Ahead of the triple-date release of Stranger Things season 5 this fall, rumors began to circulate that this season was going to be so big that every single one of its episodes was 90 minutes to 2 hours long, a blockbuster movie per entry.
Well, not quite. While definitely long, Netflix has now released official runtimes for at least the first four episodes of Stranger Things season 5, which will air on November 26. Three more will air December 25, then the season finale on December 31. The first four runtimes are:
- Season 5, Episode 1 “The Crawl” – 1 hour 8 minutes
- Season 5, Episode 2 “The Vanishing of [Redacted] – 54 minutes
- Season 5, Episode 3 “The Turnbow Trap” – 1 hour 6 minutes
- Season 5, Episode 4 “Sorcerer” – 1 hour 23 minutes
Again, not short, but not crazy. I’m not surprised that episode 4 is the longest, given that with these mid-season breaks, Netflix wants to create “mini finales’ to make sure people tune back in a month later.
Right now, this has not broken with series tradition. Earlier episodes may have been shorter, but ones like The Hellfire Club and Dear Billy in season 4 were 77 and 78 minutes long respectively. The longest series episode is the season 4 finale, the almost comical 2 hour and 19 minute The Piggyback.
Even if these first four episodes are shorter than predicted, I have to imagine the final four will see their lengths grow. I’d be stunned if any of the next three were under an hour, and at this point, I’m predicting nothing less than a 2.5 hour series finale. Netflix and The Duffer Brothers want to make this the TV event to end all TV events, and with a reportedly absurd budget of $50-60 million an episode, they better deliver.
Stranger Things season 4 is the sixth most-viewed season in Netflix history, behind Wednesday, Adolescence and three seasons of Squid Games. Netflix will no doubt want to beat its 140 million views, though this decision to break up the show into three parts, and air all three of those parts on holidays demanding hours of attention per day, seems like it could backfire. But we won’t know until it’s out. It’s about a month and a half until these first four episodes are out, so block off about five hours of time to make sure you can get through them before spoilers explode all over the internet.
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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2025/10/15/netflix-stranger-things-season-5-episode-runtimes-contradict-rumors/
