As Ribka Likes It: Growing up and down with ‘Stranger Things’
In her column “As Ribka Likes It,” Ribka Desta ’27 introduces her favorite pieces of media and justifies how and why they have taken up her time and invaded her mind.
I have yet to come across a person more obnoxious than I was in middle school. I wore my nerdiness like a cape (and thankfully, the trend of wearing capes and collars entirely escaped my youth. I envy every person who graduated middle school before the time of cameras and digital footprints.)
I loved loving differently – letting my interests become life-threatening through the intensity of my devotion. There was something deeply real to me in the stories I loved. Something worth spending a lifetime on. Something I felt everyone should be ooh-ing and ahh-ing over.
I believe wholeheartedly that my adolescence and development would have been entirely different had “Stranger Things” not struck me when it did. I watched the first season a few months after it came out, at the beginning of the sixth grade, and became forever obsessed. I browsed for mutuals on Tumblr and Twitter who never got bored discussing our interests. I knew the dangers of making friends online, but I needed companions who wouldn’t leave “Stranger Things”-shaped holes in conversation. Although pursuing my extreme passion for the show and spending so much time engaging with it online was not the best use of my young life, I know that it made me a more creative and perhaps a kinder person, someone who values strangeness in others and dares to greet the unknown in people.
It felt like there was a secret I shared with these strangers online who caught the same plague I did, hunted for details like they were human necessities and spent hours scrolling through theory after theory. It felt like I had all of Narnia to look into and learn from, but only if I strayed further and further from reality and into this portal. I stocked up on edits and posts each night as if they would all disappear come morning.
As a result, I became incredibly unproductive just before and after new seasons of the show were released. In the month before a new season, the 11-year-old Ribka, who knew no self-control (or screen time limitations), would burst to the surface, ready to return to the island of “Stranger Things” after a long time at sea.
When Season 3 released on July 4, 2019, I made the honorable sacrifice of not beginning the season right when it premiered at 3 a.m., instead waiting to watch it in the morning with my brothers. When I had to push for them to keep watching, I was shocked by their protests. After they insisted on taking a break after three episodes, I knew I had to carry on my journey without them. But I was baffled that they were baffled that I would keep watching without them. I only knew loyalty to the show.
Despite taking pride in having mostly niche interests when I was younger, “Stranger Things” was my one exception. I loved finally feeling in tune with everyone else after new releases, when the whole world spoke the same language. But I couldn’t understand how casual fans border-hopped between “the Upside Down” and the real world. I couldn’t make sense of their restraint and eventual detachment.
Season 4, Volume 1 of the show was released during my junior year of high school, the day of my physics final. I knew my priorities. I stayed up until 1 a.m. studying, then woke up at 3 a.m. for the premiere, and got ready for the school day while tuned into the fight for Max Mayfield onscreen.
The second volume of Season 4 was released during my last day at UVA’s Writers’ Workshop. I had learned from my mistakes from the previous volume drop. I skipped the all-nighter goodbye activities to get a good night’s rest to wake up at 3 a.m. and watch the show.
In the ages between Season 4 and Season 5, I would frequently hear and see people talking about how much the “Stranger Things” kids had grown. That felt like it had nothing and everything to do with me. I remember chasing my celebrity crushes in age through the years. Turning 16 after they turned 16. Turning 18 after they had turned 18. Rewatching episodes and commenting on how young they looked. In retrospect, these seasons feel like milestones for me.
In the months preceding the final season’s release in late 2025, I felt many contradictory emotions. It was dramatic, but I was preemptively mourning no longer being able to retreat into new episodes and characters. This was the longest I had ever loved a thing. I had spent the years of Seasons 1-4 learning every possible detail of every scene and character, and I had stored them within me. I wasn’t sure what I was meant to do with that information now.
After investing years in this show — exercising freedom of speech in many, many comment sections, planned Halloween costumes and the thrill of trailer drops and writers’ room teases — it’s shocking how unmoved I was by Season 5. I have nothing good to say about it — perhaps this is the nicest way to phrase the letdown it was.
Still, I don’t think any time spent joyfully is time wasted. I stand by that story — the story that was the show’s original tale of underdogs, passion and the world beyond this one. But now, it’s time to step into the world I am actually in and take in how I’ve grown.
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