SPOILER ALERT: This article contains SPOILERS for ‘Stranger Things 3’, so if you haven’t finished watching it, proceed with caution or turn back now.
The cast has already disclosed that there was a lot more action in ‘Stranger Things 3’ and that many cast members were called upon to perform more stuntwork than they had before. But that wasn’t an issue for Joe Keery, who plays high school jerk-turned-good guy Steve Harrington.
Regarding the stunts, Keery exclaimed:
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“I really love that stuff. It’s a challenge, and it’s a different skill set, but there’s something about it that for me is really immersive. If you’re doing that stuff, it’s really easy to forget that you’re acting on the show. You just forget that you’re on set acting. It just feels very real. All those sequences in [episodes] five and six, I thoroughly enjoyed.”
Ironically, it was in the more inactive scenes that proved more physically challenging– specifically, those in which Steve and newcomer Robin (Maya Hawke) are tied up, back-to-back.
“You don’t think about every time you have to reset or everybody’s like, “Let’s take a five-minute break.” And it takes you five minutes to get untied. So you’re just like, “Let’s just stay tied together for six hours.” That actually proved to be one of the more difficult sequences, much more than any of the stunt choreography. Tied together was like kind of tiring.”
But one quieter scene allowed Keery to stretch as an actor, and that was the bathroom confessional between Steve and Robin, who are both coming down from the effects of truth serum. Steve admits that he has developed feelings for Robin, but she reveals that she cannot reciprocate those feelings as she is a lesbian.
As Keery states:
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“That scene might be one of my favorites of the entire season to shoot, just because they handled shooting it with such tenderness. The whole flip in the scene is that I’m making this confessional, and I’m shedding the skin for Robin and bearing my heart on my sleeve. And then she does the same for me. And to see it handled with such acceptance on both parts, it’s just a real beautiful friendship moment and definitely a growing moment for my character because it’s continuing on the path of learning to be a little bit less of a narcissist. He started out as such a selfish guy. Slowly and surely it seems like he’s growing up and yeah, learning to put other people before himself.”
Episode 8 ends on a bit of a down note, and it isn’t clear if there will be a fourth season. But if you tuned out early, there was a post-credits scene which would seemingly indicate that there MUST be a fourth.
Hopefully, that will lead to more development for Steve, including his friendships with Robin, Dustin, and the rest.
Do you have a favorite Steve moment from ‘Stranger Things 3’?
Jax's earliest memory is of watching 'Batman,' followed shortly by a memory of playing Batman & Robin with a friend, which entailed running outside in just their underwear and towels as capes. When adults told them they couldn't run around outside in their underwear, both boys promptly whipped theirs off and ran around in just capes.
