Media Technology Evolution in Stranger Things
Part 1: Season 1
I have discussed before how much I think the show is playing with themes of like mind control, memories, altered states of mind/consciousness rather than something like characters actually moving around between timelines, alternate realities, time loops, etc.
For the sake of my own sanity, I will assume that the majority of the main characters are real people at least in their universe, and that Hawkins is a real place within the show’s universe.
I do think that this show will eventually be such a great metaphor for the entertainment industry/ Hollywood when all of this is said and done too!! But I don’t think it’s like literally Hollywood.
So with that being said, we know that:
(1) Hawkins National Laboratory has its hands in LOTS of the goings on in Hawkins, they have eyes everywhere
(2) Brenner is associated with MKUltra, which the conspiracy theory involved drugging test subjects, possibly the general public, and even people working on the project.
(3) VHS tapes and other physical media ARE important, at least in Seasons 1&2.
I think the shift between Seasons 1&2 and Seasons 3-5 represent the transition from analog technology (using signals that have continuous values, like waves) to digital technology (using signals that are binary, on and off, 0 and 1).
I am using scientific/technological concepts to analyze an artistic medium, so I may get stuff wrong…
This doesn’t happen all at once, and often times academics, military, and government get advanced access to these developments. A lot of the technology we use on a day to day basis started out being used for military or government purposes, then became consumer technology.
For instance, magnetic tapes were being used in Hollywood for professional purposes in the 1950s (expensive, time consuming). These did not become available for the average person until the 70s, and probably even later in small town America.
Side note: I think Brenner literally got the name for his father from the actors in the dark of the moon LOL (Richard Hart was the Witch Boy, and Carol Stone played Barbara Allen).
Technology and science are weird because we think of them as like stepping stones from the like telegram, to the rotary, to the wall phone, to the wireless phone, to the mobile phone, to the modern cell phone, and then to all the variations of the cell phone. So we kind of have a binary way of thinking about them, but really is is also moving like a wave.
This is all to say, I will be talking in generalities…
I’m not going to be able to explain this all very well right now 😭 but I just need to get my thoughts out there.
The Upside Down in Season 1 is primarily acting like a magnet/magnetic field. For the purposes of this explanation, a magnetic field needs an electric field. We can see this as the Upside Down is affecting the lights and electricity. It feels like a which came first the chicken or the egg situation. But for the purposes of analyzing this show through the lens of media and technology, I will be pretending that it is acting like a magnet originally. As the magnet looks for charged particles, and the charged particles look for the magnet.
We are shown El using her powers which are very early on connected to electricity. So, we have situations where the electric meets the magnetic, and the magnetic meets the electric. Even the egg scene is so interesting because it’s very much from Alien, and so even that is kinda like based off something that already existed UGH
On their own, tapes do just look black to us, like El’s void. What’s interesting as fuck to me, is that El’s void has water in it and she ‘connects’ with the Upside Down in the tank.
Because well, water is very bad for magnetic tapes! They can get moldy, which affects the footage. But you can clean it, and restore some of the footage. Reminds me of how the Upside Down seems to clean up a little as the seasons progress.
“At this stage the mold must be fully cleaned before any playback attempt, or the spores will spread onto the video heads”
The video head is what reads the tapes and converts the magnetic signals on the tapes into the video and audio signals. Video heads (please look them up, I’m running out of photo space!) look a lot like the giant cylindrical tubs El gets into.
So, we have El (lol electricity) going into a void (tape) that has water in it (water damage). When she physically interacts with what she sees in the void, it creates a reproduction of Hawkins that is deteriorating. Like tapes do.
This one is funny to me because Will is literally in a shed when he is taken into the Upside Down! We hear the demogorgons making squealing and squelching noises! And then, when Hopper is investigating his disappearance, he finds the gross sticky residue from the demogorgon.
And the magnetic oxide shedding just reminds me of the Upside Down floating white particles!
All of these damages to the magnetic tape itself can result in magnetic dropout, which are those little lines we are seeing across the frames of the VHS edition of the show.
With any VHS, we have the supply-reel and the take-up reel. The supply-reel has the magnetic tape that has no signals encoded on it yet, as it records in audio/visual/audiovisual signals it will go to the take-up reel.
Once the tape is recorded, it doesn’t go away, unless you use magnets. GRRRRRR SO CONFUSING! So, the mere presence of the Upside Down in a way is erasing the existence of Hawkins. Because the Upside Down is also acting like a magnet too… but the Upside Down also was first accessed through the lab the lab is then by this standard the other half of the magnet so which is why it’s important that it is like changing where North is. Because the lab becomes North! So like by creating a new magnetic field within Hawkins, it is kind of also erasing Hawkins!?
Again, this probably isn’t making much sense, but nearly all technology works through the electromagnetic spectrum so it’s necessary but there’s so many levels. I’m trying to figure out the best analogies. Grrr and also, if you split apart a magnet, it’s not like you’ll just oh you have a positive or negative magnetic charge no it still is 2 💆🏼♀️💆🏼♀️ my brain is fucking melting
Now we don’t have the Shadow Monster yet (#nottheMindFlayer). I think this is because it kind of comes into existence after the Upside Down… like nearly simultaneously… but I see the Shadow Monster almost as the remnants of the tapes that the Upside Down is erasing…? The magnetic particles that are degrading and getting lost to time? The Shadow Monster itself doesn’t have the magnetic field, but it looks like the magnetic field lines of a magnet. But then, also the wormhole of Season 5 looks kinda like the magnetic field lines of a solenoid.
Anywho, magnetic field lines just are like the roots that charged particles are likely to take in relation to the poles of a magnet.
I’m imagining it like each new gate that opens, creates a new magnetic north and a new magnetic south, which obviously makes things complicated. But like also, the more magnetic and electric interactions you have the more shit you can do with electricity????? I guess idk
Trying to understand this and then apply it to a show is so hard but it also feels on the money in a way?
So to me, the first gate that opens in Hawkins (that we are shown explicitly in the show, I’m sure they’ve already been opened across time and space) is in the lab. The lab is always doing shady shit. Covering shit up, erasing shit. Then we get the Shadow Monster. It’s like, I almost feel like the Shadow Monster is the shadow of the lab’s impact on Hawkins rather than an evil entity by itself.
I hope this makes more sense eventually
