It’s been almost a year since we took in the third season of Netflix’s Stranger Things, and unfortunately, we probably have a ways to go before we can see more. Filming on the fourth season began, but had to stop due to the coronavirus, which puts the show in the same boat as most of the other series and movies on the planet.
According to Stranger Things stunt coordinator Hiro Koda, the crew had actually filmed two episodes (out of eight) before things shut down. And when production does resume, it’s going to be tricky. “It’s really just this pandemic and trying to figure out when productions will be going back. We’re kind of spread out this year,” he told ComicBook.com. “We usually shoot just in Atlanta, but we’ve been spread out in two different places this year. So trying to figure out the scheduling of it.”
"And then, as far as social distancing, we can separate ourselves and work in and out of set in waves, instead of everybody on set at once. That’s easier to control. Everybody can wear masks and gloves and whatever, but the actors can’t, they have to take the masks off. They’ve got to be in close contact…Stunts, all stunts that we do, we’re physically touching each other because we’re fighting, and we’re dealing with the cast and putting them in harnesses and wires and flying them. And stunt people are always together fighting and rolling around. So it’s going to be an interesting thing to try to figure out."
Yeah, those sound like difficult problems I am fortunate I don’t have to solve. That’s why Koda gets paid (I assume) the big bucks.
Still, when the show does come back, Koda promises that it’ll be worth it. “All I can tell you is that season four is… It’s darker. It’s going to be epic,” he said. “There’s lots of great surprises and all your favorite people are in it. It’s going to be so good. It’s so epic. I’ve gotten to read through almost eight scripts now, so it’s pretty awesome. I don’t know how many we’re going to get.”
That reminds us of what Joe Keery (Steve) said about the season a few weeks back, that the new season “is definitely going to be a lot scarier than prior years, because last year was pretty dark.” The bit about filming in different places tracks, too, since we’ve heard that the show will venture outside the sleepy town of Hawkins, Indiana this year.
And of course, so far as the new season including “all your favorite people,” we’ve known for a while that Sheriff Jim Hopper (David Harbour) will be returning. How did he survive the subterranean explosion in season 3? Check back in 2021.
That explosion happened when the gang was probing a Russian research facility deep under the Starcourt Mall. Hopper and crew the place down, but he didn’t make it out alive…or so everyone thought.
“The finale with Hopper and Grigori, I directed the majority of that sequence and that was just a massive fight that the Duffer brothers wanted,” Koda remembered. “It was a beautiful, massive set that we had to start in this small control room and work our way all the way down to the end of the laser gun…Very proud of David and Andre and the stunt doubles, they did an amazing job with that sequence.”
And that was far from the only fight sequence Koda staged in season 3. “The sauna room was a lot of fun and super challenging,” he recalled. “Shawn Levy was directing that episode and he’s very on top of… You have to be really prepared when you’re shooting with him. And everything went as planned. It was challenging because Dacre , who plays Billy, was topless. So flying him around when Eleven’s throwing him around and stuff, we had to create these wild, interesting rigs for him to fly, and his stunt double had to slam into things and stuff like that without a shirt on. That was fun and challenging. Millie’s cabin when the Mindflayer takes her up into the ceiling, that whole sequence was so much fun. The Duffer brothers play this music and they get everybody into it, and it’s a lot of fun.”
And bear in mind, a lot of these intense scenes involve young actors, meaning there are a lot of restrictions on what they can do. “Everybody always wants to do their own stuff,” Koda said. “For example, Millie , there were some times that we flew her on some wires…They can’t be up too high, but they can get into the wires. There’s loads of things.”
"For me, personally, the safety is my number one priority and even though these cast members are completely capable of doing certain things, if there’s something where there’s any chance of an injury or anything like that, they have to have a stunt double for them. All the kids had doubles anyway, just because they’re children. But it’s important that they don’t get hurt because if our cast member gets hurt, then we get shut down. If a stunt member gets hurt, then it’s not going to shut the show down."
Okay, now just keep all that in mind while also protecting everyone on set from the coronavirus. Easy-peasy.
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