REVIEW: ‘Stranger Things: Tales From ’85’ Is Entertaining But...!
Netflix's first animated spinoff from the beloved Stranger Things universe arrives today, April 23, 2026, and it is unlike anything the franchise has done before.
Stranger Things: Tales From '85 Review | Hawkins Is Back, Animated, and Ready to Haunt You Again
Netflix | Animated Series | Rated TV-PG | 10 Episodes | Premieres April 23, 2026 | Created by Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer | Showrunner: Eric Robles
The Upside Down Never Really Left
Picture this: it's the dead of winter, 1985. Snow blankets Hawkins, Indiana. Somewhere under that quiet, frozen town, something is stirring again. The portal to the Upside Down may have been sealed, but in Hawkins, nothing ever stays shut for long.
That's the world Stranger Things: Tales From '85 drops you back into. And honestly? It feels like slipping on a worn-in flannel jacket you forgot you owned. Familiar. Warm. With just enough dread stitched into the lining to remind you that this town will never truly be safe.
Netflix's first animated spinoff from the beloved Stranger Things universe arrives today, April 23, 2026, and it is unlike anything the franchise has done before, while somehow feeling exactly like the show you fell in love with back in 2016.
What Is Tales From '85, and Why Does It Matter?
If you've been living under a rock (or deep in the Upside Down), here's the setup. Stranger Things: Tales From '85 is an animated spinoff set between the events of Season 2 and Season 3 of the original series. That means it takes place after the Mind Flayer's terrifying invasion of Hawkins but before the chaos of the Starcourt Mall disaster. It's a gap in the timeline that fans always wondered about, and now we finally get to see what happened during those in-between months.
Eleven, Mike, Will, Lucas, Dustin, and Max are all back. Jim Hopper and Steve Harrington are here too. The gang is intact, the friendship dynamics are alive and crackling, and Hawkins National Laboratory looms in the background like it always does, a constant and ominous reminder that the weird is never truly over.
But this time, a whole new breed of threat has crept into town. Think Upside Down pumpkin zombies. Vine-like creatures that creep through the shadows. New monsters that the live-action show never had the canvas to fully unleash. Animation, it turns out, has set the Upside Down free in ways the original could never quite manage.
The Duffer Brothers, Shawn Levy, and a New Vision for Hawkins
Matt and Ross Duffer, the masterminds behind the original Stranger Things, serve as executive producers here alongside Shawn Levy and Dan Cohen of 21 Laps Entertainment, Hilary Leavitt of Upside Down Pictures, and showrunner Eric Robles, who co-runs the series with Flying Bark Productions in Sydney. The animation studio brings with it the pedigree of some of modern animation's most acclaimed work, and it shows in every frame.
Eric Robles came to this project with a very specific vision: Saturday morning cartoons.
Think He-Man and the Masters of the Universe. Think Scooby-Doo. Think The Real Ghostbusters, which Robles has openly called his north star.
But he also studied the modern animated greats, like Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and Arcane, absorbing their kinetic visual language and their willingness to treat animation as a serious, emotionally rich storytelling medium.
The result is something that feels retro and cutting-edge at the same time. The visual style draws from the iconic illustrated poster art of the original Stranger Things, with bold lines, vivid colors, and expressionist character designs. It's brighter than the live-action show, more vibrant, almost playful. But underneath all that color, the horror is still there. The dread is still there. The Upside Down remains deeply, genuinely unsettling.
New Voices, Same Souls
One of the biggest questions hanging over this series was the voice cast. None of the original actors, including Millie Bobby Brown, Finn Wolfhard, Gaten Matarazzo, Caleb McLaughlin, Sadie Sink, David Harbour, or Joe Keery, return for this spinoff. That's a bold call and one that initially raised eyebrows across the fandom.
But Robles made a deliberate and artistically sound choice: he wanted kids voicing kids. Real young performers, not adults doing impressions of famous faces. The result is a cast that feels completely natural, full of the kind of unaffected energy you simply cannot fake.
