Stranger Things Season 5 Will Have Shorter Episodes, But a Longer Finale

The Duffer Brothers anticipate Stranger Things Season 5 will have shorter episodes, but a longer finale, they said on Josh Horowitz's "Happy Sad Confused" podcast.

Most episodes in Season 4 ran for about 80-90 minutes, with the season finale approaching two and a half hours. On the podcast, the Duffer Brothers explained the reason for the long run times and why Season 5 won't be the same.

"The only reason we don't expect [Season 5] to be as long is because typically — or this season, if you look at it, it's almost a two-hour ramp up before our kids really get drawn into a supernatural mystery," said Matt Duffer. "You get to know them, you get to see them in their lives, they're struggling with adapting to high school and so forth. Steve's trying to find a date, all of that."

He added, "None of that is obviously going to be occurring in the first two episodes. For the first time ever, we don't wrap things up at the end of four."

In terms of the pacing for Season 5, Matt Duffer said, "It's going to be moving fast."

"Characters are already going to be in action, they're already going to have a goal and a drive, and I think that's going to carve out at least a couple hours and make this season feel really different," he continued.

However, the finale episode is likely to still be movie-length.

"I'm sure the wrap-up will be a lot longer," said Matt Duffer. "It's going to be Return of the King-ish with, like, eight endings."

All episodes of Stranger Things Season 4 are streaming on Netflix.

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Deena ElGenaidi's writing has been featured in Nylon, MTV News, Insider, The AV Club, and more. You can follow her on Twitter @deenaelg.