Netflix makes big change to Stranger Things ahead of Season 5

Netflix has made a big change to Stranger Things ahead of its Season 5 release, and it sets up an interesting expectation for the upcoming season.

Stranger Things has been a huge hit across the world. Since the first season was released in 2016, the show has had spin-offs in books, video games, and even theatre.

Now, the show is gearing up for its final season launching sometime in 2025. It’ll see the cast team up one final time to defeat the forces of evil threatening Hawkins, Indiana.

But ahead of the fifth season, Netflix has made a major change regarding the content of the show.

Take a first look at the upcoming final season for Stranger Things.

As posted by X user @Updates_SThings, an account that provides updates on anything related to Stranger Things, the age rating for the show on Netflix has flipped from TV-14 to TV-MA.

What this essentially means is the content of the show is now regarded as appropriate for mature audiences only, whereas TV-14 means it would be appropriate for teenagers.

This makes sense, considering the show’s level of violence, profanity, and other explicit themes. However, the fact that it’s happening now while filming for the fifth season is still ongoing certainly sets up interesting expectations for the finale.

This isn’t the first time the show has flipped like this, either. As detailed by Stranger Things updates in a follow-up post, the rating also made a similar change just before Season 4 arrived in 2022, going from TV-MA to TV-14 before switching back to the original rating, and back and forth a couple more times.

As a Netflix rep told What’s On Netflix: “Netflix often applies a global rating to an entire show based on its overall content, but the individual episodes may have different ratings depending on the specific content in each episode.”

Either way, this rating flip could be a mistake or it could be a sign that the show is about to get even darker. The violence in Season 4 was upped from the previous three, so it’ll be interesting to see how hard the Duffer Brothers want to go with the show’s closing season.

Stranger Things Season 5 is due to release on Netflix sometime in 2025.