Brooklyn Davey Norstedt voices Eleven. Jolie Hoang-Rappaport is Max. Luca Diaz is Mike. Elisha Williams is Lucas. Benjamin Plessala is Will. Braxton Quinney is Dustin. Brett Gipson brings Hopper to life, and Jeremy Jordan steps into Steve Harrington's shoes. Janeane Garofalo and Lou Diamond Phillips round out the adult cast in roles that add both comedy and genuine weight to the proceedings.
And then there's Nikki Baxter, a brand-new character and a genuine highlight of the series. Described as a tinker with pinkish hair cropped short on the sides, Nikki is taller than the core group and brings an outsider's fresh eyes to everything the gang takes for granted. She sees Will's history with the Upside Down not as a source of trauma or embarrassment but as something extraordinary. Something cool. She is, in many ways, the audience surrogate, someone discovering this world for the first time and finding it as thrilling as we all did back in Season 1.
The Story: Something Is Brewing in Hawkins. Again.
Without giving too much away, because half the joy of Stranger Things has always been the slow and creeping revelation, Tales From '85 opens on a Hawkins that is trying very hard to be normal. The kids are navigating the social minefield of being twelve and thirteen. Friendships are shifting. Romantic feelings are getting complicated. Life, as much as it ever can in Hawkins, is moving forward.
And then something starts to go wrong.
The Upside Down's influence begins seeping back into town in strange new ways. Familiar locations, including Hawkins National Laboratory, become flashpoints for paranormal activity. New creatures emerge, unlike anything the gang has faced before. And our heroes, who have already saved the world once and would very much prefer not to do it again, are pulled back into the fight.
The ten-episode season drops all at once on Netflix, a full binge of roughly four hours and sixteen minutes across its complete runtime. It is designed to be watched in one obsessive weekend sitting, and it absolutely earns that commitment.
Why Non-Fans Should Watch This First
Here is the sleeper argument for Tales From '85: it might actually be the perfect entry point into the Stranger Things universe for newcomers.
Netflix and the creative team have explicitly positioned this as entry-level Stranger Things. The animated format strips away some of the darker and more intense elements of the live-action show, making it accessible without sacrificing what made the original great: the friendship, the heart, the genuine terror of the unknown, and the very specific magic of being young and facing something impossibly large alongside the people you trust most.
You don't need five seasons of backstory to feel the pull of Eleven and her friends. You don't need to have watched the show to understand what it means to be an outsider in a town that doesn't believe you. Tales From '85 tells a complete, standalone story, one that will send you straight to the original series the moment the credits roll on that final episode.
The Bottom Line
Stranger Things: Tales From '85 is not a replacement for the live-action show, and it doesn't try to be. It is something different and genuinely exciting: an expansion of a world that millions of people have loved deeply, rendered in a bold visual style that honors both the franchise's nostalgic soul and the extraordinary possibilities that animation uniquely unlocks.
Is it flashy? Absolutely. Is it nostalgic? Deeply. Does it capture the heart of what made Stranger Things special, the kids, the friendship, the monsters, the small-town paranoia, the overwhelming feeling that the universe is much stranger and more dangerous than any of us suspect? Yes. Enthusiastically yes.
Hawkins is back. And it has never looked quite like this before.
Quick Facts
Stranger Things: Tales From '85 is streaming now on Netflix with all 10 episodes available simultaneously.
Executive Producers: Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer, Shawn Levy, Dan Cohen, Hilary Leavitt, Eric Robles
Showrunner: Eric Robles
Animation Studio: Flying Bark Productions, Sydney
Voice Cast: Brooklyn Davey Norstedt as Eleven, Jolie Hoang-Rappaport as Max, Luca Diaz as Mike, Elisha Williams as Lucas, Braxton Quinney as Dustin, Benjamin Plessala as Will, Brett Gipson as Hopper, Jeremy Jordan as Steve Harrington, Odessa A'zion, Janeane Garofalo, Lou Diamond Phillips
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