Knows It<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Stranger Things Season 5 kicks off with an angsty Dustin. Taking place two years after the events of Season 4, Dustin is seemingly single (not a Suzie in sight) and a shell of his former self. He\u2019s relentlessly bullied, and he keeps his head down.<\/p>\n

He wears his Hellfire shirt with pride because he saw his best friend and role model, Eddie Munson, die a heroic and absolutely brutal death. He never got over that trauma, and internalized that grief. Everybody else witnessed the same thing, but Dustin, whose father is absent in the series, has always gravitated toward an older male role model to keep himself centered. He does it with Steve Harrington, and he did it with Eddie. He lost more than a friend in Eddie. He lost a father figure.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Stranger<\/p>\n

The second Steve risks his life trying to save Nancy and Jonathan by haphazardly propping a ladder up against a sinkhole of white sludge, we witness the climax of Dustin\u2019s character arc. When he breaks down crying, embraces Steve, and says, \u201cPlease, I can\u2019t do it again. Not you,\u201d it\u2019s one of the most heartfelt moments in the entire series, and it doesn\u2019t feel forced.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dustin finally, without a filter, bellows out what\u2019s been eating away at him all this time. We all knew it as viewers, but hearing him explicitly say what was wrong felt cathartic. Steve, who\u2019s emotionally intelligent in his own right but blinded by everything else going on around him, finally has that moment of clarity when the ladder falls, implying that if he hadn\u2019t listened to Dustin, he\u2019d be dead too. We bore witness to a broken teenager coming to terms with his tremendous loss in a tangible way that the rest of the gang could finally understand and make peace with.<\/p>\n

\"Stranger<\/p>\n

Honoring Eddie In The Best Way<\/strong><\/p>\n

When it\u2019s revealed that Dustin is valedictorian of his class, we all knew what was coming, but it felt earned. He honored Eddie Munson\u2019s fantasy of flipping off Principal Higgins, snatching his diploma, and running like hell to escape high school.<\/p>\n

Proudly yelling, \u201cScrew the school. Screw the system. Screw conformity. Screw everyone and everything trying to hold you back and tear us apart, because this, this is our year,\u201d Dustin\u2019s story closes in the best way possible.<\/p>\n

\"Stranger<\/p>\n

It only gets better when Iron Maiden\u2019s \u201cThe Trooper\u201d blasts over the loudspeakers as a final tribute to Eddie. For those who aren\u2019t into power metal, Iron Maiden\u2019s mascot is a giant skeleton named Eddie, which felt on the nose, but not in a way that felt cheap.<\/p>\n

As much as I loved railing on Stranger Things Season 5, it felt like the right time to talk about one of the stronger notes the series ended on. It all comes down to ole Dusty Bun making it through to the other side as a fully realized version of himself.<\/p>\n

\"Stranger<\/p>\n

We all know he\u2019s going to do great things. The sheer intestinal fortitude he built up throughout the entire series will make him unstoppable no matter what happens next.<\/p>\n

Stranger Things<\/a> is streaming on Netflix.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Robert Scucci | Published 16 seconds ago Now that we know that Dustin Henderson graduated at the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":490851,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[192220,171,2193,221305,4659,205996,5622,38947,35496,221306,173,63485,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-490850","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-duffer-brothers","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-entertainment-news","11":"tag-gaten-matarazzo","12":"tag-netflix","13":"tag-netflix-originals","14":"tag-opinions","15":"tag-sci-fi","16":"tag-stranger-things","17":"tag-stranger-things-season-5","18":"tag-tv","19":"tag-tv-news","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115834643767360623","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=490850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490850\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/490851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=490850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=490850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=490850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}