Stranger Things 3: David Harbour teases a horrifying but “lighter” season

Chief Hopper will be growing in different directions than we have seen the character before, teases actor David Harbour in a recent interview.

David Harbour has been making the promotional rounds recently in anticipation of his upcoming Hellboy film. For Stranger Things fans, the timing for this could not be better since we recently got our first look at Stranger Things 3 of the hit series and hype is at an all-time high for the show meaning that Harbour is getting bombarded with questions.

While the actor obviously can’t say too much about the new season, in a recent interview with ET Canada Harbour did give some choice tidbits. Harbour said about the new season:

"“It has all the dark stuff that we’re, kinda known for, all the horror, all the scares. But it’s also a lighter season.”"

This is interesting given that Harbour said this after talking about what we already know, that the new season will be set in the summer of ’85 and the summer aspect of it will be an important part of the new episodes.

The lighter tone is certainly something that has been captured by what we know so far for season three. The outfits are more colorful, the settings such as the fair and mall are more colorful, and more of it is set in the daytime, or so it appears. It remains to be seen to what extent this lightness extends to but expect to see more jokes and brevity with the new season alongside your scares and giant monsters.

Harbour also gave some insight into the state of his adopted daughter Eleven going into the new season:

"“He’s dealing with a daughter who’s starting to become a teenager right and who’s starting to have hormonal changes and is starting to like boys.”"

This is something else that was very much captured in that first trailer, the idea that our main cast of characters are no longer kids but are growing up into teenagers. Obviously, that is a huge change for these characters since it means, as Harbour teased, that attraction and love will probably play a bigger role in the new season for these characters.

This theme of growing up also applies to the characters that revolve around these teenagers as it means they will have to deal with these changes as well. For Chief Hopper, one can only imagine how difficult that would be for him and how he will have to change to accommodate those differences:

"“We see him stretch as a man, in terms of all that as well, in terms of letting go more, which has always been his issue with too much control over someone he loves.”"

This is interesting because the Hopper that we know is someone who is used to being in control and as he says in the new trailer he still wants to protect the city and its inhabitants. Perhaps the theme of letting go of control for Hopper will extend past his daughter to the whole town of Hawkins.

Whatever does end up happening with Chief Hopper will be interesting none the less and we will keep you updated on all Stranger Things news right here!