Stranger Things 2 hailed as an 'exciting' and 'engaging' follow-up in first reviews 

Thankfully, Netflix’s follow-up to last summer’s breakout hit doesn’t suffer from a sophomore slump, according to the first reviews. The new season, all nine episodes of which will be available to stream Friday, is being described by critics as “exciting,” “engaging,” and “satisfying.”

‘s Alan Sepinwall wrote, “Not all sequels live up to the original; this one does better than I ever would have imagined. The show itself couldn’t possibly sneak up on me a second time; how entertaining it continues to be absolutely did.”

“The first season’s epilogue left me with no interest in returning to this world, yet I had an enormous smile on my face for a lot of the new episodes, and particularly the last two, which turn out to be a tighter and more exciting climax than we got last time around.”

 is quite good and, if your expectations are in check, largely satisfying. The Duffer brothers fall into very few traps of self-importance or self-awareness, and they deliver a second season with an expanded assortment of ’80s influences, an expanded cast of instantly embraceable characters and some expanded 

 mythology without the bloat that inevitably dooms sequels.”

“There are missteps in the second season, many of them revolving around thin or unfortunate writing for some of the new characters. But once you get past the clunky first few installments — which largely restate much of what occurred last season and set up plot points that were easily inferred from the trailers — the drama’s momentum picks up noticeably. As fine as the show’s justly lauded young cast is, the adult actors — especially Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Natalia Dyer, Charlie Heaton and Joe Keery — anchor every psychological nuance with subtle skill and ease.”

“It’s a more intimate, exciting and character-driven story, but is occasionally hampered by its bloated length and by hewing too closely to the structure of the first chapter.”

 is not reinventing television, but it does once again provide a highly entertaining, extremely bingeable, and even surprisingly heartwarming viewing experience.”

, in that it’s a highly anticipated follow-up where the stakes are higher for a band of unlikely heroes. But 

 because just as Luke Skywalker spent much of that sequel on his own journey, so does Eleven here — which is perhaps the otherwise engaging sophomore season’s only shortcoming.”

The new season is darker – it’s a genuine horror show – but it still has that same emotional power and a mundanely empathetic sense of grief and loss.

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