It’s been just shy of three years since Stranger Things season 3 debuted on Netflix, and fans have clearly been eagerly waiting for the sci-fi series to return. To that end, the show’s fourth season has set a brand new record for the streaming service in terms of viewership, unseating Bridgerton season 2 as the most-watched English-language premiere in Netflix history.
According to Netflix’s official top 10 website, Stranger Things season 4 was viewed a staggering 286,790,000 hours for the week of May 23 to May 29. That absolutely dwarfs the next closest series, The Lincoln Lawyer, which logged 64,820,000 hours. For the sake of comparison, Bridgerton season 2 notched 193,000,0000 hours in its first weekend back in March. As we can see, it wasn’t even close, indicating that the Duffer Brothers’ show hasn’t lost any love in the three years it has been away. Having a horror legend like Robert Englund on board certainly didn’t hurt anything, we’d wager.
Another interesting thing to note is that both Stranger Things seasons 2 and 3 crawled back into the top 10 this week as well, with the seasons logging 22,2010,000 and 24,290,000 hours of viewership, respectively. One thing worth noting though, is that the episode lengths for the new season are much longer than usual, with the shortest episode clocking in at 63 minutes. The upcoming finale, which will drop in July, is longer than most movies, coming in just shy of two and half hours. Undoubtedly, this has helped push the show to record highs.
Now, to what degree those longer episode lengths can be justified is a matter to be decided by the individual viewer. What we know for sure is that Stranger Things is one of the most valuable shows Netflix has in its stable and, given the rough year the streaming service has had, losing around 60% of its value when compared to its all-time high, the win is sorely needed. While the show is set to end with its fifth season, Matt and Ross Duffer recently revealed that they already have an idea for a very different spin-off kicking around. So there’s that.
Stranger Things season 4, volume 1 is streaming now on Netflix. Volume 2 is currently set to debut on July 1.
